Review Marketing – aka How to Leverage Your Reviews
Erica YlimakiLast edited: November 20th, 2024
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Positive reviews are great because modern consumers trust online reviews.
In addition, reviews are proven to:
- Boost your search engine optimization results
- Improve your online reputation and
- Add a touch of credibility to your digital marketing strategy
- Reduce bounce rate when placed on your website
Let’s dig into what review marketing is and how you can create a successful review marketing strategy for your business.
What Is Review Marketing?
Before we dive into defining review marketing, let’s recap what online reviews are.
Online Reviews in a Nutshell
Essentially, online reviews are a form of social proof. They provide potential new customers with a snapshot of your online reputation.
Reviews can range from having star ratings on popular review sites (such as Google) to people doing unboxing content of your product on social media.
In short, online reviews showcase real customer experiences of people that have already bought something from you.
Nowadays, having positive reviews is essential for any business to get new customers because people trust them more than they trust recommendations. Before anyone buys from you, they want to validate what kind of customer experience you provide.
This is where review marketing comes into play.
Review Marketing – 101
Review marketing means that you’re
- Actively trying to generate more customer reviews from your existing customers &
- You implement reviews in your marketing strategy.
In other words, having an efficient review marketing strategy requires that you look for ways to get up-to-date online reviews instead of just waiting for people to give you positive or negative reviews on review platforms.
Benefits of Review Marketing
In case you still aren’t convinced that customer reviews are a thing to focus on, here are some benefits:
1. Get Customer Feedback
A business that focuses on being customer-centric is more likely to succeed than its competitors.
In order to become customer-focused, you need to create a customer feedback collection strategy. Keep in mind that when you get negative feedback, it can be used to further improve your business.
2. Chance to Respond to Negative Reviews
Nothing’s worse than going to google, typing in your business name, and finding threads of people criticizing your business.
Responding to negative reviews gives you the opportunity to turn the tone of the conversation from negative to constructive.
If you receive bad reviews online, respond to them within 48 hours. It shows you’re eager to fix the issues and provide actual value to your customers.
And don’t forget to reply to positive reviews as well!
3. Turn Customer Reviews into Revenue
Once you have customer reviews, it’s time you put them to use. That means
- Posting them on social media,
- Embedding them to website
- Using them in all communication (email, newsletters,…)
- Adding them to sales presentations
- Including a few reviews in offers
Creating revenue with online reviews is crucial for Shopify store owners and other eCommerce operators.
Real-life Example of Using Reviews for Growth
Veruska Anconitano is a pro in multilingual SEO and also works as international expansion consultant. She’s also the Founder of InclusivitEasy which aims to shape a more inclusive future with an AI-drive language checker.
Here’s Anconitano’s take on how she has used reviews to help create growth on a global scale.
– In the past, I worked as a consultant for a major U.S. e-commerce company with the goal of driving its expansion beyond the United States. I leveraged customer reviews—both those available online and those shared directly with the customer service team—in multiple languages other than English to create localized content, including landing pages. I focused on the most reviewed or frequently complained-about products, as well as the most common questions related to orders, shipping, and general customer service, to create targeted pages addressing customer needs and concerns.
This strategy had two significant effects: it eased the workload for the customer service team by providing clear answers directly on the website, significantly reducing the volume of inquiries, and it generated substantial traffic by offering relevant, multilingual resources that effectively engaged international audiences. By addressing both user pain points and business needs, this approach improved customer satisfaction, increased conversions, and laid a foundation for sustainable growth globally.
Here’s the original comment from LinkedIn.
5 Ways to Do Effective Review Marketing
Now that you know why your digital marketing needs a lot of reviews to be successful, let’s dive into 5 specific strategies to try.
First up…
1. Gather more Reviews – Constantly
Unfortunately, many companies can’t use online reviews, because they don’t have any.
It’s hard to create engaging social media posts riddled with online reviews if you only have a handful of them – and they date back to 2017.
Data shows that in 2021, 81% of consumers only took into account reviews that were left 6 months prior. That means that the individual positive reviews from even a year ago, no matter how good they are, are relevant.
They do play a part in your overall star rating, but not as individual reviews.
Because consumers so heavily trust online reviews while making their purchase decisions, you must ensure that you have a constant cycle of new reviews coming in.
Simple Tricks to Get More Reviews:
- Ask all customers to rate you on different platforms with a direct review link
- Automate review collection: ask after each interaction
- Include a QR code at the end of your receipt or within the packaging
- Send an email couple of weeks after delivery or purchase
- Respond to all reviews (especially if it’s a bad review!)
- Make it easy to rate you on your home page
A good rule of thumb is to make reviewing your business so easy that each customer regularly does it.
2. Use Customer Reviews in Email Marketing
When you send out offer emails to your customers, nothing works better than including some great customer feedback you’ve got.
Why?
Because social proof is the driving force behind most of our purchase decisions.
“If so many people love this service that their overall star rating is at 4,7, it really must be good”
How to Use Reviews in Email Marketing
- Know your target audience(s)
- Identify the biggest problem they have
- Pick the best reviews that reflect how you solved the problem
- Include those reviews in the email
You can (and should!) use customer reviews to promote all new products and services to reach those marketing goals.
Pro tip: AB test between different reviews to get even better results in the future!
3. Share Reviews on Social Media Platforms
Surprisingly, when consumers see what others have thought about a product, they’re more inclined to leave a review themselves. Just remember to provide them with a direct link to a satisfaction survey!
This is a common strategy used by small businesses. Sharing reviews shows that you care about your customers and provides you an opportunity to thank them for trusting your services.
Furthermore, a small business can phrase its review requests as a small favor.
For example, an e-commerce startup could word their review request as: “Could you help us by telling others why you chose us? By rating your experience with us, you can help others find our small business as well! Thank you for being our customer <3”
4. Spice up Your Advertising
Honestly, a copywriter can’t come up with better ad copy than your existing customers.
By creating your ad campaigns with the help of quotes, pictures, and UGC videos from your satisfied customers, you’re en route to success.
People trust people and users trust other users to tell them if something is good or not.
Take a screenshot of the best Google reviews you have and use them as an ad that drives people to your landing page.
5. Embed Reviews to Your Website
This can’t be stressed enough. Once you have people on your website, you must do everything to stop them from leaving before converting.
One common reason to leave a site is to look for reviews on third-party review sites because your content is too monotonous and not informative enough.
Safia Marmon works at a Shopify agency Sunbowl, and has noticed that customer feedback and reviews play a huge role in eCommerce marketing:
– At our Shopify agency, we’ve seen how incorporating reviews on product pages not only builds trust but also boosts SEO. By using the natural keywords and phrases customers include in their feedback, we’ve helped clients improve their organic rankings and even increase conversion rates, Marmon says.
She also adds on her LinkedIn comment that:
– Reviews provide social proof and make product pages more relatable, which resonates with both search engines and shoppers.
Showcase your brand loyalty and happy customers by embedding review widgets to your website. Most consumers trust reviews more than personal recommendations!
Using Customer Reviews in Marketing – The Easiest Solution
Using reviews in online marketing is essential for all businesses regardless of the industry. But it’s easier said than done.
Are your reviews scattered across different review sites? Are you finding it laborious to gather new reviews and testimonials? Looking for a way to embed reviews into your home page and landing pages?
With Trustmary, you can:
- Get recent (and relevant!) reviews
- Eliminate manual work related to getting reviews
- Use all your existing reviews from third-party review sites (Google, Facebook, G2, Yelp, Capterra, …)
- Embed reviews to your website
- Boost your overall review marketing strategy
- Get better SEO results
The Simplest Review Process on the Market
Trustmary enables you to get high-quality reviews within minutes.
All you need to do is:
- Sign in
- Choose a review template
- Import an email list of customers
- Hit “Send”
You can even get video testimonials!
Get Started in Minutes with Existing Reviews
If you already have raving reviews on Google (or other popular review sites), getting started on review marketing has never been easier.
Get started here to import and embed a Google review widget on your site:
Trustmary is the easiest way to get Google reviews embedded to WordPress site!
Further Reading
If this sparked your interest, but you’d still like to read more, here’s some further information that you might find helpful.
FAQ
In short, review marketing refers to using reviews as an integral part of your marketing strategy.
As the recency of reviews has become increasingly important during the past years, each review marketing strategy should also include how to constantly get fresh customer feedback and reviews.
Do I need a review marketing strategy?
Yes, because well-planned is half-done. Having reviews is so vital to all companies that getting and using reviews shouldn’t be ignored.
Is review marketing relevant for a B2B company?
All companies need third-party validation in order to build trust with their potential new customers. B2B isn’t an exception.
Especially businesses that sell expensive items or services should pay attention to their online reputation because studies show that sales of expensive items increased by 380% when placed alongside customer reviews.
What if my company gets bad reviews?
The best way to turn bad reviews into something positive is to reply to them promptly.
It’s beneficial to answer each negative review to show that you care about your customers. Remember to apologize and then take the conversation offline to resolve the issue.
Erica Ylimaki
Erica Ylimäki is a Growth Marketer at Trustmary. She is an expert in how to grow the organic traffic of a business with effective SEO strategies, and how to utilize reviews on different CMS and platforms.