Customer reviews are critical to your ability to attract new customers. In fact, 87% of consumers read online reviews when searching for local businesses. But, it can be hard to get customer reviews because there are a number of different roadblocks that customers may encounter. In this article, we’ll explore some of the roadblocks that may prevent customers from writing reviews, techniques to help customers overcome those roadblocks, and best practices for businesses to adopt to systematically reduce friction for customers to write reviews.
It’s Hard to Get Customer Reviews, Because It’s Hard for Customers
There are many different reasons customers may not write a review even if they had a good experience. Let’s take a look at some of the most common.
They just need to be asked
Many customers may not think to write an online review for a business because they feel that their opinion is too insignificant. These reviews can have the potential of affecting others’ decisions, but it’s hard for some people to believe that their words actually matter. Simply asking them to write a review can often help overcome this barrier.
They don’t know the value of reviews to your business
Customers may not write online reviews if they don’t know how valuable these are to businesses, especially for smaller companies. They might think that it’s too much effort or time on their part when the business should really be doing the leg work themselves. Make sure to educate your customers about why you need these reviews and how they can help improve
They don’t have time
If customers are busy with work or school, it can be hard for them to find time to write a review. They may also have other commitments and obligations that make it difficult for them to take the time. Make sure they know that you’ll follow up with them after a few days, at which point they might be able to find more free time
Techniques to Overcome Customer Review Roadblocks
First, to get customers reviews, make sure to ask for them. This is the easiest and simplest way of getting them from customers who may not know how important they are. Make sure that you’re asking at key points in your customer’s experience with your business such as when they receive their product or after a service has been performed. You can also ask at check-out or the conclusion of your service deliver. Adding links to your customer emails is also a great “always on” way to ask for reviews.
Second, educate customers about why the review is important and how it can help improve their experience with you in the future. This way they’ll know that these reviews have a direct effect on them as an individual customer and not just on other people’s decisions about whether or not to use your product.
Third, follow up with customers after a few days to make sure that they’re able to find the time and have the opportunity to write an online review of their experience with you. Customers may not have been aware how valuable these reviews are to your business. Or, they might have been busy with other commitments and obligations that prevented them from writing a review. Many businesses are able to more easily get customer reviews when they send a gentle reminder.
Best Practices for Businesses to Reduce Friction
One thing you can do is provide customers with the ability to write reviews on their mobile phone without having to go through your website or app. Research shows that customers are 134% more likely to respond to a text message than an email with open rates of 98% for texts versus 20% for email.
Get customer reviews by providing direct links to the review sites most important to your business. This will help guide customers to the most appropriate site and make it easy for them to write a review.
You may consider incentives for customers to write reviews. This could take the form of coupons for their next purchase, a chance to win a prize or entry in your monthly drawing, etc.
Businesses can also send follow-up requests with links for writing reviews after an interaction, or at the conclusion of a transaction. This will help get customer reviews by helping customers remember and take action on writing reviews as well. Using automation to send reminders is a great way to keep this from being manual work.
You can also use social media to reach your audience and ask them for reviews after they’ve had an interaction with you–whether it be through email, phone call, or over Facebook Messenger conversation.
We hope that these tips will help you get more reviews from your customers. Making it easier for customers to write reviews will make it easier for you to get them. Check out our Reputation Management solutions to learn how you can help reduce friction for customers and get more positive reviews.
