How to Get Customer Reviews on Your E-Commerce Site
Did you know you can increase your e-commerce conversion rate by 14-76% just by adding customer reviews to your online store? The latest research from Internet Retailer found that people love reading online reviews before making a purchase, especially from a brand they are not very familiar with. In fact, the more reviews you have the higher your conversion rate can be!
After analyzing 57 million reviews across 35 billion product pages, the research found that adding one review increases orders by 10% and that number jumps to 25% when you have 30 reviews. Products with 100 or more reviews experience a 37% lift in conversions!
MarketingProfs also found that 67% of consumers read 6 reviews before they feel they can trust a business enough to make a purchase. The writing on the wall is clear, e-commerce sites don’t just need reviews, they need lots of reviews to really move the needle.
How do you get customers to come back to your online store to leave a review? Some customers will do it out of the kindness of their hearts (and to help fellow shoppers out). However, many of your customers will need to be incentivized to leave a review.
The good news is, while you incentivize customers to leave a review you can also incentivize them to make another purchase!
Here’s an example of how one e-commerce shop is increasing their customer reviews:
Automate a Follow Up Email Request
Set up an email marketing campaign to automatically go out to each customer about 2-3 weeks after they receive their purchase. This gives your customers time to try out your product and fall in love with it before you ask them to leave a review.
Using email software like Yotpo you can easily allow customers to fill in a review form right from their inbox. This makes the reviewing process easier than if they had to click over to your website, register for an account and then find the right product to leave a review on.
You can further incentivize customers to leave a review by offering a coupon or discount code for their next purchase! In this example Skirt Sports is offering a $5.00 coupon but they have also tested a 10% offer. It’s a great idea to a/b test different offers to see which drives the most amount of repeat sales!
Yotpo integrates with your online store and knows exactly which products your customers purchased and applies the review to the correct page on your site.
You can also add related items to the bottom of the email to entice customers to make an additional purchase!
Send the Coupon Right Away
Immediately after your customer submits their review have the coupon or discount code show up in their inbox. While writing a glowing review they’ve thought through all of the reasons why they love your product.
While they’re still feeling extra good about spending their money with you, encourage them to spend a little more.
Once again, include suggested products in the email to entice the customer to click through to your website and browse your offerings.
Setting up this type of email campaign should be a no-brainer for any serious e-commerce shop owner looking to increase sales.
For expert digital marketing advice, Contact Green Dot today for a free strategy session. We can help you optimize your email campaigns and think through other marketing channels that will help you increase your profits this year.