In case you haven’t heard, reviews are all the rage!

Whether you’re looking for the best multivitamin for you, looking for the best moisturiser for your skin type or keen to try the best plant based meat alternative, the opinion of those who have already made that decision matters. What did they like? What did they dislike? Would they make the same choice if they could do it all over again? 

There is power in customer reviews, for both the consumer and the business. For the consumer, they get insights from previous buyers that can confirm or deny their positive and negative feelings towards a product. As for the business, positive reviews act as a form of advocacy and negative reviews provide feedback on what they can do to improve. 

Proof customers read reviews

1. About 95% of customers read reviews before making a purchase. (Spiegel)
2. 72% of customers won’t take any buying actions until they’ve read reviews. (Testimonial Engine) 

Impact of online reviews on sales

1. 4. 92% of B2B buyers are more likely to purchase after reading a trusted review (G2 and Heinz Marketing)

2. 6. When a product gets five reviews, the likelihood of it being purchased increases by 270%. (Spiegel)

3. 7. When higher-priced items display reviews, the conversion rate increases by 380%. (Spiegel)

4. 9. Purchase likelihood increases by 15% when buyers read verified reviews over anonymous reviews. (Spiegel)

5. 10. Given two products with similar ratings, consumers are more likely to buy the product with more reviews. (Psychological Science)

6. 12. Reviews make customers 71% more comfortable purchasing a product. (3D Cart)

Customer review engagement

1. 14. 91% of customers from the ages of 18 to 34 trust online reviews just as much as personal recommendations. (BrightLocal)

2. 18. About 85% of consumers consider any review older than three months to be irrelevant. (BrightLocal)

How to capture reviews

One of the biggest challenges with any review strategy is building a constant stream of verified reviews. It's not only important to have quality reviews, but also good scale and recency of reviews. For most FMCG brands this can prove really difficult. This is where the team at Shping comes in. Shping connect brands with their customers whilst they are engaging with their products.This provides an amazing platform to acquire verified reviews for our partner brands. Our reviews engine allows brands to completely customise their own review template, include video reviews and we have our own experienced moderation team working around the clock. We have helped our partner brands capture over 140,000 verified reviews in the last 12 months.

How to best leverage your product reviews

Shping have a reviews API so that brands can take an effortless constant feed of the reviews that have been generated in our app to syndicate across multiple touchpoints in the customers buyer journey.

Website

First impressions are important — that’s why leading FMCG brands are now displaying their consumers’ reviews both on product pages as well as the front page of their website. This ensures that a fellow shopper’s stamp of approval is the first thing a prospective customer sees when they arrive on the homepage.

Retailer Ecommerce

Not only can you create a great first impression on your own website, but you can also provide the reviews generated in Shping to potential retailers to be showcased in their ecommerce sites to help convert more sales.

Commercials

Consumers often tune out or even skip commercials. Make them genuinely worth watching by using the voice of the consumer. Not only does this Gillette commercial display reviews, it also shows how Gillette genuinely listens to the feedback from consumers that the brand gets through reviews and uses it to improve their products. In addition to improving product design, customer reviews and questions can help identify issues with customer service, website content, pricing, shipping, or other areas of the customer experience. See their clever commercial HERE.

Social media

As social media becomes more shoppable, this is an integral place to display your customers’ reviews. Whether it is an advertisement, Instagram story, or organic post (all of which are seen below), customer testimonials are a simple way to promote your products in an authentic way.

Email campaigns

Displaying testimonials from consumers alongside product photos helps your consumers do additional product research with minimal work on their end. Reviews from fellow shoppers will help your click-through and conversion rates that you’re working to bolster through these types of campaigns.

In-Store advertising

Including testimonials in store displays and signage, shoppers can see the opinions of other consumers, in addition to being able to test out or try products themselves in store. Neutrogena, Rexona, and Suave does just this at a retailer’s store.

The results are in 

The statistics speak for themselves. Reviews matter, and your brand could be missing out on some seriously valuable business opportunities if you aren’t using them correctly. Don’t make the  mistake of leaving your reviews in the dark.

If you want to explore how Shping can support your review strategy you can set up a webinar demo with our Head of Sales, Joel Stevenson below.