Value Relationships more than Transactions.
Customers can make or break any business. That’s why, they are known as the lifeblood of any business.
In Amazon, customers are the boss. Therefore; you will have to please them in order to survive.
Taking care of customers is more than just the greeting cards and writing emails. It’s should be feeling for a lifetime.
Although, and as a matter of fact, emotions are the best way to attain customer loyalty and trust. However, this isn’t the only way.
It’s not about the product reviews and customer retention, it’s more about the brand building. As a starter, you need to be extra cautious about your customer feedback, because a single bad review will not only take away that customer, but, also it will make you lose many sales.
In Amazon, product reviews and ratings are more than just random comments. They not only reflect the value of your product, but, also they will highly reflect your product rankings. The A9 Ranking Algorithm of Amazon highly consider reviews when determining the ranking of a product.
Amazon product reviews are a great way of increasing traffic and sales. Why, because product reviews plays a convincing role for customer in making a purchase. Whenever, a customer finds himself on a confusing ground, he looks for the ‘social proof’. So, if you have good product reviews and ratings, you’re most likely to get a conversion.
This is why, you need to be extra cautious in Amazon.
So how we get reviews on Amazon?
First of all, go away with fake reviews. There isn’t a review machine that can help you generate good reviews. You have to achieve them!
As far as the paid reviews are concerned that have been a hot topic among Amazon Sellers, it is vital to know that Amazon has banned most of the paid reviewers except the few like Vipons that functions with Amazon’s TOS for getting reviews.
Brands can offer huge discounts to customers and increase the chances of reviews with Vipon, however, it doesn’t guarantee whether you will receive one. Why would you pay a hundred dollar for a review that too is not guaranteed?
Getting the information
There are few tricks that you can take help of:
- Always read reviews
Not just your own, you need to pay attention to your competitor reviews as well.
If you’re getting bad reviews and are more-like ‘clueless’ about the reason, may be, your competitor reviews will tell a lot.
Moreover, reading your competitors reviews can help you know and learn the interests of people towards your product. This is what you want, right?
I can say for sure, from my personal experience, Amazon product reviews are the 2nd vital thing in Amazon selling after Product photography. As much as you need ideal photography for your Amazon listings, you need ideal reviews too.
- Check the authenticity
There are fake previews too. For them, you can’t really do much about them. You can remove those product reviews from your listings by reporting them to Amazon.
- Gather advice from the experts
Now, this is the most crucial part of gather information about reviews in Amazon.
If you’re selling ladies clutches, you need ladies for expert opinions. Name it A/B testing or whatever, you need to find the real feedbacks from real people.
If you’re selling clutches, give it your mom or sister but not to your girlfriend (you can’t satisfy her); ask them for honest reviews.
What Can Amazon Reviews do for you?
Amazon Reviews are a reflection of your product. You will realize their real value while running PPC. Sometimes, you’re getting clicks, but not enough conversions. Lack of ‘decent’ reviews can be the major reason for the low conversion rate.
- Reviews increase your conversion rate. If your products have reasonable good reviews, you’re more likely to get sales.
- They give you a superiority edge over your competitors. As a matter of fact, the products with more reviews are more likely to get sales even if they are expensive.
- They enhance your brand reputation and customer loyalty.
- They act more like a ‘word of mouth’ recommendation.
Top Practices to earn product reviews in 2020
Don’t fall on the old-fashioned way of generating reviews. I am going to tell you the most uncommon ways to acquire customer reviews in Amazon. Let’s dig out.
Reach Out to Bloggers
The best part about social media and bloggers is the fact that they are the trusted voices. People follow them and adore them as empowered individuals who are making a difference in society.
Bloggers share the power and audacity to market your product in front of an untapped audience. You can reach out bloggers for your Amazon product reviews, but it should be carefully planned and executed.
Instagram bloggers are a major source of marketing nowadays. You can reach them for a review by asking them to make a purchase in exchange for a gift/discount or maybe their ‘fee’. Getting reviews through Bloggers have significant benefits for your brand.
- You can get high star reviews from bloggers. In this case, you are very much guaranteed of positive and quality reviews that can really turn on the viewer in making a purchase.
- This will enhance your brand visibility in the market along with a sense of trust and reliability.
- What can be a better way to increase your sales than reaching out to bloggers? Their fans can literally turn into your customers by just doing a click. As a matter of fact, these bloggers have some serious fans who take their words and suggestions for granted.
The only reason I have kept Bloggers on the top of the list is that they are more than just getting reviews. Highly uncommon, but highly successful, I recommend sellers to reach out as many bloggers for their Amazon product reviews even if you have to pay an additional fee.
Here are a few steps that are to be followed when reaching bloggers for Amazon Reviews.
Step #1
Reach out to the popular Bloggers
You need to find as many bloggers that share content similar to your niche. Off course, you shouldn’t ask a sports enthusiast to promote a lipstick as that would make no sense and neither any difference.
There is number of tools online that can help you find bloggers on a specific niche. Moreover, they also tell the engagement rate and authenticity rate. That’s cool, han!
HypeAuditor, FollowerWank, and Alltop are two of the best tools for finding popular bloggers on specified niches.
Step #2
List down the bloggers on the basis of their Social Authority.
Just like the web has DA (Domain Authority), social channels have their own way of defining popularity “Social Authority. So, if you are using FollowerWank, you will also find the SA (Social Authority) listed alongside the blogger.
Step #3
Make yourself visible to the selected influencer
The next step is to let the influencer know about your existence is the market. You should follow them, like, and follow their recent posts. Building a relationship is very important in this business because that develops a sense of confidence between you and the blogger.
Step #4
Reach out to the influencer.
After that, you can hit their message button and describe your demand. It is wiser to ask for their opinion and suggestions for reviews because they’re more experienced about the marketing techniques and they know what works.
When asking for a product review through email; you should be polite and clear.
Include Product Inserts in the packaging
As mentioned by Forbes, product inserts in packaging help increase good reviews by establishing an emotional attachment with the customers. The insert provide a customer an immediate opportunity to express his thoughts and experience about the product which will refrain you from getting a negative product review in Amazon.
Note: You can’t incentivize a customer in writing a review because it’s wrong and is a direct violation of Amazon policies.
Moreover, you can take a step further by providing customer a discount on their purchase. Known as the CLV, this will not only enhance your brand value, but also it will increase customer retention rate.
Ideal example of Product insert:
Are you happy with our leather jackets? We hope it reached you timely and is delivered on 100% quality. Your satisfaction is our #1 priority.
If you like our product, please give us a short feedback. In case you don’t, please reach us back on our email Id so we can help you.
You can design a creative template of product insert and write an ideal content for the insert.
When giving customer a discount on the next purchase, it is wiser to mention the word ‘Gift’.
Encourage Customers to write reviews through Email
You need to have automated emails being sent to the customer after a purchase is made. These 4 steps will definitely help you gain a positive review.
- Sent an order confirmation email
- Once the expected delivery date has passed, write an email to ensure that the customer have received their order. Also, ask them whether he is enjoying it or not.
- In case, they aren’t up to any negative feedback, politely ask them a review
You might be wondering about directly mailing the customer about requesting him for a review; trust me, this doesn’t work most of the time. In that way, you are going to lose many reviews and it may not help you with your ‘Brand Building’
There are 2 things you should be careful when asking for the review:
- Flooding their mailbox with tons of mails. Don’t do that.
- Offering incentive for giving feedback. I repeat, it’s a clear cut violation of Amazon Policies.
Amazon Early Reviewer Program
Earlier, sellers use to get fake reviews by incentivizing customers with free and discounted products. This trend badly hit the reputation of Amazon for having skewed reviews on their site. In order to protect the integrity, Amazon banned the incentivizing method and introduced its Early Reviewer Program.
The program is designed to help sellers in their new product launches. With this program, they can get reviews for their products that have little to no reviews.
Under this program, the seller participation in the reviewer program is only visible to Amazon and not to the seller. So, as a seller, you can’t really brag anyone for high ratings. This draws a clear line between incentivizing method and the early reviewer program.
Amazon chooses those customers who have bought a similar item before. They are offered an early program reward in exchange for a product review. It should be noted customers are only notified about the reward after they make a purchase. Those customers with history of negative and abusive reviews are excluded by Amazon in their reviewer program.
After making a purchase, the customer can leave a review ( any rating between 1 to 5). Following the review, customer will receive the corresponding reward of $1-$3 on amazon gift card.
The fee for this program is $60 for each product. Maximum of 5 reviews can be obtained through this reward program, and you will be charged once you get your first successful review.
The Not So GOOD is that you may not get good ratings or positive review as there is always a chance of getting a low star rating and a negative comment.
This program is great for your new product launches, however, it is not a standalone solution for your Amazon Product Reviews.
Offer Discounts
If the first 3 fails to deliver decent reviews, you can offer discounts to customer for writing a review because that acts as a motivation.
In this case, designing an ideal email template is the most crucial aspect. You can go ahead with stuff like win-win situation, write us a review and get a $20 discount on your next purchase etc.
According to Power Reviews, this has worked greatly for their clients as 83% of them were able to witness uplift in their reviews by offering discounts.
Paid Reviews
Although, Amazon has banned most of paid reviewing sites except few such as Vipon that works differently and in accordance with the Amazon Policies. Unlike other banned practices, this isn’t a way of getting reviews by paying few dollars.
Brands can use their services to promote heavily discounted products to the customer that is aimed to receive more Amazon Product reviews. These services suggest the customer to leave a review to the specific product.
However, these services doesn’t guarantee a brand that whether it would receive more product reviews or not.
Friends & Family
If you notice all the methods of generating product reviews for your listings, you will realize that getting 5 star and quality review is still difficult. But, your friends and family can really make it easy for you.
It is ideal to ask out your friends and family members to make a purchase of your product and leave a 5 star review. This is an ideal technique that can be used in the beginning of a product launch. I must say that this is by far the easiest way to generate quality Amazon Product Reviews in no time.
Many Chat Reviews
Many Chat has been in the spotlight among many marketers for establishing a strong and constant connection with their customers. The Facebook Messenger Bot, Many Chat, is an automated machine that pops up whenever there is a visitor on a page.
Many Chat is an innovative way to generate Amazon Reviews without violating the policies of Amazon. However, it is a bit technical so you have to learn the process of setting up Many Chat for Amazon.
Build your audience on social channels like Facebook.
It’s all about gathering the users of a particular interest into a Facebook group. Like, if you’re selling pet supplies on Amazon, you need to create a base of loyal buyers who are interested in pets. This will help you generate good sales and some quality Amazon product Reviews.
When launching a new product on Amazon, you should take help of social media by finding pages where you have the right audience. The right Audience will help you achieve quality Amazon product Reviews that will eventually increase your brand exposure.
Over to you
Getting reviews on Amazon can be very tempting if you are practicing the old-fashioned methods for earning reviews. Using dishonest methods for getting product reviews aren’t worth the risk of permanent banishment from Amazon. In order to game the system in the right way, follow these ideal methods for getting reviews on Amazon.