Your e-commerce store wouldn’t be complete without the addition of a social media presence. In order to attract more customers, you need to provide them with better value for their money. You can do this by conducting online reviews so that potential buyers know what to expect from your goods or services.
A well-managed online review strategy is essential for any eCommerce business. It not only helps build trust and credibility but also indicates whether or not the business is a reliable source of goods and services. There are many ways in which an online review can help your business. No matter what type of business you operate, having an effective and efficient online review strategy is key to success.
What Can An Online Review Do For Your SEO?
An online review can do wonders for your SEO and marketing efforts. It can increase the amount of traffic to your site, increase your SEO ranking and even bring in new customers who might have otherwise passed by your store in the first place. You can use reviews to help you gain exposure, establish trust and build your brand’s reputation. With so many benefits that come with receiving an online review, it’s easy to see why it’s so important for your business to have an effective strategy for them.
Why Is Online Reviews So Important For SEO?
As you can see from the list above, the benefits of receiving an online review are numerous. But why exactly do reviews exist and what can they do for your business? Here are a few reasons why reviews are so crucial for your SEO and marketing efforts:
Increased Awareness
A recent study found that 84% of customers who review your products and/or services are likely going to continue to do so. This is tremendous exposure for you, and even though the survey only said 1% of people are likely to become fans, it still indicates a huge potential for growth.
Reviews are great for increasing your business’s awareness. This can help you build a stronger customer base and increase the number of people who discover about you through online search.
A review from a happy customer can go a long way toward building your brand’s name recognition. This can boost the likelihood of your products and services being used and trusted by future customers.
Trustworthy
A 2007 study found that almost 80% of consumers would choose a business again if they had an issue with it. This means that even though people might not be buying from you as much as you’d like, they still have some level of trust for you as an entity.
The reviews you get from genuine, happy customers are going to be more trustworthy than those that are fake. This can help you build a stronger relationship with your customers and encourage them to continue to recommend your brand to their friends and colleagues.
Increased Review Traffic
SEO is all about getting more traffic to your site. Potential customers can see your reviews and determine whether or not your business is a trustworthy source of goods or services. With more traffic, comes more opportunity for you to make sales. You can charge more for your products or offer free trials so that you can try out new services or products and see if they work for you.
The more reviews you get, the more traffic you’ll get to your site. This can lead to greater sales and is an effective way to build your business’s reputation.
Attract New Customers
Customer reviews are important, but they don’t mean much if no one is buying from you. With more reviews, you increase the likelihood that someone will make a purchase. This is a prime example of the power of peer review. Your peers are the customers who bought your products or services before. They can now vouch for you and your business on the Internet. This increases your overall customer satisfaction. If a potential customer feels good enough about your business to leave a review, that means a lot more than if they just saw your blog and liked it.
Factors To Consider The Online Reviews To Be Effective
Productiveness
You want your online reviews to be as productive as possible. This means that you should be using them to encourage customers to give you more positive feedback. This is important because it motivates you to work even harder to make your business even better.
It lets potential customers know that you care about their feedback and what they have to say. Plus, it gives you the opportunity to respond to their queries, requests, and issues. If a customer has a question, you need to be able to give them an answer. If they have a request, you need to be able to fulfill it. If they are having an issue with shipping or billing, you need to be able to help them out.
Professionalism
All of this online review goodness won’t matter if you don’t put your own spin on it. You need to create a professional and engaging online review strategy that highlights why your business is the best choice for customers. This is especially important for businesses that are just starting out. You need to make it obvious to prospects and customers that you are the right choice for their needs.
You can do this by:
- Keeping your website’s navigation and design professional. This not only looks clean and professional but it also preys on the curiosity of prospects and customers and gives them a reason to visit your site.
- You are using your online review strategy to land quality conversions. It’s not just reviews that you need to have. You need to convert customers, which is why you need to provide excellent customer service.
- Make sure that your reviews are current, relevant, and accurate. Your reviews need to reflect the state of the art as of today and reflect the quality of products and services you provide.
Quality
Your online review strategy is only as good as the products and services you are using. You can’t use automated software to generate bad reviews or legitimate reviews that are out of date or do not reflect the state of the art as of today.
You need reviews that are high-quality and accurate. This is especially important for SEO. A Googlebot can’t read a review and understand how helpful it is. You need to manually review your products and services so that a bot or a human can properly understand and weigh the data.
Responsiveness
Your online review strategy should be reactive. You need to use your online review strategy to respond to customer queries and issues that they might have. This is because when a customer has a query, you need to be able to give them an answer. If you don’t have the answers to their questions, you have a couple of options.
You can either:
- Offer a live chat with a customer service representative. This is a quick way to respond to queries and concerns.
- Send an email with a question, answer, or suggestion. You can also create “best practices” emails based on customer needs and concerns.
Online Reviews as Part of a Good Digital Marketing Strategy
An effective digital marketing strategy is key to having a successful eCommerce store. There are a number of digital marketing strategies that can help you increase your online sales and build brand recognition. Here are a few of them:
Have A Presence on Notable Review Websites
If you want to maximize the chances of a potential customer leaving a review on a notable review website, you need to make sure that they are able to find you. The more information a potential customer has to go through before they find you, the less likely they are to leave a favorable review.
To maximize your chance of a favorable review, you should have a strong presence on review websites. You should have at least one on all the major review websites. This will help you build trust, increase your review traffic, and even get more positive reviews for your product or service.
Make the Review Process Easy
One of the greatest things about online reviews is that you don’t have to be an expert to do them. Anyone can write a review, and anyone can leave one. This is great both for your business and your customers.
Build a Culture of Trust
Reviews are the first step to building trust and credibility, and they also indicate to potential customers that you trust them and their feedback. Since customers are more likely to leave a favorable review if they have a relationship with you, it’s important that you build a culture of trust with your customers through your online reviews.
Provide Transparency
Another important thing to remember about online reviews is that they are personal. Thus, you shouldn’t avoid addressing the feelings and emotions of your customers. While you don’t have to be mean about it, you should also avoid being patronizing and overgeneralizing about certain issues.
You should be transparent about your business and its operations, including your pricing, shipping methods, and the other details that are mentioned in your reviews.
Sharing Reviews on Social Media
Another important thing that you can do to boost your online reviews and social media shares is to run “likes” and “shares” on social media. By clicking on the social media icons at the top of your website, you can share your reviews and photos with your followers. This not only helps you build more followers but also earns you more likes and shares.
Bottom line
Ecommerce stores have become more important than ever before. This is due to the fact that more consumers now rely on online shopping for their online purchases. With more people relying on online stores for their daily purchases, it’s important that businesses have strategies to boost their SEO and marketing efforts.
You may also want to read:
Why Ratings and Reviews Are So Vital to Your Business
