A key part of digital business development is building your online brand. Investing the time to create an online presence that users know and trust will pay dividends in the long run, as it elevates all areas of your business.
A great way to build trust and transparency with your customers is through use of third party reviews. Giving a customer the opportunity to see what other people felt about their purchase makes them a much more informed, confident and ultimately satisfied buyer.
Why use third party reviews?
Displaying product and service reviews on your website has many benefits, some of which have an obvious and tangible effect, while others are more subtle:
Social validation – Displaying customer reviews help people to feel more confident in their purchase as it shows that other people have made the same purchase in the past. Shopping online can be a lonely pursuit, but reviews help to create a sense of community.
Higher Conversion Rate (CR) – By building in these social proof points, people are more comfortable on your site and therefore more likely to buy your products. This drives up the conversion rate for the site.
Improved Click Through Rate (CTR) – Some Review platforms like Reviews.co.uk will enable you to display star ratings in Google search results. Product pages with a high star rating have been shown to receive a much higher CTR, meaning that more people will land on your site.
Reduced advertising costs – A higher CTR in the search results means that you can spend less on advertising to receive the same amount of clicks, therefore increasing profit by reducing your overall cost base while keeping revenue stable.
Fewer returns – Being fully transparent with people and giving them an unbiased review of what the product does well (and not so well) empowers them to make a far more informed purchase. Knowing the downsides to the product before they buy sets their expectations appropriately and makes them less likely to return the item.
Make third party reviews part of your eCommerce Marketing strategy
Client testimonials have long been used to give potential customers social validation, but these can easily come across as contrived and biased. Third party reviews can have a far greater impact as they are impartial and present an honest and balanced view.
Whether you’re selling through a WordPress site, Shopify, or a Magento shop, there are plugins available that will enable you to collect and display reviews on your platform.
We have experience building this into campaigns and have seen first-hand the type of impact it can have. If you’d like a conversation about what third party reviews could do for your business, don’t hesitate to get in touch.
