Business Reviews

One question that comes up often with clients is “How do I deal with negative online reviews?” In this post I will discuss the best way to put your company’s digital reputation in good standing. Although some of the suggestions require considerable company resources, I can’t stress the importance of managing your company’s online reviews. Social Media and the Internet enables a transparent world that can make or break any company in a highly competitive market.

Why?

Why is online reputation management important to your business? The short answer is everyone researches companies online before making a buying decision. It’s easy, fast and very informative.  Here are some of the most important statistics:

• 70% consult reviews or ratings before purchasing (BusinessWeek, Oct. 2008)
• Traffic to the top 10 review sites grew on average 158% last year (Compete.com)
• 97% who made a purchase based on an online review found the review to be accurate (Comscore/The Kelsey Group, Oct. 2007)
• 51% of consumers use the Internet even before making a purchase in shops (Verdict Research, May 2009)
• 92% have more confidence in information found online than from a salesclerk or other source (Wall Street Journal, Jan 2009)
• 90% of online consumers trust recommendations from people they know; 70% trust unknown users, 27% trust experts, 14% trust advertising, 8% trust celebrities (Econsultancy, July 2009, Erik Qualman, Socialnomics)
• The average consumer mentions specific brands over 90 times per week in conversations with friends, family, and co-workers. (Keller Fay, WOMMA, 2010)
• 61% of people rely on user reviews for product information or research before a buying decision is made. (Razorfish, 2008)
• 34% have turned to social media to air their feelings about a company. 26% to express dissatisfaction, 23% to share companies or products they like. (Harris Poll, April 2010)
• 75% of people don’t believe that companies tell the truth in advertisements (Yankelovich)

(Hat Tip on stats – Moto Message & BazaarVoice)

Your customers are researching, reading, learning and reviewing you right now. They have grown to expect more than just a static company website and many feel it is their duty to update the online community about your business.

What can my company do?

The simple answer is: Be the best business you can by providing outstanding service and products that consumers love. A good start is to ensure you make a superior product and educate your employees about how to best deal with unhappy customers.  If you are a sales organization, this could mean attaching consequences to poor reviews or correlating positive feedback to incentives and salary.

Organic Tactics

One way to help boost positive reviews is to make it simple for new customers to sing your praises. Ensuring that the company website or online store has the capability for customers to submit reviews is essential.  This can be unnerving for some businesses because of the risk of bad reviews, but studies have shown that most reviews are positive. (Across all of Bazaarvoice US clients, 80% of product ratings are 4 or 5 stars out of 5. Across all of Bazaarvoice UK clients, 88% of product ratings are 4 or 5 stars out of 5. – “J Curve,” Bazaarvoice and Keller Fay)

Inciting Reviews for Physical Locations

For businesses that don’t have an online purchase or product, it’s a bit more difficult to ensure customers have the ability to post great reviews.  Restaurants, hotels and other brick-and-mortars  can create on-site computing centers for customers. The photo below is an example of an on-site computing center with signs helping to direct customers to review websites.

Email Follow-Up

Another option for generating additional reviews are follow-up emails soliciting feedback.When using follow-up emails,  remember to give customers several social network options and keep the directions simple.  Google and Bing have their own review systems, but they also aggregate reviews from Yelp, CitySearch, Angie’s List and Dex. Make sure to provide a link to the business listing where you want your customer to post the review. There could be multiple listings for your business on one website so it’s best to consolidate reviews to one listing.  Consolidating reviews will also help overall SEO (search engine optimization) by making it easy for search engines to find and understand your business.

Non-Organic Tactics: Pay to Play

Bonfire does not endorse companies paying for false reviews, however it can be an effective tactic.  Google, Bing and Yelp use complicated algorithms to determine review relevance. If the mayor of a large city that has 2 million followers on Twitter and 500,000 ‘Likes’ on Facebook reviews a restaurant on Yelp, it’s likely the review would be more visible than a review by someone without any community standing. As networks become more interconnected, community relevance will become more important.

Companies that can “fix” or buy a brand’s online reputation use scripted reviews on popular websites to boost awareness. Pricing can range from $5,000-$10,000 over the course of 6 months.

Summary

As you have read, online reviews are important for your business.  A good online reputation is best achieved by encouraging outstanding business practices and providing customers the tools to share their story.  If you have anything to add or know of any other solutions to online reputation management, please share below.