How to get more reviews on your Shopify store

After setting up your online store, the goal is to get it known within your target market. Stretching from when the internet wasn’t a phenomenon, buyers always sought their neighbors’ input leading to the purchase of a given product.

Fast forward to the era of online shopping, these neighbors make their opinions about particular products through the reviews they leave online.

Customer reviews are a powerful tool that can either make or break your Shopify store. While it might seem like it’s just the grumblings of a few unsatisfied customers, negative reviews will send rippling effects through your entire operation.

You might deploy comprehensive marketing strategies alongside innovative sales techniques but still see little change in your online business’ performance. The problem will stem from inadequate handling of product reviews on your Shopify store.

In this article, we explore in detail how you can get more product reviews on Shopify stores and how you can ensure that they’re authentic.

What makes customer reviews for Shopify authentic?

According to various studies, 84 percent of customers pay attention to online reviews when shopping. Moreover, these customers trust online reviews from strangers just as much as personal recommendations from friends and family. Your Shopify store needs to have a streamlined system that allows customers to leave reviews. From these reviews, you see what improvements to make, what to get rid of, and what practices to keep.

Ensure that only someone that has used the product or service can leave a review. Potential customers can easily sniff out fake reviews. This allows you to leverage the power of social proof. In other words, authentic reviews on your site will draw in potential customers, enabling you to convert them into buyers.

Real product reviews give uncertain customers an unbiased look into the quality of your products and overall experience of buying from your store.

How to get more Shopify product reviews

When most customers come into your online store, they add products to their cart and proceed to checkout. Then, they wait for you to ship their items to their doorstep. Once they receive the products, few buyers will bother to return to your site. That is if the product meets their expectations. Customers are more likely to leave reviews if your service falls short. Positive customer reviews for Shopify are harder to come by.

Therefore, you have to find a way to elicit reviews from customers regardless of whether they’re leaving positive or negative comments.

Here’s how you can get more customer reviews for Shopify.

1. Make the review process easy

Put yourself in the customer’s shoes. You want to have a smooth experience while making a review. Therefore, as the seller, make it easy for your customer to leave a product review for your Shopify store. Keep the process short and sweet. Even bad reviews are feedback. They test your customer relationship management in the way you respond. Reach out to the customer and make them feel heard, and the go-ahead to work on the issue raised.

More often than not, the said customer will come back with a useful review after following up.

2. Ask for the review

This may come as an obvious trick, but many ignore it. There is no shame in asking the customer to go ahead and speak about the user experience they have with you.
Research shows that consumers will often leave a review for a business when asked.

Usually, the customers take it upon themselves to write and leave reviews, but a little push from you is not bad at all. It solidifies the fact that you want to hear what the customers want to say about you and are not afraid of whatever the comment may be. An automated review process on your Shopify store will ensure that customers are nudged to make the review.

3. Make the review attractive with incentives

Everyone loves free things. In the world of the consumer, it means less expense on a future purchase or an extra product on what has already been purchased.

Incentivize your reviews with discounts on subsequent purchases. This has proven as a way of hitting two birds with one stone, getting more reviews for your Shopify store and increasing your online store’s conversion rate.

4. Email your customers

Your marketing efforts are more than likely to include a lead generation strategy. You are at an advantage that your customers submit their emails, among other details, for identification and easy communication. Use these email addresses to reach out to them.

Set up automatic review request emails to customers once they have received their order. This email will push them to share their experience with the product they bought from your store.

Be creative with this email. Avoid the basic content header and body. Customize your communication to resonate with your customers based on their demographic details.

When they respond in email, be sure to respond to them as well. Break the cycle that pins stores for using automatic chatbots that are the least bit interactive. When the review is negative, reach out to the consumer, make them feel heard, and go ahead to rectify the issue and show you care. In the end, it’s how you handle negative reviews that make all the difference.

5. Use visual content to reach out

Basic text isn’t as engaging as images or videos. Human brains process visual information 60,000 times faster than text. Visual content such as images, colors, and shapes reach our brain faster than textual information.

The consumer’s reaction to your method of requesting feedback depends entirely on how well-thought-out and engaging your visual work is. The response that comes after was already decided by the brain after looking at your visual work. Therefore, you need to employ plenty of visual cues to get more product reviews on Shopify.

6. Show off your review scores

Everyone wants to brag a little about even the smallest things. Nothing is stopping you from flaunting those 5-star reviews you have gotten.

For Shopify product reviews, the best place to put them is on the product page itself so that they are hyper-relevant to that page.

Humans are remarkably impressionable. When one customer sees their friend has done a review and it has been shown, they will be drawn into making themselves displayed on the product page.

7. Make it a point to react to all reviews

Throughout this article, we have made it known that human beings attach a lot of emotion to their purchases and the process before and after.

It doesn’t matter whether a review is good or bad; you will need to react to them. Appreciate and nudge those with good reviews to come back and make purchases with you. Reach out to those who do negative reviews and understand their dissatisfaction. This will show that you value every opinion and everyone who comes into contact with your product and your Shopify store. And it won’t take a lot of your time. The customer is vital for your store, and they are supposed to be treated to satisfaction.

First-time buyers are usually influenced by the conversations held about the reviews. If the feedback is taken greatly and acted upon, chances are high they will be loyal customers. Consequently, they’ll be more willing to leave reviews because they get to interact with the brand.

8. Ask for reviews on social media

In 2019 alone, the average person spent 135 minutes on social media daily. These are the people that interact with your product and your online store. Furthermore, they feel free to say a thing or two concerning their experience with your product.
You can take advantage of this willingness to post an opinion by providing a channel for your audience to leave customer reviews for Spotify. For example, you can add a review tab to your store’s Facebook page. Facebook reviews enable potential customers who come across your brand on the platform to get a measure of your products and brand in general.

Alternatively, you can invite your customers to share their experiences with your store by using a branded hashtag on Instagram. A similar method can be used on Twitter as well.

9. Request reviews at an ideal time

Ask for the review at the right time. A reminder for your customers to leave product reviews is vital, just as much as when to send it.

It is an online store; therefore, there will be time between the placement of the order and delivery. You don’t want to ask for the review as soon as the customer has cleared their cart. This is because the consumer has only just come in contact with your product and hasn’t had enough time to form a reasonable opinion. If you ask for a review about the product at this time, chances are high the review will be negative because they will consider this annoying and pestering.

You also don’t want to send in the review request three or four months after the customer came into contact with your product. Chances are that the customer doesn’t recall the experience they had with your product.

Of course, this only works if you sell products with a short life span. Some products are long-lasting, enabling customers to develop opinions about them over time.
There is no clear cut definition on time to reach out to the customer. To best understand when to reach out, put yourself in the consumer’s shoes, and imagine when you would want to hear from the store about the product.

10. Build a rapport with consumers

With the tight competition in the eCommerce space, you need to make sure you stand out. One way to accomplish this is to engage more with customers. When they perceive your brand’s personality, they’re more likely to open up. Therefore, you need to build a rapport with your consumers.

This will help your business in various aspects like increasing sales, building loyalty, creating advocates, and creating a great customer experience to grow your business.

Little things like a hand-written note of gratitude or even a birthday card or gift could go a long way in cementing this relationship with your consumers. When buyers feel confident, and at ease with the brand, you’re more likely to get more product reviews on Shopify.

Conclusion

Social proof is a neat way to convert visitors to your Shopify store into customers. Product reviews provide social proof, showing potential buyers that other people enjoy your products. When they see this, they’re tempted to join the pack because they don’t want to miss out.

Therefore, you need to get in several customer reviews for Shopify. They will put stock in your offering. This is more evident when you display reviews next to each item in your product range.

This is why it’s so important to choose the right theme that allows you to aptly and prominently display product reviews and testimonials on your product pages.