Your business can add credibility and
complexity to its content when you regularly incorporate the positive feedback
your customers leave. This practice has an added bonus of rewarding customers
for their praise, strengthening your relationship with them and encouraging
others to follow in their footsteps.
You may think that simply regurgitating
customer acclaim can seem like a cheap or shallow tactic. When you go about
using customer reviews incorrectly, that can absolutely be the case.
But when you can masterfully weave praise into
your content marketing and collateral materials, it feels like a natural fit.
Your content becomes richer, and your brand name becomes more credible.
According to eMarketer research, [online reviews are by far the most trusted source of\\
business information](https://www.emarketer.com/Article/Consumer-Trust-Evolving-Digital-Age/1014959 "Link: https://www.emarketer.com/Article/Consumer-Trust-Evolving-Digital-Age/1014959")
. In fact, 8 percent more people 18+
trust online reviews compared to their own friends, family and colleagues.
Putting your reviews front and center in your content offers documented proof
of peer approval, and no one has to go digging into third-party sites to find
that proof.
So if you’re considering using customer
reviews to obtain all of the above benefits and more, try putting the following
strategies into action.
Pepper Website Pages, and Especially Landing Pages, With Embedded Reviews and Accolades
Businesses have a huge trust gap they must
clear when a potential customer or client first arrives at their website. No
matter how comforting or flashy the site is, customers are always on the
lookout for signs that they could get burned. They may scrutinize your claims
or look for fine print that reveals how your offers aren’t what they seem.
Oftentimes, they will look to outside
resources before they can let down their guard. A study by Nielsen and the
Better Business Bureau unveiled that [over half (55 percent) of all U.S. adults online “always”\\
or “often” used ratings and reviews](https://retail.emarketer.com/article/just-how-influential-online-reviews/59d55a6bebd4000aa48d8e5e)
to inform their
purchase decisions. The trend deepens among those under 55, where only 7.5
percent of people say they “rarely” or “never” look at reviews.
Incorporating reviews right there on your web
page immediately begins to chip away at their defenses. They can feel a tinge
of relief knowing explicitly that your business has rewarded others for their
trust. Evidence that people don’t regret spending their hard-earned money on your
products or services can reduce the natural hesitation some people might feel.
You also potentially negate their need to go
hunting for outside information on your brand. If they already see positive
reviews or a live meter documenting your score aggregate for a site like Yelp,
then they don’t need to go wading into all of the other reviews online. By
extension, they are much less likely to encounter negative reviews that color
your business in an unfavorable light.
Even if someone does do their own homework and
encounters a mixture of positive and negative reviews, their first impressions
are already fairly rosy. Each negative reviewer must then make their case for
why this positive first impression is wrong.
When incorporating testimonials and feedback
on your web pages, be sure to use the following best practices:
● **Take a second to re-read the third-party reviews site’s policy on**
**sharing reviews.**
They may have limitations on how you
use them.
● **Always ask the reviewer for permission.**
Nothing hurts worse than having someone who praised your business turn around
and complain that their own words were used unethically.
● **Don’t take things out of context.**
Using an
excerpt of a review is fine, but don’t cherry-pick statements that are actually
out of color for the nature of the review as a whole. For instance, don’t take
just the positive things someone conceded out a scathingly negative review.
● **Quote the person verbatim.**
Changing words
around or using tricks like mashing two unrelated things together to make a
sentence is absolutely deceptive and unethical. You may even be subject to FTC penalties
.
● **Favor embedded reviews over text quotes.**
Most
third-party sites actually demand that you use embedded features since these
are more transparent. When you receive direct feedback, such as on a blog
comment, try to embed the message itself when possible.
Share Interesting or Glowing Reviews to Social Media
Getting people to leave reviews is hard work!
Unless, of course, they had a bad experience. According to one study of 2,000
U.S. consumers, [over half of people say they’re likely to publicly\\
complain about a bad experience with a business](https://www.socialmediatoday.com/social-business/how-and-why-customers-leave-negative-reviews-infographic)
—often
resulting in a bad review.
A second study found that most people only
leave a positive review if they were overwhelmed with how great their
experience was. “If instead you had a moderate view, you’re likely to have left
no review at all, finding it not worth the time and effort,” say the researchers in the _Harvard Business Review_
.
So how do you encourage people to leave a
review if they aren’t angry with you and they weren’t absolutely blown away?
Simple: reward them with a public mention!
By sharing someone’s positive review online,
you reinforce the behavior. You also encourage others who want public
recognition and attention to leave reviews of their own.
Again, follow the guidelines above. Certain
platforms like Yelp forbid copying and pasting review text, for example. You
also absolutely need to secure permission from the person before sharing, even
if their praise was a public comment on one of your social media or blog posts.
Let Reviews Inspire Your Content Marketing Strategy
Content should solve audience needs and
conclude with a gentle promotional nudge towards your company. Treading this
narrow path between information and promotion is admittedly difficult for most
businesses. [Seventy-nine percent of editors say they have to turn\\
down guest blog pitches because they’re overpromotional](https://www.inc.com/john-hall/3-stats-to-know-if-you-use-content-to-reach-your-audience.html "Link: https://www.inc.com/john-hall/3-stats-to-know-if-you-use-content-to-reach-your-audience.html")
.
The problem is that most businesses can’t find
an angle. “8 Reasons Our Food Is Amazing” is something no one would want to
click on! But “10 Keys to Improving Customer Service” can work, especially if
you’re able to point to specific best practices you can use.
When writing these types of articles, starting
with positive features of your business or product as a jumping-off point can
lead to a disconnect. In other words, your business could be proud of something
that no one really notices.
Instead, take a look at your own reviews to
get inspired. Take a look at this review below to see what we mean.
Here, you can see that the person cites six
different positive reasons they love coming to the resort; it was clean, pet
friendly, had great cabins, lots of site availability, a swimming beach and
also a swimming pool.
Taking that list, you can simply write an
article about the “6 Most Important Things to Look for in a Camping Resort.”
Since you know people enjoy these things about your business, you can mention
them honestly. You can also write while thinking about the perspective of a
customer who has been to a campsite that is not clean or that regularly has
overcrowded and overbooked sites.
Of course, you can also use negative criticism
to inspire you. If you have had issues in the past with bad customer service,
you can list “X Things We’ve Changed to Make Your Experience Better” to win
people back.
Getting More Customer Reviews to Use in Your Content Marketing
All of the strategies listed above depend on a
constant, fresh stream of customer feedback. If your most recent review was
from 2014, you may have a problem!
To counteract this issue, make leaving a
review as convenient as possible. You can use third-party software tools to
automatically send an email to someone and ask them for their review on your
preferred platform. You can also leave a convenient link on your home page so
that everyone can easily find their way to your review pages.
Don’t just encourage people to go on sites
like TripAdvisor or Yelp, either. You can ask for more detailed feedback in an
email or through an online form submission. Reach out to some of your most
loyal or satisfied guests to see if they would take the time to write a one to
three paragraph testimonial on your behalf.
You can use these longer reviews (with their
permission) as quotes or embedded reviews framing your content or occupying
your most critical landing pages.
Another surefire method to jog people’s memory
is to use marketing collateral offered by review platforms both online and in
real life. Place window decals on your entrance, or include a ready-to-print
plaque right by your cash register.
Train sales associates and customer-facing
reps to ask for feedback at the end of every interaction. Be aware of specific
platform policies, though. For instance, [Yelp demands that\\
you only use certain brand materials in certain ways](https://www.yelp.com/brand)
.
They also have a strict policy where you can’t ask people to “review our
business on Yelp!”
With just a small amount of effort, your
content quality and credibility can be dramatically improved by using customer
reviews in clever ways. Customers’ trust absolutely thrives on documented
proof, and they like to see that their words matter when they have something to
say.
Sharing their reviews is the best way to tell
them “thank you” and that their opinion is important. That’s customer service
and content marketing rolled into one!