In the mad drive to build credibility for your brand, few
avenues carry as much weight as customer reviews. With more than two-thirds of
global consumers trusting the opinions posted by other consumers online, these
social signals can make a giant impact on your overall marketing success.
If you don’t already have a plan for encouraging customers
to recommend your products or services, it’s time to get started. Email can be
a fantastic tool for beefing up your reviews—so long as you follow these best
practices.
Tip 1: Stay On Brand
Your brand is your marketing equity, so wear it loud and
proud. Every email you send should match the tone, style, look and feel of your
brand, so your customers enjoy a consistent, cohesive experience. This inspires brand
loyalty.
It’s clear the marketers at Victoria’s Secret know their
brand intimately (pun intended!), because they ask for the review in a way
that’s both on brand and on target:
Tip 2: Make It Easy
We live in an era where “busy” is the most common response
to the question, “How have you been?” Everyone always seems to be running 100
miles per hour. Making rating a purchase too complex or time-consuming for your
customer probably means losing the opportunity.
American Eagle Outfitters makes the review process quick and
easy by letting the customer select the number of stars for the review right in
the email:
Tip 3: Make It Personal
I love the way ThisWear, a clothing retailer on Amazon.com,
turns its email into a personal request. We immediately see the email has been
sent by a real person (Kayla even included her picture), and we have to learn
more about the company’s story. After reading all of this, of course we want to
help them.
Tip 4: Reward the Customer
Keep in mind, your customers are always wondering, “What’s
in it for me?” While plenty of people are willing to post a review simply
because they love a product, including a small offer with your request can boost
your response rate even more.
Consider how Best Buy entices the customer with the
carrot of 25 points added to the customer’s loyalty account. It’s a small token
of gratitude that can mean a lot.
Tip 5: Don’t Worry About Being Fancy
Euromaids is a relatively small house-cleaning service
in the Chicago area. For this organization, reputation is everything. That’s
why it does everything it can to boost its reviews on Yelp. This email may not
be fancy, but it’s sincere, it’s personal, it offers the customer a great
reward and it’s hugely effective.
Customer reviews are essential to your brand’s continued
success, and leveraging email can help you create the buzz you need to take
your business to the next level. By following the examples set by these brands,
you can fill your marketing arsenal with the words of plenty of happy
customers.
