How to Get Customers to Leave Reviews? Brand Building for Businesses.
brand managers sitting together at office desk
"I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel." Maya Angelou
A happy customer is your brand ambassador. The more advocates you will have, the lesser you will spend on advertising. Social proof is a psychological phenomenon, and it does wonders for brands, services, or products. Over the years, several big brands have cracked the code on how to get customers to leave reviews that are positive for their products and services.
In 2012, Coca Cola installed "Happiness Machines" around the world that dispensed free coke instead of some antics like dancing, hugging the machine, etc. Around 2018, in a bid to revive sales, the company began a "Share a Coke" campaign across 70 countries. Every bottle had common names like dad, mom, daughter, friend written, so people were inspired to share them with their family, relative, or friends. This was taken further with the creation of a hashtag. The social media movement picked up as people happily posed pictures of sharing their beverage with their near and dear ones. This again created a positive brand image for the company.
Netflix has seen an unprecedented rise in its popularity. Its model has been simple from the start – upon registration; the user gets a free month of unlimited content, including the Netflix original productions. The company is so sure that the user will convert into a paying customer, that they don't mind the open access for 30 days. This has led to a massive rise in the platform's popularity, with the early users recommending and sharing their experience with their friends.
Even start-ups have made use of positive experience of customers. In its early days, Dropbox attracted considerable referral traffic. At the time when internet users had no idea about cloud services, Dropbox was offering an incredibly useful service. It gave an additional 500mb to every user who signed up using a referral code. Users enjoyed how they were able to accumulate more space, and this increased brand loyalty. This gave them a compelling reason to choose Dropbox over its competitors.
As you can see in all the three examples, the businesses focused on keeping their customers engaged and happy. All techniques were unique, but they had the same end goal – increasing brand awareness through customer loyalty.
There are so many factors that play a role in a customer's decision to buy from your company. Generally, people look to their friends and families for recommendations and then go online to look for options. Since it is so easy to place an order online without even talking to a sales representative, that the internet promotes for you – and this has a massive impact on whether customers purchase from you or not.
The fact of the matter is, your best marketers are your customers, not your sales representatives and customer service teams. If you figure out how to get customers to write online reviews or get them talking about your brand in a positive light, you've won half the war.
BrightLocal reports that as many as 85% of shoppers trust online reviews as much as they trust personal recommendations. The same survey found that positive reviews increase the trust of customers in a brand by 73%. Around 57% of buyers visit the business' website after reading positive feedback from previous customers.
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