There is nothing more convincing to buy a product than a good old recommendation from someone we know. People that read positive reviews are 105% more likely to purchase a product.Are you customer reviews ready

1. A re you
Customer
Reviews Ready?
Thepower of Wordof Mouth
Have you ever chosen your outfit based on your
mum?s advice? Have you ever purchased a
product because your friends told you they
loved it? Or have you ever bought a product
even though your friends told you how terrible
it was?
Even though you must advertise the new
collection of your company and spread
appealing promotional offers, there is nothing
more convincing to buy a product than a good
old recommendation from someone we know.
Word of mouth has always existed. However,
the advent of new the Internet and especially
of the social media has made it a double-edged
sword, giving you the opportunity of reaching a
much larger audience through testimonials. On
the other hand, negative comments concerning
your brand can and often go viral online and
deeply harm their reputation.
How can online word of mouth affect your
brand? How can you leverage the best out of
online word of mouth?
Effect on thebrand
3 out of 5: this is the number of shoppers that check online reviews
before purchasing a product. ?They can eliminate any doubts
potential customers may have about a product, or can help product
selection?(Charlton, 2012). Positive content generated by the
customer leads to more conversion as people that check these
reviews are 105% more likely to buy from you (Bazaarvoice,
Conversation Index, Q2 2011). To some extent, negative comments
can also increase the conversion rate of your business as long as
they are well balanced with positive comments. If you read only
positive comments, you don?t have any idea of how the product can
disappoint you and you start doubting its reliability. But if you read
both positive and negative testimonials, you realize how amazing the product is. If people have
experienced the negative aspects of a product but still comment on it positively, doesn?t it mean
that it?s actually a truly nice product that is worth the spending?
http://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/

2. However, too many negative comments and your
potential buyers will not think how amazing your
product really is but rather how terrible it can be. In
a word, this is all about your reputation. Sometimes,
even though your product might work, a bad
reputation might dramatically hit your sales. For
example, in its latest advert for its weight loss
collection, Protein World has drawn the ire from
feminists who considered their posters as sexist.
Everywhere in London, the posters were tagged
with protest from outraged people, while a petition
demanding their removal has already been signed
by more than 50,000 people and that public
demonstrations are to take place in Hyde Park
(Timpf, 2015).
http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/
If the extent to which this is going to hit Protein World?s sales isn?t known yet, Domino?s Pizza can?t
say the same thing. Remember, in 2009, two employees publish a video of them preparing pizza,
putting cheese in their nose before spreading it on the dough. In 3 days, the Youtube video
reached 1 million views and forced the Domino?s Pizza?s President to post a video to apologize for
the harm caused. Sales suddenly dropped by 39% and it took the fast food 3 quarters to recover
(Dumond, 2011).
How can you leverageit?
The danger of customer reviews is that they can
harm your reputation. So how should you
handle negative customer reviews? And what
do you have to do to take advantage of positive
ones?
Well, for positive reviews it is pretty simple.
Make sure there are visible in the most suitable
places. Display some on your welcome page to
help you increase the trust in your products.
Moreover, in a purchasing decision, there is
always a moment of hesitation. Your potential
buyer is thinking: should I buy this or not? Can I
find the same for a better price from another
company? Does that really fulfil my needs? And
this is exactly at this point that positive reviews
have the strongest impact. They help you erase
the last doubts in your customer?s mind. On the
other hand, dealing with negative reviews is all
about response, time and the team. Harris
Interactive found that if you respond to a bad
review, there is 33% chance that the
disappointed customer posted positive reviews
following your response and 34% delete their
negative comment(s) (Forbes, 2013).

3. Respond promptly! Remember what I have just said about Domino?s
Pizza. It took the video only 3 short days to reach 1 million views on
Youtube. How could that happen? Domino?s simply feared to raise
the attention on the video by commenting on it and so tried to let it
go in the first place. The best advice I can give you is to deal with
bad reviews as soon as you can. First because you give yourself the
chance to get feedback from your customers and your customers are
or at least should be your first focus. Second because you can avoid
a bad reputation to spread throughout the social web. If you deal
with the issue fast enough, people will have less to complain about
and you save yourself from a very dangerous situation.
Finally, to handle a reputation crisis, you must set up a team that will
understand the intricacies of your business. Obviously people from
the PRand marketing departments are essential for that. But you
should also consider the help of your lawyers and executives can do.
As reputation can harm your business as a whole, this is the whole
business that must be integrated in the crisis resolution (Flandez,
2009).
All about Control
In the end, both good and bad reviews are important to your business. Both can influence your
reputation and this is the reason why you must keep an eye on them. As Warren Buffet said, ?It
takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you'll do
things differently.?Your reputation is as important as the quality of your products. Stay aware of
what people say about you helps you to keep the control over your image. Do it well and you will
see a positive effect on your sales, positive reviews helping you enhance your conversion rate.
At Pictawall, engaging your customers is our expertise. Have you ever had to face negative
customer reviews? Tell us how you dealt with it.