How to Get More Product Reviews

Now more than ever, customers look at reviews before making a purchase. Reviews are an essential part of product sales, but getting them can be difficult, especially if your product is new. So how can you get more product reviews? Let’s take a look at a few strategies.

Do You Really Need Product Reviews?

First, do you really need product reviews? The short answer is, yes.

Surveys show that 98% of consumers think that reviews are an essential resource when making purchase decisions. And, the more reviews you have, the better. The likelihood of a product getting purchased increases 270% when it gets at least five reviews. Most customers say a product should have at least 26 reviews. Most customers also think that 40 or more reviews are necessary for an overall star-rating to be accurate.

There are also many ways to use product reviews. Product reviews can help increase conversions on your landing pages. Product reviews are also essential for your products to be competitive on online marketplaces like Amazon or Ebay.

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How to Get More Product Reviews

Product Delivery Note

When you deliver your products, include a note to ask for a product review. Emphasize to your customer how much product reviews mean to you. Use this template and customize it to get started. Don’t forget to include the right link or a scannable QR code to make it easy for your customer to contribute a review.

Hello!

Thanks for purchasing our product! We hope that you enjoy it. If this item works well for you, we hope you’ll consider writing a review! Visit our website at (URL here) or use the QR code to write a review. These reviews mean a lot to us, and they help other customers find us! We hope you’ll take a few minutes to help us out.

Thank you!

Beta Testers

If you’re trying to get product reviews for a new product, it can help to work with beta testers first. You might give some of your new products to a few loyal customers, social media influencers, or friends or family. This will help you not only improve on your product where necessary, but it can also help you gather your first product reviews.

Free Samples

Just like you might give beta testers a sample of your product before the official release, you might give free samples to loyal customers, social media influencers, or friends to get more product reviews.

However, keep in mind that most third-party review sites like Amazon or Google do not allow this practice. This can be a good way to gather more product reviews to use on your landing pages, however. For full transparency, you might include a note in the review like “This customer received a free sample of the product they reviewed.”

Follow-Up Email

Once your customer received their product, send a follow-up email to ask for a review. Customize this template and don’t forget to include a link to your review-gathering page. Or, if you’d prefer to get more product reviews on a third-party website, include the right link to submit a review to the site.

Hello!

Now that you’ve had a chance to try your product, we’d love your feedback. Use this link (URL HERE) or QR code to record some video feedback or write a product review. Tell us about some features you enjoy, how you use your product, or whatever comes to mind!

We appreciate your help. Your feedback helps us improve and helps us reach more great customers like you!

Thank you!

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Facebook Post

Asking for a product review on Facebook can be a great way to reach lots of customers at once. The customers that follow you on Facebook are also more likely to be fans of your product, too. Customize this template to write a product review request on Facebook.

Have you had a chance to try our new product? This is a hidden gem we’d like to share with even more people, and product reviews help us do it! If you’ve tried this product, it takes only three minutes to write a product review or submit a video! This helps us out so much! Mark off your good deed card for the day and submit a product review! (URL HERE)

Twitter Post

A Twitter post can also help you reach lots of people quickly. This post must be shorter, and it might reach people who aren’t just your fans. So, you may want to monitor responses and retweets more closely. If your time on Twitter has been contentious, this might not be a good avenue for you. Regardless, make sure you have a few responses to negative reviews ready as well.

Customize this Twitter post template to ask for a product review.

Have you tried our new product? If so, we’d love to get your feedback! This helps us out a lot and helps us find great new customers! (URL HERE)

Instagram Post

To ask for a product review with an Instagram post, you’ll need a compelling image or short video. This is a great way to use existing video reviews or written reviews you already have. Within your image or video, mention that you are looking for additional product reviews. This way, you’ll get your customers’ attention even if they don’t immediately read your post’s caption.

Customize this text to include in your Instagram post.

Have you tried this product? We’d love to get your feedback! Reviews from customers like you mean a lot to us and help us reach new customers. Show some love today and write a product review! Click on the link in our bio to write a review in just a few minutes!

Gift Card Rewards

Your customers are busy people, and they may need some incentives to provide a review. You might offer a gift card or discount in return for a product review. Keep in mind that most third-party websites do not allow this practice, but it might be effective for generating product reviews for your own website. Notify your customers about the gift card giveaway via email, social media, on your website, or in your store, if possible.

This practice can be considered paying for reviews, so it’s important to disclose how you gathered these reviews. You might include a statement like, “This customer received a gift card in exchange for their review after they purchased the product.”

Sweepstakes

A contest or giveaway can also help you get more product reviews. Let your customers know that they can win a prize if they submit a review for a particular product. This practice, like the previous one, is not allowed on most third-party websites, but it can be a good strategy for gathering reviews for your landing pages.

Notify your customers about the sweepstakes via email, social media, on your website, or in your store. Tell them about what they could win, like a vacation, shopping spree, year’s worth of products, or something else.

What You Can’t Do to Get More Product Reviews

There are many different strategies you might use to get more product reviews. However, there are some practices that you shouldn’t use. The following practices will put you in violation of rules set by the Federal Trade Commission, and can get you into legal hot water.

- Pay for reviews: Paying customers to provide reviews is not a good practice. In some cases, you can pay customers for their time, but you’ll need to disclose the payment.
- Use fake reviews: Making up reviews is illegal under FTC regulations. This practice has also generated lawsuits from third-party websites.
- Violate terms of service: Third-party websites like Amazon, Ebay, Google, Yelp and other sites have stricter rules when it comes to incentivizing reviews. Read the terms of service and be sure that your strategies to get more product reviews are following the rules.

If you’re looking for a way to quickly gather, organize, and edit your reviews, try Boast. You can easily create landing pages to gather video or text reviews, showcase the reviews on your site, share them on social media, and much more. Start a free trial today to test it out!