How to use customer reviews to help grow your brand
The importance of customer reviews is a conversation we have at length with nearly all our clients on a regular basis, many of which weren’t aware quite how important they are to a brand. Not only do they serve an SEO purpose but they can also give you some incredible insight into how your customers view your business, which can then inform your brand copy and content strategy.
Here we break down our top tips on how to use your customer reviews to help grow your brand.
They are a gold mine for good copy. What treasure can you find?
We often find that brands come to us with a distinct disconnect between their brand messaging and the audience they’re targeting. It’s easy to slip into the habit of writing what you think sounds good vs writing for your customer. And that’s where customer reviews come in. When you read through your customer reviews, look at the language they use to describe your business. Does that align with your existing copy? What words could you integrate more? Customer reviews can also highlight areas that people love about your brand, which you may not be talking enough about - e.g. your excellent customer service or gift wrapping offering or speed of shipping etc.
Can you turn any of them into testimonials?
When customers leave a review, often you’ll find they pack them with snippets that could be used as excellent testimonials or pull quotes to use on your website and/or content channels. It’s a great way to generate some authentic testimonials without having to lift a finger. Testimonials build trust. Trust builds loyalty. It’s the number one target for all your marketing.
What areas of your business are making people tick?
It’s easy to make assumptions as to what they USP or best part of your business is but once you’ve bedded in, started acquiring testimonials and building your customer base, your reviews can often paint a different picture. For example, you might emphasise the quality of your product within your core marketing but if your reviews are constantly indicating it’s your exceptional customer service that’s impressing them, this should be something you highlight more vehemently.
Reconnect with past clients / customers
When a client comes to us and says they have no reviews/testimonials to hand, we encourage them to actively reconnect with their client/customer base to seek them out. More often than not, they seem quite daunted by this request and worry that it’ll generate negative reviews they don’t want…but more often than not, we prove them wrong. What actually ends up happening is the nudge for a review serves as a reminder of their existence, which often leads to more work/sales and an important reconnection. Send them a nice email to reconnect and ask for a review. Make sure to include your Google review link. I promise you, you’ll be pleasantly surprised as to what comes out of it!
Support your SEO strategy
It’s simple really. Google seek out trusted sources to rank them higher. If lots of people are saying lots of nice things about a brand/business, Google will start to see them as an authority in their field and take note of them. Generating Google reviews works in tandem with your SEO strategy and is a crucial part of making it work. The more positive reviews, the better you’ll rank. Simples.
Don’t sweat the negative reviews…turn the frown upside down
It’s not always sunshine and daisies when it comes to reviews. Every now and then, a negative or constructive one will trickle in. Breathe…it’s ok when that happens. It’s how you handle it that matters. That can look like like an open apology and offer to remedy it, offering a discount off their next purchase, a response from the founder/CEO or, in moments where their negative review is wildly ridiculous, you can even turn it into a PR’able moment. Here’s a cool example of that…
Unplugged offers digital detoxes at off-grid cabins. A customer, having spent time in a cabin without her phone, realised her husband was insufferable. She emailed Hector, Unplugged’s founder, to blame him for the divorce she was now going through.
Hector turned to LinkedIn to ask if anyone had a good lawyer. As you can imagine, everyone found the story hilarious and shared the post. It got Unplugged attention, reinforced their USP, and increased sales.
