We all know that some people read product reviews and consider them when making purchase decisions. But did you know that nearly everyone does this? One study found that 93% of people have used a product review to help them decide whether or not to buy.
What’s that mean for you? If you sell something — anything — you need more reviews. And email is the best way to ask for them.
In this article, we’re going to look at ten ways to get more product reviews using email.
The statistics of asking for product reviews
How effective is asking?
One study of hotels and travel companies found that only 22% of people left reviews without being asked, but that number swelled to over 80% when they added a simple request.
If all you have to do is ask, that’s a pretty low bar to get four times as many reviews.
Another study found that 65% of people left reviews for local businesses when they were asked.
The most preferred method for requesting product reviews? Email. More than being asked in person, on a physical receipt, or through SMS, people prefer to be asked to leave reviews through email.
Ten ways to get more product reviews using email marketing
1. Use social influence
One great way to get more reviews is to show other reviews. Send an email with screenshots of reviews on social media, Google, your own site, or another review platform.
“Look at all these great reviews from other customers! Don’t miss your chance to voice your opinion!”
2. Ask for product reviews featuring photos or videos
Photos and videos aren’t just more powerful and effective. They’re also more credible. Fake reviews are a big problem these days, but it’s harder to fake a photo or video.
“Unboxing” videos are particularly popular for physical products. You can also ask for photos or videos that show the customer using your product.
Many review tools, including some WooCommerce extensions, allow users to upload rich media as part of their review. If you tend to allow reviews directly on your product pages, you should definitely consider a solution that has this capability.
But people can also leave “reviews” through social media posts. It may not contribute to a typical star rating, but it will get your business more attention and provide social proof that can lead to a boost in sales. Just include a clear set of directions explaining how the customer can do this.
Here are the key items to include:
- Take a photo or video of themselves using your product.
- Post it on their social media page.
- Tag your company using a specific hashtag.
With the tag, you can track how many people are responding to your product review email campaign.
3. Automate product review emails
To really ramp up your online review numbers, you need to automate this email process. You could simply add an email to the welcome series you build through MailPoet.
Create an email asking for a product review and add it to your post-purchase email sequence. Then, you’ll ask for reviews every time without having to remind yourself over and over.
And watch the timing…
The primary decision you need to make here concerns the timing of this email. When you schedule your product review email to go out depends on a few factors that vary by industry:
- How quickly after receiving your product is it likely to get used?
- How long does shipping take?
- Do customers see the effects of your product immediately? Or does it take time?
- Is your product perishable or edible?
For example, a bookseller would be silly to send a product review email the day after the book gets shipped. Few people will receive their product by the next day and even fewer will have had time to read the entire book. A more reasonable timeline would be a few weeks. A clothing retailer, however, would want to ask for reviews much sooner.
A food product that promises some change in physical feelings or appearance also should wait longer to ask for a review, so the customer has time to observe the effects of the product. But other types of food products could garner reviews much sooner.
You need to consider what timeline for your product will likely result in the highest-quality reviews — and more of them. You can also adjust your timeline and see how the results change.
4. Send a follow-up email
If you automate product review emails, there’s little reason not to send a follow-up too, especially if you avoid sending it to those who responded to the first one.
Send a friendly, lighthearted reminder giving them one more chance to leave a review.
5. Include an exact link
Google receives more reviews than any other platform on the internet. With Google, you can include the exact link in your email that takes your customer right to the form. All they have to do is type the review in the box provided, as long as they’re logged in to their Google account.
Most other platforms work similarly. Do your best to locate the most precise link that removes as many roadblocks to leaving a review as possible, and include that link in your email.
And to get better response rates, include the link as both a button and text.
Call to action buttons tend to get higher response rates because they’re visual. But sometimes buttons don’t load. Other times, people simply have more trust in text links. Buttons may not be effective for the percentage of your audience that uses screen readers. Whatever the reason, provide multiple avenues for people to get to a place to leave a review.
6. Consider who receives your product review emails
Should you send product review emails to everyone who buys a product? Maybe. If you just need more reviews and that’s your primary goal, then yes.
But perhaps you’re in a situation where you have a decent number of reviews, but too many of them are negative or just average.
One way to improve your review rating average is to only send product review emails to customers making their second purchase. These people are much more likely to leave positive reviews.
7. Give options for where to leave reviews
Requiring customers to only leave reviews on one platform might not get you the best results. Plus, it’s good to have reviews pointing to you from multiple places on the internet. This increases your visibility among potential visitors on varying platforms and can also look better to search engines.
So, consider offering multiple options for where to leave a review and provide direct links for each site.
You could let people choose between leaving a review on Google, Facebook, Yelp, or other major platforms. Or you could use a third-party review site like TrustPilot. If you’re using WooCommerce, there are a number of review extensions available in the extension library.
8. Use a survey to get higher-quality reviews
If your review process is internal, well-designed surveys can improve the quality of your product reviews. Reviews like “Great product! Love it!” don’t really share enough information to sway someone who’s looking for substance to help them make a decision. This is exactly where a survey prompt can help.
Here are some great prompts that will improve the quality of the content in your product reviews:
- If you were to recommend our product to a friend, what would you tell them?
- What is your favorite thing about the product?
- How has this product made a difference in your productivity (or another attribute applicable to your product)?
- Please share three ways this product has improved your quality of life.
You can adapt all of these to be more specific to your products and make them more effective.
For example, a product meant to save time could be prompted with something like this: “Please share how this product has helped you save time and be more efficient.”
9. Keep it short and fun
Product review emails don’t need to be very long. The best approach really only needs to hit on two points.
First, thank them again for making a purchase. Then, ask them to leave a review.
It’s good to express how much their reviews mean to you, which also serves as a good bridge between gratitude and your request. Here’s an example of a product review template:
“Thank you so much for your purchase of [product name]. We hope you’re enjoying it!
It’s very important to us that our product is the most effective one on the market.
Have you found that to be true for you? If so, would you please leave us a review? It would mean so much to us and will help other customers trying to make the right decision. Thank you!”
This is only three lines. Include the text link in the third line, then a CTA button below. Or if you’re offering multiple review options, include logos or CTA buttons for all of them.
10. Present the review as helpful to others
You saw an example of this in the review template in the previous strategy. Kindness is motivating. People like to be helpful, but they may not initially think of their review as being helpful to others.
Include this idea in your product review email as an incentive for leaving a review. Leaving feedback is kind and helpful, and all it takes is a couple of minutes.
You can amp this up even more with language that suggests leaving a review might help a friend. For example, you might say, “If your friend was considering buying our products, what would you want them to know?”
Get more product reviews
You can ask for product reviews in person, through email, via SMS, or even on receipts and invoices. You can also include a card or flier as part of your shipping experience. There are numerous ways to get more reviews, and you should pursue as many as you can in order to maximize your reputation.
The key is to make it easy for customers to leave a review, and easy for you to collect and display them.
Here are all the WooCommerce extensions related to getting more product reviews. And remember, MailPoet offers the best way to build custom WooCommerce emails directly in the WordPress dashboard.
