I know Angie's List, Yelp and TripAdvisor focus heavily on reviews. For a business site that includes professionals, are reviews a good feature?
Reviews are a powerful capability that gives credibility for transparency. You also have to be prepared for those open conversations - as you know from referencing those three sites. This means committing to authenticity (as cooked reviews are a major mistake some have attempted) and navigating the appropriate moderation of reviews.
It really is driven by what your B2B goals are on your business site. Some sites have handled building credibility through questions and answers (i.e. Quora, LinkedIn, et al). There you can allow users to rate answers - and also allow for flagging of those that don't pass the genuine test.
I call it the Amazon effect (others use eBay) as they were among the first to offer reviews on a massive scale. It is powerful and influences decision making, purchasing and attitude toward products, services or even the site itself.
Having designed policies for social communications, customer service communications and more in B2B environments - I've seen reviews work well and not so well. It can be done - but requires judicious planning for rules of moderation and engagement, and for how readers of reviews can reward or flag them.
I'd be glad to hold a follow up on this and talk through those elements.
I believe that reviews, especially "verified" ones that can only be left by customers or other association (ex: investor / vendor / etc) are critical to help get someone over the hurdle of making a request.
Think about making the decision to rent a movie, what do you want to see to ensure you're not making a bad decision?
This is especially true for less concrete service like general contractors, etc - since there's no fixed unit of the transaction you can curate for (ex: Uber drivers, Airbnb listings).
Always up for a call if need be.
Customers Reviews are a great way to build credibility and increase trust in your customer’s mind. A recent survey (Local Consumer Review Survey 2013) by BrightLocal.com revealed valuable information about how important reviews are and how they influence the consumer’s trust and decision to contact local businesses. The number of consumers who read online customer reviews to determine whether a local business is a good business is increasing every year. Here is the link to BrightLocal report
http://www.brightlocal.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Local-Consuner-Review-Survey-20131.pdf
In addition having a frequently updated page with reviews on your website is a great on-page optimization strategy and an online reputation management method that is often overlooked.
"YES" - current, high-profile (known business representatives) reviews establish realtime credibility.
"NO" - outdated, abstract reviews can appear desperate.
Personally, I stay away from self-promoting reviews in my marketing. New clients can see portfolio examples of my work from clients past and present .
The quality and craftsmanship of your product or service far outweighs any referral.
Yes, reviews are good features depending upon which industry you deal with.
If you are associated with the eCommerce industry then the review feature is a must from a customer point of view.
For example, if you are an entrepreneur and are into the restaurant business or food delivery business like GrubHub a review feature is a requirement for such business.
1) From the customer point of view, a review feature is required to share their experience, share suggestions, look for advice by viewing other reviews, etc.
2) From a restaurant point, you can instantly reply to the reviews and suggestions shared by the customers. Reviews are the honest way to know what the customer feels about your product or service.
How to add the review feature to your online business model visit: https://www.yoyumm.com/ for detailed information related to review features for restaurants, admin, and delivery staff.
Reviews play a major role in decision making for a customer which is why you can not ignore this feature.
Here are some more reasons in support of having a review feature:
1) The online reviews on your website help your eCommerce business boost your SEO
2) Reviews also play a major role in brand loyalty.
3) Reviews feature connects you directly to your customers, and you get a clear picture of what your customers expect from you.
4) If you consider the customer buying behavior, in that case, a customer always prefers and recommends a product that has good reviews and ration. It automatically becomes the first choice of the customer.
5) Online reviews also increase sales.
6) Customers trust the reviews posted online.
7) As per the customer’s buying behavior, 90% of the customers first check out the online reviews before making a purchase online.
I strongly believe that the review feature is a must in today’s business world. Online reviews can also impact the conversion rate of your website. Read https://www.fatbit.com/fab/online-reviews-impact-conversion-rate-online-store/ for more information related to the conversion rate with respect to reviews online.
The reviews are important in the marketplace. The reasons being the following:
1) Better Understand your Customers & Improve Customer Service: Analyzing reviews left to you by customers helps keep your feet on the ground in respect to overall customer satisfaction, as they can provide your business with feedback regarding what your customers truly want. By using this information as input, you will be able to improve customer service by quickly and efficiently resolve the issues that consumers faced, thereby creating a positive experience for the consumer and keeping your focus on their needs.
2) Credibility & Social Proof: No doubt, we are social creatures since the moment we come to this world and we are interested in knowing what other say before we make our buying decisions. Much like we would ask friends and family for recommendations, review sites allow us to do this online with just some clicks.
3) Fight with experience to save margins: Reviews enable new businesses to stand shoulder to shoulder with more established competition, and potentially gain a positive niche in people’s estimation and expectations.
4) Allow Consumers to Have a Voice and Create Customer Loyalty: Consumers that take the time to leave an online review for your business are far more likely to feel a certain loyalty to you and keep coming back. Through the act of leaving a review and establishing a relationship with your business, it allows consumers to feel like they have a voice even behind a desktop and/or mobile and/ or tablet screen and are able to provide feedback in a positive and meaningful way.
5) Improve Rankings: Reviews appear to be the most prominent ranking factor in local search. It helps businesses rank well even if they have low quality link profiles. According to Google, “pages with reviews which mention a keyword and/or the name of a city, were found to have higher rankings in Google’s local pack. At a high level, having a keyword you are trying to rank for, and a mention of a city you are working to rank in, in reviews has a high correlation with high ranking Google My Business results”.
6) Consumers are Doing your Marketing for You: Positive online business reviews are worth a great deal and can offer your business benefits that a simple marketing campaign can’ t. In a nutshell, they are like micro – marketing campaigns that keep working long after the online review has been posted, providing, thus, a constant positive image to potential customers and creating a continual brand awareness that benefits the business for both the short and the long term.
7) Reviews Generate More Reviews: When a business has already received online reviews, it encourages other visitors to leave their own feedback. Just the appearance of several reviews seems to be enough to give new customers the incentive and confidence to submit their own opinion on a particular product or service.
Besides if you do have any questions give me a call: https://clarity.fm/joy-brotonath
