Please consider this article as a help guide to seek customer feedback.
To say that customer reviews are powerful is an understatement. A few sentences in a review can have more influence on consumers than an entire website. A difference of one star—or even a half-star—can be all it takes for a shopper to choose a competitor over you.
There are just as many ways to ask customers for reviews as there are communication mediums within your business and marketing efforts. These include:
- In-person
- Over the phone (or via text)
- Via social media (direct message or post)
We follow three directories to get the most out of our reviews as it help us generate even better results.
Do’s while asking for a review.
-You don’t have to wait for a customer to come to you to ask them for a review. More often than not you’ll need to strike up a conversation with them that will provide the opportunity. You can do so by asking questions about their experience with your store, services, or products upon checkout. Good questions include:
- Did you find everything you were looking for today?
- Is this your first time [using the product you purchased]?
-Don’t force it
Don’t ask for a review upon a customer’s first positive remark about your business. Instead, get a read on the customer. If their response is short and indicative that they don’t feel like talking, don’t force it. If they respond positively and offer more information or feedback, continue the conversation. As it comes to a close, ask them for the review. For example:
-You can find plenty of opportunities to ask clients for reviews over the phone. But choose who you’re asking wisely. If you’ve just helped a client through a long or difficult problem, it’s probably not best to ask them for a review.
However, if you have a self-proclaimed satisfied customer (ideally if they express gratitude for your help), this is a great time to ask for a review.
-Nothing can make a customer feel quite as appreciated as when they receive a personal email from the business owner. Choose a handful of loyal customers who have done a great deal of business with you, or customers with whom you’re hoping to cultivate lasting relationships, and send them a personal note thanking them for their business and asking for the review.
-Most importantly don’t give up on the customers if they are not giving you the review in your first email. You’ll always have to follow up with the right person and make sure you change the strategies to send the follow up frequently for example
-Strategy 1 - You can ask the customer for a review once the designs are completed(website project) or if you already had 3-4 calls with the customers(Hubspot) or once the client says he loves the animation once you have shared the first draft you can ask him to review them on the clutch.
-Sometimes clients might be confused about how to review the directories you can always share these links so that they know the process of how to review.
-The frequency of the follow-up should be as follows you should at least send 7 follow-ups if you’re not receiving any reply from the client.
-The other way is to keep sending the follow-ups continuously for 4 days once the project is about to be finished/or finished see if you get a reply and if you still don’t you can wait for 2 days and then again start the cycle.
-Out of faith you can always offer some return gifts to the client if they’re willing to share the review it can include an amazon coupon, a free service/consultation, free logo animation.
Do Not to follow these things while asking for a review
-Putting too much focus on getting feedback or pushing too hard for online reviews can sour the relationship at a moment when it holds so much potential. Don’t survey too often and become a nuisance.
-Beyond helping you to understand your customer’s satisfaction and sentiments, direct feedback from surveys can be a rich vein for creating compelling marketing and sales materials.
Your customers are your most precious resource – listening to their feedback is the best way to make sure you’re keeping those relationships healthy.
-Do not wait for the project to get ended and then plan to have a review because it might not be possible for you to get a review at that point as we have already delivered everything and the client already have what he needed. Plan to ask for the review when you’re midway through the project.
- if you give your customers a particular template in which to send in a review it will be obvious that those comments were manipulated. Overall, you don’t want to give anyone uncomfortable “car salesman” vibes by manipulating them to say what you want, how you want, and when you want. Let your customers be who they are and report on their authentic experience.
Submitted by: Sandeep Kumar