As an Amazon seller, your reputation is everything when it comes to becoming – and remaining – successful. As your business grows, one of the most important ways of securing your reputation is by the reviews left by your customers. When considering making a purchase online, many customers will immediately check out the reviews for the item and for you as a seller, meaning that the quality of your reviews can make or break your business. A great review will give a potential customer the confidence to make a purchase as well as boosting your rating as a seller. However, a negative review will very much have the opposite effect.
The following guide will help you to effectively manage your Amazon reviews and, more importantly, gain more positive ones.
Try to get more reviews from the beginning of selling on Amazon
When starting out as an Amazon seller, your goal should be to score positive reviews for your products right from the beginning. Anybody who uses popular review site, TripAdvisor, will tell you that, although they do, of course, read the positive reviews, it’s the negative ones that they pay most attention to. Even if you have a number of great reviews, one or two less than wonderful ones may put off a potential customer.
There are a number of ways you can obtain reviews for your products including:
Tapping the vine.
Amazon’s Vine Program is a premium service for Amazon sellers designed to increase product reviews. Sellers sign up to Amazon Vine for a fee (dependent on package and vendor) and can include up to 20 discounted or free products. Amazon will then invite high-quality reviewers to review your product(s).
The advantage of Amazon Vine is that the reviewers chosen are experienced and are likely to leave articulate and well thought out reviews. Although Vine is a really effective way of quickly increasing the number of reviews received for your product, be aware that there is no guarantee that only positive reviews will be received as with those received organically.
Amazon Trader Review Sites
Amazon trader review sites can be invaluable to a seller when used properly. Sellers can use sites such as Amz Special in order to secure reviews for their products. For as little as $0.99 per month, sellers can endorse and discount their products via the site and then reach out to customers to request reviews. The fact that products have been discounted gives sellers a head start when it comes to receiving positive reviews.
Other recommended Trader Review Sites include; Vipon (previously known as AMZ Review Trader) offers buyers discounts between 50% and 100% and, the approval system means that sellers can be selective about the buyers involved. One of the first Trader Review Sites, SnagShout works on the basis that, the more reviews a buyer leaves, the more incentives they receive. SnagShout does not require seller approval. Considered by many to be the best Amazon Review Trader Site, VIP Power Club has the highest discount rates, delivers directly to the buyer’s inbox and, is 100% legitimate.
There are, of course, pros and cons to using Amazon Trader Review Sites:
Pros
- Generates more reviews than through organic means
- Buyers are more likely to leave positive reviews for the discounted product
- Increased reviews help build trust in a seller
- Increases visibility for a seller’s product
Cons
- Competitors are able to leave fake negative reviews
- There is no guarantee that reviews will be positive
- May generate a higher volume of negative reviews
Although, as with anything, there are drawbacks to using Amazon Review Trader Sites, on the whole, the positives outweigh the negatives – if you have confidence in your product and customer service, this is a great way to boost your positive reviews.
Social Media For Reviews
Any business worth its salt knows the value of marketing products through social media. By creating pages and joining groups, you can tap into thousands of potential customers quickly and easily. Try creating a page for your product and post regularly to the page in order to engage and attract your customers.
There are a huge number of groups on Facebook which exist specifically to help sellers gain reviews. By joining these groups, an Amazon seller can showcase their product and request reviews.
For a comprehensive list of seller review Facebook pages, click HERE. Other social media sites for sellers include story sharing sites Instagram, and Pinterest and Google Plus.
Before posting your product onto social media, there are a few things to take into consideration:
Pros
- The ability to reach thousands of potential customers
- The possibility of positive interaction with customers and potential customers
- Quick and easy to post updates and news
- The ability to include links and images to engage a customer
Cons
- Can attract trolling
- Social media accounts can be suspended if a seller posts onto too many groups
- Negative feedback is instantly seen by a huge number of potential customers
When it comes to social media, it’s best to tread carefully – take the time to engage on the platforms rather than just constantly posting marketing material and adverts. Post sparingly in order to avoid sanctions by the social media provider.
Request reviews from Customers when you reach a certain amount of customers
Straight from the horse’s mouth. The AMZFinder Feedback Request system allows Amazon sellers to request reviews directly from their customers by sending emails to customers. The Review Request system offers multiple options for pricing plans: 500 emails for free, 2000 for $19, 5000 email addresses for $39 and, 10,000 emails for $59 and more.
Deal with negative reviews in time
Nobody likes receiving negative reviews -, particularly when, as a seller, you feel that a review is unfair. After receiving a negative review on a product, you can minimize the damage by following a few simple steps:
Don’t ignore it. If you feel that you’ve unjustly received a negative review, it’s important to act quickly to deal with the situation. In this situation, your options include:
Ask Amazon to remove the review.
If you feel that a negative review is unfair, untruthful or contains offensive content, you can ask Amazon to remove it. Go to your seller account dashboard and navigate to ‘customers and orders’ and then product ID and then, follow the instructions to request removal of the review. When explaining your reasons for the removal request, keep your message as short and concise as possible – a long-winded, whiny essay will generally result in a negative result from a disgruntled Amazon who has had to spend time reading through the whole thing. Amazon will then make a decision and let you know the outcome.
Use software to remove negative reviews
You can also use a software program to remove negative reviews from your account – The AMZFinder Review Management Feature allows users to match review to their products and then contact the reviewer directly in order to ask them to remove or to edit the review that they have left.
Try putting together a polite email explaining to the reviewer why you think they were unfair and asking if there is anything you can do to rectify the fact that they were not happy with their purchase.
It may be that the reviewer was in a bad mood when posting the review or, has since changed their mind, in which case they may be receptive to changing it.
If desired, you may offer an incentive to a customer, such as a free gift card – this should only be offered as an apology and should not be connected in any way with a request to remove a review as this is strictly against Amazon’s policies.
Receiving a great Amazon review is fantastic and can leave you walking on air but, a negative review needn’t be the end of the world. As a seller, it’s easy to feel dispirited after receiving a negative review but, using our guide, it’s always possible that you can reverse it and help to turn that frown upside down!
3 Comments
Hannah
Fantastic website. Lots of useful info here.
Alexis
Wonderful information