In Three Tips for Improving Your Ecommerce Sales, I suggested adding customer product reviews to your site. To follow up on this, I came across an article recently that described how a Customer Review Widget Increased eCommerce Sales by 36%. This was an interesting read and it describes how a Facebook widget was not successful but a Review Widget gave much better results.
Now, a direct comparison in the same month and year wasn't done here and there are a few ifs and buts about the tests but I think it's indicative that adding product reviews from customers are something you should try. Reviews from people who have previously bought the same product give potential purchasers the reassurance that they need to make a purchase.
I've been thinking about this. Do I read reviews? Well, Yes! I browsed many sites for a recent camera purchase and, as well as the camera review and technical specification on the site, it was the customer reviews that I was often reading to 'justify' and narrow down my decision.
If you add customer product reviews, you will have to manage and moderate their publication but I don't see that as a major problem. And there are a couple of other potential advantages:
- By adding reviews to your site, you are gaining valuable customer feedback on your products.
- Any product reviews will provide fresh content for Google to index.
So, it's well worth trying out customer reviews on your site. An increase in sales is the potential reward!