Using customer reviews to acquire new customers

Customer reviews are important for your Shopify store but managing them can be a mess.

Part of the problem is that there are two types of reviews you should be collecting from customers:

1. Product reviews on the actual products they ordered
2. Company reviews on the buying experience

Most of the review apps for Shopify focus on Product reviews. Some will combine all of the product reviews and pretend they are company reviews.

Really the two types should be treated differently.

The problem is that it's difficult to get a customer to post a review in the first place so getting any kind of review from them is important. You don't want to prompt a customer twice to leave reviews.

Since the apps focus on products, put any of the reviews there.

Then have someone go through the product reviews and copy out any parts that are more company-based. Store those someplace safe (e.g. a document or spreadsheet) and make sure to use them in your marketing and sales copy.

For example, say a customer left a review of:

This ACME portable hole is great for catching birds. I wasn't sure what size to get but ACME's chat worked with me to pick out the best size for my wall

The whole thing is fine for the product review.

Then pull out the second sentence for your company reviews:

I wasn't sure what size to get but ACME's chat worked with me to pick out the best size for my wall

Based on what they said, this would be perfect to put on your Contact Us or Help page. Anyone going there to see that you're available to help with pre-sales questions.

The really great reviews you can feature on your homepage or other prominent places.

Done right, this will let you use the words of your most loyal customers to help sell your new, undecided customers.

Eric Davis