If you have been selling on amazon, you must be quite aware that its difficult to rank your products unless you have reviews on listing. If you have zero reviews then even selling with amazon ppc campaign gets difficult or has very low return on ad spend.
Having said that good reviews, they serve as social proof, and Amazon’s algorithm gives heavy weightage to the number of reviews on a product while ranking it.
In this article I will discuss all the tricks, tips, and methods, which I have been using successfully to get customers leave genuine feedback on my listings. Also I will disucss how you can get organic reviews on your product listings. So, let’s begin!
How Do Amazon Reviews And Ratings Affect You?
Amazon Reviews are one the main things that drive your sales. More positive reviews on a listing can significantly increase the sales of that product. After the launch of a product, the seller should focus extensively on getting customer reviews. Organically less than 1% of the customers review a product. However, using a few methods, you can increase this percentage.
Reviews and ratings on Amazon influence your ranking on the Amazon search engine. Amazon’s search engine algorithm considers the number of reviews, ratings, and quantity.
Additionally, having more customer reviews can make you eligible for Amazon Buy Box. The algorithm heavily weighs customer reviews and can increase your chances of getting the buy box.
Why Should You Care About Amazon Reviews?
According to a survey on consumer behavior, approximately 89% of online consumers read the reviews of a product before buying it online. Most of these customers say that positive product reviews are the main factors in their buying decision.
Amazon reviews are important for sellers because they build trust. If a customer reads positive reviews about a product, they will trust that this product is of good quality.
Customers will trust reviews other customers post more than the product description, pictures, and information the seller provides. Customer reviews prove authenticity; consumers will prefer products with more ratings than those with fewer ratings.
How To Get Amazon Reviews And Ratings
White Hat Strategies To Tet Amazon Reviews
1. Amazon Vine
Amazon Vine is a program initiated by amazon to help sellers to get more reviews and help them grown on Amazon. Under this program Amazon Sellers can receive reviews from trusted reviewers in exchange for free or discounted products.
However, the seller needs to meet specific criteria to utilize this program. This criterion includes having high customer satisfaction and good sales volume. New sellers or sellers with low sales cannot opt for this program.
You must consider that the Reviewers on Amazon vine will be unbiased and honest. There is no way that a seller can communicate with the reviewers or influence their content. So, if you are eligible for this program, ensure your products and services are at par for a good review.
2. Requesting a review on Amazon
- Between 4-30 days of purchase, you can use the “Request a Review button” to request a customer to review your product.
You can find this option under the Orders section of your Sellers account once you install the app on chrome.
You must stick to Amazon’s guidelines while requesting customer reviews and ensure you are not offering discounts or incentives in exchange for reviews.
Sending customer reminders for reviews can help you get better ratings on Amazon, ultimately boosting your sales.
According to a survey by FeedBack Express, the average review rate of sellers using the “Request a Review” button increased to 1-2%. This increase is significant because the organic review rate is usually less than 1%.
Automation
To utilize the “Request a review” button, you must go to each order, which can be tedious. Using automation can solve a lot of your problems of getting reviews. You need to reach out to your customers to get more reviews.
However, doing so manually can add a lot of burden on you. Tools like Jungle Scout that offer a Review Automation feature can fasten and simplify the entire process.
The Automation tools help you to send an automated review request to all your customers. You can monitor the status of these requests, set a custom time for sending out the review requests and customize your order table. These tools can help you save time and keep your data organized.
You can select the products you want to send the review request on and set a custom time, after which the tool will send out the review request. The tool has a dedicated dashboard with some fantastic features that can help you streamline the entire process of requisition reviews and tracking them.
Review Reminder Cards
Another great way to get more customer reviews is to include a physical card in your product packaging that reminds the customers to leave a review on your product page.
Including a reminder card in your packaging can increase your request's visibility and the chances of the customer leaving a review.
Additionally, you can put a link or a QR code that the customers can use to access your review page directly.
A few apps can create custom QR codes for you, which you can use to direct your customers to the review page. You can even get their feedback using customized survey questions and even provide incentives for their feedback. Getreviews.ai is one of the best apps for this and is even Amazon complaint.
This way, your customer won’t have to go and search for the product or put off reviewing it for later. Review cards can work as positive reinforcement, and you can add customized messages in the cards that show you value their feedback.
Launch Offers and Discounts
Having more sales volume means more customers and the chance of getting more reviews from them. So, many sellers offer significant discounts and launch offers while launching a new product to drive more sales.
Product giveaways, rebates on products, offers, and discounts can attract more customers to your product. Most Amazon Sellers offer 20-25% discounts on their new launches which get the product a good headstart.
This way, you can increase your sales, and there is a high probability that some of these purchasers will leave a rating. You need to keep in mind that requesting a review from the customers is still crucial.
Creating an Email List
If you haven’t already been creating an email list of your customer, it is the perfect time you start doing it. Building an email list will let you stay in touch with your previous customers, and you can direct them to your website for new products and offers.
Another benefit of creating an email list is that you can reach out to the customers and offer them direct benefits of being on the email list. You can offer early bird offers and discounts for your new launches, which will help you get a high sales velocity in the first few months of your launch. Sending a product page link instead of links to your website can make the customer more likely to leave a review.
One of the critical factors in getting more reviews on Amazon is ensuring that you value your customer and their feedback is extremely valuable. So, ensure these two elements are conveyed while sending them product links or emails.
Converting Seller Feedback to Product Review
There is a difference between Seller Feedback and Product Reviews; most customers don’t realize this while leaving a review. It comes down to the seller to remind the customers to leave a product review while leaving seller feedback.
You can view all the customers who leave positive feedback on your Seller's Account. You can also email these customers and request they leave a product review. You can also explain to the customers how to leave a review on Amazon.
There is only a tiny percentage of customers who leave a review. However, you must consider that there are more chances that the customers who have left positive seller feedback will also leave a product review.
Converting Negative Reviews to Positive
Negative reviews on your product can significantly affect your sales. There is nothing that kills your sales more than a bad review. However, reviews are reviews; you can find ways to convert bad reviews into good ones.
Earlier, the sellers were not allowed to contact the customers who left a bad review, but after 2021, sellers can reach out to customer who leaves a rating and review of 3-star or less. You can persuade these customers to change or delete their negative ratings or review. Acknowledge their concerns and tell them you are committed to resolving the issue.
However, this feature works only for sellers with their brands registered on Amazon, and you cannot send a custom message unless the customer responds to Amazon’s canned message.
This is not a way to get more reviews but improve your rating on Amazon.
Improving Product Packaging
Product packaging is part of customer service and can significantly improve customer satisfaction. At the same time, sending products with poor packaging can lead to dissatisfaction, and the customer is likely to leave negative feedback.
Improved protection in the packaging can ensure that there is no damage during transit. Apart from this, making the packaging more creative gives the customers a memorable unboxing experience. This can increase the likelihood of the customers leaving a review and even posting pictures of your product.
An enhanced presentation of your product includes well-designed packaging that stands out from those boring boxes. Giving the customers a better unboxing experience can lead to higher customer satisfaction and more product reviews.
The packaging is the first impression of your product; ensure that it leaves a mark on the customer. Good packaging can also increase brand visibility on social media and more reviews.
Customer Reviews for Service.
If you have provided excellent customer service, you can reach out to those customers to get a positive review for your product. Customer service includes pre and post-purchase services, answering customer inquiries, technical support, and services related to exchanges, returns, and refunds.
If you have engaged with a customer and helped them with your product-related service, you can directly ask them to leave a review. Since these customers are already satisfied with your customer service, there is a high chance that they will leave a review.
Most customers who converse with the seller before and after the purchase leave a review. You can reach out to them again if they don’t leave a review but make sure not to nag them all the time.
Other Ways To Get Amazon Product Reviews
Getting a review on Amazon can be challenging, especially if you are a new seller. We have discussed all the White Hat Tricks and ways to get more reviews on Amazon. However, these ways can often take time, and the percentage of customers who leave a product review is very low. The organic rate of customer reviews is even lower.
However, there are more ways to get reviews on your products. These include Grey and Black Hat techniques for getting more reviews. You should note here that all these techniques are against Amazon’s policies, and you may end up getting your Amazon account suspended if Amazon finds out.
But the world is competitive, and many Amazon sellers use these Black Hat tricks to get product reviews. I recommend that you stay clear of these techniques, but getting information about all the different ways to get reviews can be helpful. Let’s get started!
Reviews from Friends and Family
This is a very common trick, and most of the sellers on Amazon, at one time or another, have used their friends and family to get reviews on their products. Amazon’s Terms of Service strictly prohibits this way of getting reviews, and if it detects that the reviewers are related to the seller based on the shipping address and IP address, it can suspend your account.
However, you can use this in low volume and the shadows of genuine reviews. If a few reviews are solicited from friends and family, among many others, it can increase your rating, and the risk level is very low.
Facebook Review Groups
Another way to get Amazon reviews is through Facebook Review groups, where group members order your product and post customer reviews. After leaving a review, you can refund them. There are millions of Facebook Review groups; you can get them simply by searching the term on Facebook.
There is a high risk involved in this technique, and many accounts get suspended for this technique. To avoid getting detected by Amazon, ensure that all the transactions regarding the refund and review happen outside amazon.
Amazon constantly monitors the conversation and interaction between sellers and customers. Your account can get suspended even if it finds a single message related to an activity that goes against Amazon’s policies.
Email Append Services
Usually, the seller cannot access the customer’s personal information like email address and phone number. Amazon is very vigilant and maintains strict confidentiality regarding customer information.
Email Append services use shipping information from amazon and run it through different databases to extract the customers' personal information. You can use the customer information to remarket them on different social media platforms or Google.
This technique only sometimes works and has a success rate of less than 40%. It goes against Amazon’s policy, but the chances of detection are very low.
Zombie Accounts for Fake reviews.
This method is one with the highest level of risk. It is fairly common among Chinese sellers to get hundreds of fake reviews using this method, and Amazon is getting increasingly vigilant.
Zombie accounts are created by Hackers and sold on the dark web. People offering to post fake reviews buy them and offer these services to sellers. These people use a variety of tactics to avoid getting detected by Amazon, including changing or hiding their IP address, appearing more local and genuine, etc.
Amazon has become aware of the increasing number of fake reviews and has implemented several measures to reduce these instances. It has been upgrading its AI and machine learning algorithms to improve the detection of fake reviews. If Amazon detects that a seller has been using this tactic, it can permanently suspend their seller account.
Even after enhanced vigilance from Amazon, many sellers still use this method to get more product reviews.
Buying Reviews
Another way that many sellers get reviews on Amazon is by buying them. Sellers buy reviews from Facebook groups, paying for Zombie accounts and offering incentives.
Amazon prohibits sellers from offering any kind of incentive or discount in exchange for reviews. Still, it has become a common practice among sellers to get more reviews on their listings.
There is a high chance that Amazon can detect these fake reviews and suspend your account on the ground of fraudulent activity. However, sellers have become more clever in finding ways to stay undetected.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Is It Legal To Buy Reviews From Customers On Amazon?
It is legal to pay someone to review your product. However, Amazon’s Terms of Sale strictly prohibit such kind of activity. As a seller on Amazon, you cannot incentivize your customers to post reviews on your product.
How Much Does Amazon Reviews Cost?
Amazon does not pay anyone to post a review and prohibits sellers from offering incentives to customers for leaving a review. So, Amazon reviews do not cost anything.
Can I Offer a Rebate To Customers For Reviews on Amazon?
It is against Amazon’s policies to offer customers any kind of monetary or non-monetary benefits for leaving a review on products on Amazon.
What Happens if Amazon Detects Fake Reviews on Products?
Amazon is stringent regarding fake reviews and ratings. If it detects that any of the reviews on your product are fake, it can temporarily or permanently suspend your account.
Are Black Hat Tricks Worth a Try?
Some black hat tricks have a very low risk of getting detected by Amazon. However, in my opinion, you should not try any Black Hat tricks because even a slight detection by Amazon can lead to the suspension of your account.
Can You Get Sales Without Amazon Reviews?
Yes, it is possible that you will still get sales even without Amazon reviews. It is also possible to rank on Amazon without any reviews. All you need to do is utilize good marketing strategies like influencer marketing, social media presence, promotions, etc.
However, Amazon reviews are still very important to boost your sales.
What’s Next?
We have discussed all the ways in which you can get reviews on your products. However, this isn’t enough. You have to understand that sellers with dozens of reviews on Amazon know how to maintain them and keep the reviews consistent.
Maintaining the visibility of your good reviews, mitigating bad reviews, and consistently getting more reviews can help you rank better on Amazon.
A big mistake many sellers make is stopping engaging with their customers to get reviews. In the initial launch, getting reviews is a significant task for sellers who focus on it diligently. However, they depend solely on organic reviews in the later stages, impacting their sales growth.
I recommend using automated services to request customer reviews and prompt them after good customer service. This way, you can build a consistent flow of reviews that can increase your sales in the long run.
I hope this article helped you in getting a clear idea of the different ways of getting reviews on Amazon. For more helpful content on selling on Amazon, stay tuned!
Samrudha Salvi ‧ Author
With more than 5 years on selling on amazon, and helping 100s to get started on Amazon.
