SuccessFactorsOnlineReviewsPeople look to their surroundings and the "wisdom of the crowd" to confirm the correctness of their behavior. This phenomenon, the so-called social proof, takes place intuitively and is part of human nature. The more people do a certain thing, the more likely it is that others will copy that behavior. This also means that the more customers rate a company positively, the more likely it is that others will buy there.

In the online world, customer ratings are often the only point of reference that interested parties can base their purchasing decision on. And the trust of potential buyers is heavily influenced by public opinion through reviews. If they come across many positive reviews during their research, their willingness to buy increases. The customer base thus acts as an active brand ambassador to other customers.

For a company to benefit from successful online review management, a few points should be met, and a special focus be placed on the company's reputation. This results from the perceptions customers have of a company and what they convey to the outside world. In this context, reputation is formed to a large extent from the publicly visible customer ratings that a company receives. A good reputation shows credibility and trust in the company and is therefore considered the most valuable intangible asset. The prerequisite for this is a holistic overview of all customer ratings on all relevant platforms.

The first step to successful online review management is to identify all touchpoints during a customer journey. Therefore, all touchpoints must be consistent to always be informed about the current performance and satisfaction.

To make sure that as many potential customers as possible learn about the positive opinions about the company, it makes sense, for example, to publish reviews on social media or on your own website. Using it as a marketing tool is inexpensive but can have a big impact depending on the reach of corporate channels. But not only is the public opinion about your own company highly relevant and should be monitored but that of your direct competitors as well. Comparing your own ratings with those of the competition provides information about your position in the market.

Above all, companies must recognize and classify the relevance of online review management. There must be people responsible for monitoring, marketing, analysis and generating of the reviews. If these processes are designed completely manually, an enormous amount of time and resources is required, which can become very expensive in the long run, so the use of software is recommended.

Buying fake reviews or simply ignoring critical comments is an absolute no-go in online review management. Rather, it’s about providing dissatisfied customers with a quick, personal, and understanding response that shows they are heard and valued, which creates an opportunity for rethinking. To do this, the deficiencies criticized in the assessment must first be remedied.

Customer ratings are an important benchmark for prospective buyers. It is therefore of enormous advantage for a company to be able to show many positive reviews that customers use as a guide. So, if your goal is to get as many ratings as possible, it’s a good idea to actively collect feedback from happy consumers or create review campaigns that automatically generate genuine positive reviews.

The campaign enables customers, for example, to submit a review via QR code, email or directly on the company website. The positive reviews are then displayed to other customers on rating portals, while critical feedback is processed internally. The reputation of the company increases due to the higher number of positive reviews, which increases the market share and ultimately sales.

By MediaBUZZ