A few examples of how to arrange reviews on your website
Commercial websites and blogs that use reviews as proof of the quality of their service, products, and services are working with one of the of the most powerful triggers - trust. Writing and posting reviews has two important functions:
Provide potential customers with information about positive experiences of using a product or interacting with a company. Serve as social proof, as a large number of reviews indicate the popularity of a product. According to a survey conducted by Bright Local, almost 84% of users perceive customer reviews with the same level of trust as personal recommendations. Interesting fact! People most often read reviews on websites and social media about restaurants, hotels, and car dealerships, service stations, doctors and medical clinics, and online clothing and accessories stores.
How important are reviews on a website?
It’s not enough to just write a praise review. For it to really work and benefit the project, its structure must take into account the user’s experience.
Posting a positive review on the Internet doesn’t mean that people will necessarily believe you and immediately buy what you offer. Why is this so? Because template phrases immediately feel deceptive, and this is off-putting. This is compounded by incorrect presentation and lack of meaning. A good review helps businesses deal with objections and doubts of potential customers, and can increase their desire to make a purchase, as people see it as a solution to their problem or an opportunity to get what they want.
Please note! First, the idea is worked out, and only then the content, meaning, and format of presentation.
The main rule of how to write a good review
Let’s draw an analogy between a review and a person. What kind of person can you trust? Sincere, compassionate and understanding, reliable, someone who doesn’t get lost in the details. What happens if you see a false note? That’s right, you’ll stop trusting and want to break off contact with this person.
With reviews, the situation is the same. Potential customers will walk away if they feel deceived or connoted. From this, you can form the first and foremost rule of how to write a good review on a website:
The feedback should be convincing, realistic, and reflect an understanding of the clients’ pain, needs, and desires.
Why do people write reviews?
It is clear what benefits posting reviews on the Internet brings to businesses: confirmation of quality, popularity, and reputation. But what is the benefit for those who write them themselves? There are five reasons for this:
- Customers thank the company for their positive experience and help it grow.
- The ability to influence the quality of a product, service or service without consequences for yourself.
- In the case of a negative review, customers can express their dissatisfaction with the quality or share a story of unsuccessful cooperation.
- Opportunity to earn money. Some sites pay for posting reviews, regardless of their tone (positive or or negative). There are also businesses that are ready to buy reviews for the site.
- Some companies offer a discount or gift for posting reviews. Such offers are especially common in online stores cosmetics and clothing online stores.
Please note! Brief reviews such as “it’s okay” or “I didn’t like it at all” have no meaning or value.You can write or buy reviews on the site that are detailed, correct, and able to help both users and businesses alike.
How to write a good review?
There is no one-size-fits-all testimonial sample and no templates that always work for it. You’ll need to tailor the format for the niche and specifics of the project to make them useful. It is also important to consider the parameters of the target audience, product quality, market situation, etc.
Writing reviews is similar to writing an essay: add your feelings, tell a story about the topic, include conclusions, and you will you will get both a good essay and a review. However, there are other rules for making good reviews about a person, website, social media profiles, product, service, etc. social media profiles, products, services, etc.
Personal opinion
Any feedback, no matter what color it has, should be based on the experience gained. It should reflect their feelings about the use of the product, the quality of the service, or the interaction with the performer. Based on this, people form a generalized opinion that is individual to them. The author’s opinion should be credible, but third-party information should be avoided. For example, you don’t need expert opinions or other people’s experience, as this will create the impression of an advertising post.
Use numbers
In your review, include the parameters that are important to the user and can be measured and expressed in numbers. For example, describe the power of the of the device, how long the product lasts without breakdowns, for example, how many cameras are in the double-glazed window, and how quickly it was installed. Specifics relieve readers of doubts, and at the same time serve as a neat native ad. It is more valuable than a subjective assessment.
Pay attention. Mentioning product parameters, terms, or other numerical values often helps potential customers to make a purchase decision. Users especially appreciate reviews that include technical parameters, dimensions, and and indicate that all of these correspond to the declared properties.
Add details and nuances
These are the little things that indicate the authenticity of a review and make it more informative. Use them when describing services rather than products, but services. This will help others evaluate the quality of service and the services themselves, understand how well they suit them and whether the service has aspects that are important to a particular consumer.
Want an example? When you are looking for a hotel or recreation center, do you read reviews and what do you pay attention to? You pay attention to such nuances such as reservations, the possibility of checking in without them, check-in time, speed of service, etc.
Specify the pros and cons
Many marketplaces, such as Prom, and review sites use mini questionnaires in forms. In them, users can indicate the pros and cons of a purchase, service, or store. If there is such a questionnaire, fill it out, and if it doesn’t exist, manually write down what you liked or didn’t like. This is one way to write a good review.
Most products have both advantages and disadvantages. By pointing them out, you lead the reader to make a final decision: either to buy, wanting to get the benefits, or not. In the second case, you prevent a negative experience for the potential buyer and their future bad reviews.
Structured and organized
Any structured text is better perceived and easier to read. The same rule applies to testimonials. Create a small outline with mini-sections: when the order was made, how long it has been used, what it looks like, and what are the product’s parameters, your impressions and opinion, pros and cons. This way, you won’t miss anything important and will help your audience to better understand the offer through the information you provide. This outline will serve as a guide to how to write a good review. Readers will be able to quickly find what they need to know in a structured text, and they will be able to quickly find what they are interested in and show a higher level of trust in the author.
Make customer reviews complete on your website
This refers to the amount of information you can use to reveal all the important aspects. Some platforms, especially those specialized for reviews, have restrictions on the minimum number of characters. A review that is too short is considered uninformative.
The opposite side of this aspect is excessive length due to excessive information that is not directly related to the topic of the text. The reader is unlikely to finish reading an excessively long review, and as they study it, they may even get confused and not find the answer to their question.
Add photos and videos
Visualization is not always necessary, but sometimes it can provide much more information than words. Have you ever ever noticed this? When a product in a photo, especially against the background of other supporting objects, looks clearer than in the pictures in the catalog. Supplement this with a description, and you have a good informative review.
Sign the author
One of the nuances of how to write a review is to add the author’s name to it to get
- responses from other users;
- increased trust in the information;
- feedback from the store or manufacturer (if it is provided by the platform’s functionality);
- solving the problem if the previous methods did not work.
Show a respectful attitude
All sites and platforms have censorship, so comments with profanity are most often deleted. The same applies to dismissive attitudes, insults, and devaluation of the rights of others. Even if the experience of buying or interacting with the company was bad, it is important to avoid harsh and incorrect statements that are unpleasant for all participants, including other readers. In addition, to the author who allows himself to swear immediately loses credibility.
Be literate when writing negative and positive feedback
Reviews with many mistakes are unpleasant to read, and sometimes impossible. The reader focuses on the mistakes, stumbling over on every word, and does not perceive the essence of the message. It is best to check the text before publishing it using a special spell checking service.
Examples of how to design reviews beautifully
Making up reviews is not the best solution. Of course, you can order them to be written by a copywriter or do it yourself, and this will be a good start if you have nothing. But as your profile or business grows, it’s better to collect real reviews for your website or look for an alternative to social proof.
Now let’s look at examples of well-designed testimonials.
Example 1: Screenshots of reviews from social media
Check out the page of any course on the Genius Space website. Take, for example, Integrated Internet Marketing. We add screenshots of reviews with reactions and answers from other users. This increases the level of trust and confirms the expertise of our speakers.
Example 2: Video testimonials
As diverse as our educational products are, the formats of feedback vary. Some of our students leave video feedback, sharing their stories and results after the course. We post videos with feedback in a different section of the site
- so it is more convenient for users. This works to build trust and encourages people to take the training.
Example 3: Screenshots of Facebook posts with photos of the author of the review
For example, let’s take the Big Money University project. It was launched by Yevhen Cherniak, and one of the organizers is our GeniusMarketing is one of the organizers. This event has a high level of trust because its organizers, speakers, hosts, and headliners are well-known people with excellent reputations. But posting positive reviews with photos or videos of participants works as an additional trigger trust and motivation to attend the event when it is held again.
Example 4: Screenshots of Instagram stories
In stories, people share their experiences and impressions “in the moment.” Their authenticity is rarely questioned. Thanks to to this approach, those who look at reviews mentioning a brand/company/course have a desire to get the same thing, to achieve the same level of success. The format is suitable for products from the “medium+” and “premium” categories, as well as for businesses whose target audience is socially active people who strive for success and a spectacular appearance.
Example 5: Screenshots of correspondence with a client
Satisfied customers usually don’t skimp on words of gratitude and good ratings, so they often post on social media. Take a screenshot and add it to your Instagram stories, Facebook album, website, etc. The format is suitable for any niche, standard and exclusive products.
Example 6: Part of a testimonial with the option to read it in full
Some messages can be quite long. A good way to organize reviews is to make a clipping of the of the most interesting and important things or insert a separate fragment. Don’t forget to leave a link where users can read the the original and verify its authenticity.
Example 7: Customer testimonial with a photo of the customer in a business setting
Testimonials on behalf of the company owner or its top manager who used B2B services look impressive. this applies to large-scale construction, banking and insurance services, and legal support.
Example 8: Add Google reviews to your website
We found a good example of a review on the website of Auto-Profi service station, which has integrated a message from the company’s Google profile on its main page.
Example 9: Integrating social media reviews into a website
We actively use Facebook, as this platform has many advantages, including the ability to use special plug-ins to insert comments on posts with the right products on the site.
Example 10: Review for each product
This is very successfully implemented on the Rozetka and Prom marketplaces, as well as in the online stores Parfums.ua and Makeup.ua. First of all it is convenient for the users themselves: they open the page to get acquainted with the product and immediately find out what is being said about it. Secondly, it increases trust in the products and the seller.
Example 11: Desired outcome, textual feedback and work samples
Raskras.com.ua, an online store selling paintings by numbers, has added the ability to add a review with a photo to a specific product. Other customers can see what the final result will be, how it looks in the process, and how satisfied customers are with the quality.
Example 12: Photo of a master’s work and a review of it
The example of a review of a tattoo artist’s work on barb.ua shows how informative such a message is. Potential clients of this tattoo artist will see the quality of his work in the photo, and through a text message, they will understand whether to to trust them and what emotions they evoke.
Example 13: Feedback feed
At its core, this is a small block on the website page that allows you to scroll through the feed and view a series of screens with reviews from social networks. This option is suitable for those who have already accumulated a lot of reviews.
Example 14: Timeline from different sources
One of the fashionable Ukrainian women’s clothing brands publishes reviews organized by time. Messages are strung together on it from Instagram, Viber, and other communication channels.
Example 15: Social media screenshots on the main banner of the website
A good example was implemented by the WayUp platform: by hovering over a student’s avatar, you can open their video feedback about their studies and course.
Example 16: Add a link to the service to your review
This technique works very well for beauty salons, service centers for the repair of small appliances and gadgets, repair and construction companies, law firms, various outsourcing services, etc. Thanks to the active link, site navigation is easier: A user reads a review, gets interested in a service, and can immediately go to the page with it.
Combine different feedback formats
A combination of different types of feedback can look interesting and work very effectively. The technique allows you to attract the attention of different users: some prefer to read a message, others prefer to watch a video. It is only important to keep the balance. Let’s follow the examples below.
Example 17: Text interview with video feedback
Poster has masterfully utilized this approach. There are separate pages with customer case studies, which contain a brief description of what the video interview what the interview video is about, and feedback on the use of solutions from this company. When you start watching a video, it is convenient to to use the timeline below the video, and a text version is added below it. Therefore, one post can reach two types of people:Those who prefer to read and those who prefer videos.
Example 18: Good review in video+photo format
This option is well suited for fitness centers, beauty salons, stylists, and other companies where people change. You can show the changes in photos and videos, and a text review will help to support them.
Example 19: Link to an online store added to a review
The reception is suitable for the B2B sector, when you can add a link to a completed project. It’s a good opportunity to showcase your potential and case studies.
Checklist on how to choose the format of the block with reviews
Do you want a simple and concise guide to choosing a way to submit feedback? We have prepared a clear seven-point checklist for you:
- Create a portrait of your target audience and segment it.
- Think about what format is best for these people: short, long, light, or detailed?
- Evaluate whether you need a powerful emotional charge or more rationality in the presentation?
- What is better for the target audience - text or video?
- Which social network does the majority of your audience use - Instagram or Facebook?
- What emotions and thoughts should the testimonial block evoke?
- What objections need to be worked out by posting positive reviews on the site. You can check out a competitor’s a competitor’s testimonial to get inspiration.