How to get reviews on Amazon: 5 expert tips for better ratings

This is a guest post by Kristen Hicks. She is a content writer at eComEngine, which offers software tools for Amazon sellers to help them optimize their inventory management and bring in more reviews to drive sales.

Many Amazon customers follow the same routine when researching products on the platform. They click on the product, look at the photos, skim the description, and scroll down to the review section to see what other customers have said.

Those reviews can make or break a customer’s decision to purchase. In fact, 93% of consumers say reviews influence their purchasing decisions.

For Amazon sellers, every good review you earn becomes a lucrative selling tool that can help you win more business. Plus, customer reviews provide you valuable insights into how people use your products and what they like about them.

But all the benefits of good reviews are dependent upon convincing customers to take some time to provide them. In this article, we’ll share five expert tips about how to get reviews on Amazon and improve your overall ratings.

By following these tips, you can increase the number of reviews you receive on Amazon. This will help you improve your product’s visibility, boost sales, and build trust with customers.

5 Ways to Get More Reviews on Amazon

Earning 5-star reviews on Amazon requires a two-pronged approach. To ensure success in garnering positive reviews, your strategy should focus on increasing the number of customers who leave feedback and providing them with a top-notch experience that earns the highest possible rating.

Without further ado, here’s how to get more reviews on Amazon.

1) Make Sure Your Products Meet Buyer Expectations

Providing a strong product is an absolute necessity for earning five-star reviews. If your product is made of flimsy material or breaks soon after arriving, plenty of customers will be quick to leave reviews—they just won’t be the kind of reviews that you want.

Whether your business is involved in the manufacturing process or you’re sourcing products from other companies, develop a process for quality control. The only way to consistently earn five-star reviews is to deliver products worthy of that rating.

2) Create an Accurate, Comprehensive Product Listing

Your product could be perfectly functional for its intended uses, but if customers expect it to do something it doesn’t, they’ll still be disappointed. The best way to avoid confusion and reach customers who genuinely want what you’re selling is to create a product listing that provides as much useful information as possible.

That could include:

• Multiple high-quality photos that show your product at different angles and in different colors (if relevant)
• A detailed description that includes materials and/or ingredients as well as common use cases
• Product measurements or a sizing guide
• Compatibility information, particularly for tech products and accessories
• Answers to common customer questions

You’re much more likely to get positive reviews if customers can confirm the product they’re ordering matches their needs and expectations.

3) Join the Amazon Vine Program

Getting reviews tends to be the most difficult when you’re launching new products. When customers can’t see what others have to say, they’re less likely to buy. And you can’t earn reviews until people start receiving your product. The Amazon Vine program is one potential solution to the problem.

For sellers who are registered with Vendor Central or the Amazon Brand Registry, the program helps you get new products into the hands of reviewers with a trusted reputation on the platform. The reviewers, known as Vine Voices, know how to write detailed, well-written reviews that provide the kind of information other customers are looking for.

The program will eat into your wallet though: you must pay $200 for each parent ASIN along with the cost of providing free products to participating reviewers. However, in exchange, you get a headstart in building the reputation of your products. For most sellers, that’s a win-win.

4) Proactively Request Reviews After Each Purchase

The most basic -but effective- strategy for how to get more reviews on Amazon is to ask for them. It sounds simple enough, but doing it at scale can be challenging. More importantly, you also have to ensure the way you ask keeps you in compliance with Amazon’s review policies.

Amazon allows sellers to ask customers for a review once within the first 30 days after the purchase. There are a few different ways that you can do so:

1. Manually send a review request through Amazon’s Buyer-Seller messaging service in Seller Central. Some customization is permitted, but you must proceed very carefully as certain rules apply.

2. Select the Amazon Request a Review button in Seller Central. This method sends an automated email that comes from Amazon, meaning you can’t customize the message in any way, but it will automatically translate it into the buyer’s preferred language. This is a big rule that sellers often break with manual requests.

3. Use an approved third-party software that connects to the Amazon API. Depending on the software you choose, this option could give you the ability to personalize your messages, while also offering automation features that make it easy to send a large number of review requests quickly and easily.

If you go the last route, make sure you choose an Amazon-approved third-party app that’s available in the Selling Partner Appstore.

5) Take Action on Feedback from Past Reviews

Reviews aren’t just useful to your customers, they’re a learning opportunity for you, too. Take advantage of the free feedback customers provide. The information they share can empower you to:

• Update your product listings to better reflect what customers like about your products
• Highlight common use cases for items that you hadn’t thought of
• Improve your products based on specific suggestions that customers make
• Identify new marketing opportunities both on and off Amazon

By incorporating what you learn into your business strategy moving forward, you can increase sales and create an even better customer experience, which then leads to more reviews. It’s a cycle that produces better results for everyone.

How to Get More Reviews on Amazon with Automation

The more successful your business becomes, the harder it is to get review requests out to every new customer that you earn. Using software designed for requesting reviews on Amazon can simplify the process while also improving your results.

FeedbackFive by eComEngine enables you to automate the process of sending review requests to customers at scale. And because the software was built specifically for Amazon sellers, it helps you stay compliant with Amazon’s rules and incorporate best practices to get your timing and messaging just right. You can also receive alerts for negative reviews and compile comprehensive review data for every single product that you sell. Learn more about the industry’s top-reviewed software and start a free trial today!