Business Through Word of Mouth: Customer Reviews [2024]

Introduction

Business Through Word of Mouth – Starting a business is tough, but keeping it going and, in turn, making money is even tougher. There are countless tips and tricks for creating a solid business plan. These will undoubtedly give you a better shot at building a successful company. However, as with anything in life, the best-laid plans rarely guarantee a smooth ride.

Theory and reality don’t always align, which means you need to be flexible when it comes to business. You might have a plan to attract customers, but what if that fails? This is when you need to adapt and find new ways to increase interest in your products and services.

Again, just as there are multiple ways to write a business plan, there are various ways to attract customers. One of the most effective is to use customers. In essence, you’re taking something you have and parlaying it into something more. Of course, you need to know your customers before you use them as a marketing tool. You need to think about the type of people that use your business and, in turn, what their desires are. However, the fundamental point here is that you can use customers and their opinions to promote your company.

Reviews Can Boost Your Business

Business Through Word of Mouth – What we’re getting at here are customer reviews. You can use your customers as a marketing tool by giving them a platform to voice their opinions. And, if you don’t want to do this in a direct way, you can leverage the power of positive reviews through third-party platforms. The key point here is the word “positive.” You want the reviews to be positive, so they encourage more people to try your business. But, and this is important, negative reviews shouldn’t be seen as a negative.

As long as you publicly acknowledge the negative reviews and address the points raised, you can turn them into positives. Indeed, if customers see that you’re actively engaging with critical comments and striving to be better, they’ll give you credit for that. This isn’t just theory. The facts support the idea that positive customer reviews can boost your business. A survey by Fan & Fuel found that 97% of people use customer reviews when they’re deciding whether or not to buy something. Additionally, 92% said that companies without any reviews made them hesitant.

Building on this, data from RewardStream shows that 90% of people are influenced by the views of others, particularly if they know the person. Moreover, 51% of people often make purchases based on recommendations. Therefore, as you can see, there are potential benefits to harnessing customer reviews. Indeed, this is something the travel industry figured out a long time ago. When TripAdvisor launched in 2000, it changed the travel game. Today, its reviews influence the spending decisions of millions.

Personal Opinions and Expert Insights Are Valuable

What’s interesting about TripAdvisor is how it’s evolved. It started out as a place where individuals could post reviews. That’s still the main component of the site. However, travel companies now engage with comments and even offer incentives for people to post positive reviews. Additionally, TripAdvisor aggregates reviews to create its own guides. Given its position in the travel industry and the vast amount of data it collates, these guides have a high degree of authority and, in turn, influence. It’s a similar story in the gambling industry.

Digital casino gaming is worth billions of dollars, and the market is saturated with options. Given that money exchanges hands and gamblers put a lot of stock in trust, reviews have become paramount.

Like TripAdvisor, the reviews and recommendations are a combination of player insights and expert opinions. Prospective customers can find real money online casinos by scrolling through automated and impartial ranking systems. These rankings offer additional links to overviews that outline a casino’s products, its promotions, and its payment options.

Again, these guides are the product of actual tests, market data, and customer opinions. Thus, casino gaming fans are not only able to find the best sites but the sites that are best for them.

Conclusion

Business Through Word of Mouth – We’ve already touched on how you can harness the power of positive reviews by asking customers to post comments on platforms such as TripAdvisor. You can also get them to share their experiences on social media. You can even go as far as offering incentives, such as discounts, if someone posts a review or shares some images of the products/services. This can’t be too overt though.

What’s more, you can’t encourage people to post fake reviews just to earn rewards. There needs to be a level of authenticity to what’s published, otherwise, people will see through the smokescreen. However, if you can strike the right balance and get customers to tell the world about you, you’ll have a great shot at making your business a success.