As a business owner, it is vital that you know the value of your activities, investments, and marketing. This is particularly true when it comes to assets that help drive profitability and grow your customer base. So, what value can you place on a single positive review? How much might a negative review cost your business? Let’s look at the value of an online review and the impact on your business. Continue reading “The Worth of Online Reviews”
For businesses large and small, being active on social media is a critical consideration. Today, consumers expect the businesses they patronize to not only have a robust website, but also to have a social media presence. That means Facebook is a must, and you’ll need to create a Facebook Business page. However, you can’t simply build a page and be done. There’s work that must be done, and you need to ensure that you’re doing the right thing with your page. Not sure what those might be? We’ll cover five things that you really must do with your Facebook business page below. Continue reading “5 Things You Should Be Doing With Your Facebook Business Page”
It’s no secret. Most people would much rather communicate via text message than on the phone or over email. It’s a lot less intrusive and a much more efficient way to engage. As people became comfortable texting their friends, they started looking for opportunities to engage with businesses that same way. Continue reading “What Is Business Text Messaging?”
Online customer reviews have been making waves for some time now. They originated in the world of e-commerce, but have quickly spread to virtually every type of business. There are even entire websites dedicated to nothing but allowing customers to review the businesses they patronize. Why do online customer reviews matter so much? What is it about these reviews that allows them to have such a dramatic impact on businesses large and small?
Perhaps the single best summation of why online reviews matter is that they are read and trusted by other consumers. A recent survey found that 90% of internet users read reviews before visiting a local business and that 85% of those consumers trusted the reviews as much as they would a personal recommendation from a family member or friend.
It goes beyond this, though. Customers are using those reviews to inform their shopping and spending habits. For instance, if a business has excellent reviews, consumers are likely to spend 31% more money with that business than with another one that has lower reviews. Note that this has nothing to do with product price, the perception of quality, level of service, or any other traditional metric. It is predicated strictly on the number and rating of reviews.
Why is that, though? Seventy-two percent of consumers say that it is all about trust. A business with positive reviews, particularly a local business, is seen as much more trustworthy as one with no reviews, and definitely more so than one with negative reviews.
As mentioned, customer reviews have an impact on all businesses, large or small, local, national or international. However, they have more of an impact on smaller, local businesses than they do on international conglomerates. For instance, Joe’s Shoes is going to be much more affected by a negative review from a customer than larger national brands.
What does that mean for local businesses? Simply put, a good reputation is imperative. Ninety-two percent of consumers will buy from a local business if they have at least a four-star rating, and 72% of consumers will buy from a company only after reading a positive review. That means a negative review has the potential to knock your star average down, but also to prevent a significant number of potential customers from walking through your business’ doors if it isn’t properly addressed
Really, it comes down to trust. And trust can be hard to build without online reviews. For instance, 8% of consumers state they read no reviews before buying from a company, but 24% said they read two to three reviews. Thirty-two percent report reading four to six reviews before deciding to buy from a company. The magic number seems to be four to six reviews, as consumers trail off beyond that point. 18% of consumers report reading seven to 10 reviews, and only 8% report reading 11 to 20 reviews.
Consumers point out that they use online customer reviews to determine several important traits in the businesses they patronize. For most consumers, the critical traits are professionalism, expertise, and reliability.
As you can see, online customer reviews are of vital importance for businesses, particularly for local companies. It is essential that business owners monitor online conversation, and take action. All reviews should be responded to, including positive ones, but negative reviews must be handled with care.
Infographic by- Invesp
Facebook Messenger has become an important tool for businesses that use Facebook’s social network. It allows you to communicate with your customers in a range of ways, and even provide customer service and support through chat. While you can do this easily through the Facebook platform or via the Messenger app for your tablet or smartphone, you can also add Facebook Messenger to your website. Continue reading “How to Add Facebook Messenger To Your Website”
Struggling to determine which marketing methods are best suited to reaching your particular audience? Stymied by the growing number of options out there, ranging from mass mailing to email marketing to social media marketing. Well, let’s throw one more your way — SMS marketing. There’s a good chance that SMS Marketing will replace one or more of your other, less successful options, and there are quite a few reasons that it deserves a (top) spot in your marketing toolbox. Here are 8 of the many reasons SMS marketing should be part of your business marketing plan. Continue reading “8 Reasons SMS Marketing Should Be in Your Toolbox”
One thing that all business owners need is more time, but until we figure out a way to get more than 24 hours in a day, you need to maximize the time you do have. Being more productive with your working hours can be a challenge, especially when you’re the one in charge. Below are some examples of what successful business owners are doing to be more efficient with their time to increase your productivity: Continue reading “Increase Your Productivity”
The art of how to survey customers is valuable for any business. In this guide to ensuring accurate information and the best response rate with any customer survey we’ll explain how to survey customers, when to survey customers, what questions to ask customers and much more. Continue reading “How to Survey Customers”
If you search for advice on small business advertising ideas, you often find that the best tips hinge on getting online and reaching a broader audience. But if your small business is a brick-and-mortar store that relies on local foot traffic more than online orders, there may be a few other small business advertising ideas to consider. Local advertising let’s you target, focus and stand out, and there are plenty of tried-and-true marketing techniques that can still be very effective for reaching your immediate audience. Continue reading “Small Business Advertising Ideas”
Knowing what to do with your business’ Facebook page can be a difficult task. You know you need to post and engage with your audience, but you don’t necessarily know what to post or even how often to post. When used correctly, Facebook can be a powerful tool to build relationships and even drive leads. To help make sure you are getting the most out of your business’ Facebook presence, we’ve compiled a list of the top nine Facebook marketing ideas every business should use. Continue reading “9 Facebook Marketing Ideas Every Business Should Use”