Social commerce company Reevoo has released research that suggests bad reviews are good for business.
The company found that 68% of consumers trust reviews more when they see both good and bad scores, while 30% suspect censorship or faked reviews when they don’t see anything negative at all.
Not only this, but shoppers who go out of their way to read bad reviews convert 67% more than the average consumer.
Reevoo CEO and founder Richard Anson said that though this may seem counter-intuitive, negative user-generated content is actually one of the most effective conversion tools.
This is because shoppers who seek out bad reviews are highly engaged with their pre-purchase research, viewing almost four times as many products as the average visitor to a site, and staying considerably longer.
The company discovered that three times as many consumers actively seek out and read negative user-generated content as look for positive content: negative reviews are even more popular than 'most recent reviews', or 'reviews from people like me'.
Figures quoted are from data collected across Reevoo’s network of 150 UK and international partners and from Reevoo.com, the company’s consumer website, as well as from independent consumer surveys.
The results contrast with a study last year, which found that reading between one and three negative reviews would deter the majority of customers, though much depends on whether there are any good reviews to outweight the bad.
12:19PM on 10th January 2012
Academic research came to the same conclusion.
http://rohitaggarwal.wordpress.com/2011/10/11/blog-blogger-and-the-firm-can-negative-posts-by-employees-lead-to-positive-outcomes/
E-Business Consultant at Dan Barker
12:35PM on 10th January 2012
is there a link to the research?
thank you!
dan
Head of community at TMW
12:37PM on 10th January 2012
Sadly no Dan, I looked for that myself.
Revoo contacts to follow up with though:
Head of community at TMW
12:50PM on 10th January 2012
;)
1:01PM on 10th January 2012
Dan, there has been academic research into this topic by the University of Utah and Carnegie Mellon. You can access it from the authors blog here http://rohitaggarwal.wordpress.com/2011/10/11/blog-blogger-and-the-firm-can-negative-posts-by-employees-lead-to-positive-outcomes/
Head of Conversion & Product at Ticket.com
1:33PM on 10th January 2012
I'd agree that having a good representation of bad reviews will aid conversion, however 67% is a very large number and I imagine there's a breaking point of the ratio of bad to good reviews required to maximise conversion - its something that could be A/B tested against to show/hide certain reviews to measure impact on conversion
Marketing and Community Manager at Reevoo
2:01PM on 10th January 2012
Kat from Reevoo here - you can find the results of our data-crunching are in an ebook on the subject, which you can find here:
http://b2b.reevoo.com/bad-reviews
Thanks to Adi for the link to the academic research - will have a read.
@Depesh: I'm sure there's absolutely a breaking point where too many bad reviews do damage conversion. We've found, however, that across all the products/services we cover, an extremely small proportion have lots of bad reviews. The difference we're looking at is when people do or don't display the handful of bad reviews alongside all the dozens of positive ones. In that situation, the impact on conversion really is that powerful!
E-Business Consultant at Dan Barker
4:02PM on 10th January 2012
hi, Kat,
might the takeaway be "where customers click a 'show me the bad reviews' button, they are more likely to be in buying mode"?
ie. If you simply had the 'show me the bad reviews' button & none were present, the increase in conversion may remain.
dan
11:19AM on 11th January 2012
If I see too many positive reviews then I usually think something is up as I also like to know the limitations of a product when I buy it. I know nothing is perfect but even if I read negative comments then I will weigh up the pros and cons and usually buy it.
11:23AM on 11th January 2012
One can't help thinking that figure needs to be taken with a pinch of salt as well - as the degree as both volume and tone of the negative review may affect to what degree the review impacts a potential customers propensity to buy.
Certainly a handful of baddish reviews within a reasonably positive blend is likely to add a degree of 'realism' to the review process imo
11:25AM on 11th January 2012
I've found similar results in my own academic research. The positive is generally found in how the company handle the negative review - It's almost like service recovery. With positive reviews too many increase secpticism - so some negative do help.
6:46PM on 11th January 2012
Missing in this is a measure of review quality. As somebody who actively seeks out negative reviews on products I first look for specific complaints and then commonalities between complaints before deciding whether or not I can accept the chance that I will encounter that specific problem. Reviews without specifics are completely discounted. Balanced reviews are typically given greater weight as well.
Editor at Econsultancy
8:47PM on 11th January 2012
Taken in isolation, it's a great stat, but much depends on the context of the bad reviews. If there are two out of 10 negative reviews of a product, it makes the other eight more believable.
I think Dan Barker has made an excellent point - those people who seek out bad reviews are clearly demonstrating purchase intent as they attempt to find any flaws in the product they are considering.
For retailers, the key is to place reviews in context and help shoppers to make sense of reviews, especially when there are lots of them. Amazon is great at this, with it's 'top rated good and bad reviews' and comparison charts, while Kiddicare lists pros and cons of products from customer reviews.
http://econsultancy.com/uk/blog/3774-how-to-organise-product-reviews
11:59AM on 30th March 2012
I'd agree that having a good representation of bad reviews will aid conversion, however 67% is a very large number and I imagine there's a breaking point of the ratio of bad to good reviews required to maximise conversion.