Harshly critical comments like these on TripAdvisor, Amazon, Yelp and other shopping or review sites are killing your sales and ruining your brand’s cherished reputation.

Depending on the size of your company, negative reviews like this may be costing your business hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars.

Here’s why:

1.       Online reviews influence what people buy. 83% of online consumers say reviews influence their purchase decisions, according to Opinion Research. In the hotel industry, travelers are 3X more likely to book a room at a hotel with 5 stars vs. a hotel with 3 stars, Morpace has found.

2.       Negative online reviews are a “silent killer.” Prospects don’t call you and say, “Hey, I just decided to eat at a different restaurant because I heard your service sucks.” They just go to a different restaurant.

How to Estimate Impact of Negative Reviews

Here’s a simple formula of how much business is lost by negative Word of Mouth in the form of negative reviews, using a restaurant as an example:

Brand Under Attack? Fight Back!

Identify and energize your Advocates, those highly-satisfied customers who act as champions for your brand and products. Invite them to rate and review your products and services. Make it easy for them to share and publish reviews on shopping and review sites and elsewhere.

Here are a few real-world case studies:

• Norton doubled its star ratings on Amazon and increased sales by $26 million after it started energizing its Advocates.
• Over 150,000 Advocates for Chili’s Bar & Grill, the popular casual dining chain, wrote reviews of their local Chili’s. About 50,000 of them published their reviews on Yelp, plus shared their reviews on Facebook and Twitter, reaching 7.5 million potential diners with social recommendations.
• A leading consumer electronics manufacturer boosted its star ratings on a major shopping site from 2 to 4 stars in less than one month after energizing its Brand Advocates.
• A popular software company increased star ratings on a shopping site from 3.25 stars to 4 stars in two weeks, in time for Black Friday.
• In about three months, a boutique hotel saw its ratings on TripAdvisor jump from 3 stars to 4.25 stars after energizing its Brand Advocates.

-Rob Fuggetta, Founder/CEO, Zuberance

Download: Top 5 Myths of B2B Word of Mouth.

Word of Mouth (WOM) is the “world’s most powerful sales tool,” according to Nielsen. Today, thanks to social media channels like blogs, Twitter, review sites and more, WOM and social recommendations are more influential than ever. But is WOM effective in B2B environments? Discover what’s fact and what’s fiction in B2B Word of Mouth marketing.

Download this whitepaper and learn:

• What role does social media play in influencing business purchase decisions?
• How to measure B2B Word of Mouth
• How B2B and B2C WOM compare.

We want to hear from you!  Share your thoughts on the whitepaper here.

Download: Turning Social Media Into Sales.

The  Holy Grail in the Social Media Age is how to leverage social to drive leads and sales. As Ellis Booker, the editor of BtoB Magazine and BtoB’s Media Business, said recently: “How to best use- but not abuse- social media for sales conversion is the $64,000 question, and will preoccupy marketers, agencies, and media companies for the foreseeable future.”

This report features real-world examples of companies generating social recommendations, qualified leads, sales, and positive Word of Mouth now from social media by energizing their highly-satisfied customers (AKA “Brand Advocates”) via the award-winning Zuberance Social Recommendations Service

Download this white paper and learn:

• What role social media plays in influencing business purchase decisions.
• How to generate qualified leads via Brand Advocates.
• How B2B and B2C WOM compare.

We want to hear from you!  Feel free to share your thoughts about the whitepaper here.

Download: Consumer Electronics Company Gets 5% Conversions By Energizing Brand Advocates

This case study highlights a leading consumer electronics company that was recently facing a marketing crisis. Negative Word of Mouth for their new flagship product was hurting their reputation and sales. So they turned to their most enthusiastic customers (AKA their Brand Advocates) and energized them to create social recommendations for the brand and product.

In only a few months the company has:

• Energized thousands of Brand Advocates to create social recommendations
• Increased its star ratings on a leading shopping site from 2.8 to 4 stars
• Recorded a 5% sales conversion rate, 10x higher than normal

Download the case study and learn how to:

• Identify Brand Advocates by name and email address
• Mobilize Advocates to create social recommendations and drive sales
• Track results from social recommendation programs in real-time

We want to hear from you!  Feel free to share your thoughts on the whitepaper below.

In an effort to juice conversations, Intuit gives grants to small businesses to get people talking about small business, explained Laura Messerschmitt of Intuit.

This is not a “pay-for-play” solution which is a major “no-no” when seeking out recommendations for Advocates. Intuit is just trying to show general support for a community, especially at the local level.

-David Spark, Social Media Journalist, Spark Media Solutions

For so long brands have operated on this model of selling and showing product, explained Avi Savar, Founder of Big Fuel at the New York Brand Advocacy Series event he co-sponsored with Zuberance at his offices.

Brand Advocates can’t be bullied into liking your product. You need to create a relationship with them. That can often come from just having a great product, great customer service, or both.

If you want Brand Advocates, you need to shift your communications from a “Show me/Sell me” model to a “Help me/Entertain me” model, said Savar. Building a relationship with a customer to turn them into a Brand Advocate is no different than building a relationship with a friend.

The best way to create engagement with customers is through social and digital platforms, Savar suggested. Content drives conversation and advocacy. It is a commodity which can be leveraged on behalf of a brand. Audiences are engaged by content especially when delivered in the right context.

If you do it right, you can build a relationship with the customer for life, said Savar.

-David Spark, Social Media Journalist, Spark Media Solutions

Is there a brand that you enjoy more because of the personal attention they’ve given you? Most often this is in the service industry, but it doesn’t necessarily have to be that way. Sometimes it’s because you had a problem with a product and they handled it so well that you immediately became an Advocate.

Ted Rubin, a consultant with Zuberance, loves Virgin America, Dell, BlackBerry, and Verizon. They won him over because he just loves brands that do excellent customer service. When they handle his problems well, he appreciates it, and he tells people about it. (Read Ted’s recent blog post that highlights the importance of customer service here.)

The brands that get the most advocacy from Rubin are the ones who engage and interact with him on Twitter.

-David Spark, Social Media Jounalist, Spark Media Solutions

It’s a bird..it’s a plane..no, it’s BRAND ADVOCATE MAN! Watch the story of how Brand Advocate Man helped a struggling marketer energize her Advocates and drive positive Word of Mouth and sales.

Starring:

• Tim Chingos (Brand Advocate Man)
• Alex Littlewood
• Prema Sridhar
• Courtney Ward
• Chris Carrier

Directed by: Karolyn Anderson

Edited and filmed by: Kristina Hontalas

Advocates are a whole new type of quality control: social quality control.

If your product is fantastic, when identified and energized, your Advocates will spread the word like wildfire. Social networks and traditional Word of Mouth will start buzzing with your product, and sales will reflect your Advocates’ delight.

But your Advocates won’t try to get someone to buy your sub-par product, and they certainly won’t apologize for you or your product. Don’t try to make your Advocates do that work for you, because they won’t…and they shouldn’t have to.

The sale starts with your product, not your Advocates; your Advocates are simply the reward you get for ensuring your product is and does everything you promised it would (if not more!).  Your strongest relationships are built on trust – trust that your brand is committed to producing quality products and services – and if you don’t deliver that top-notch product, that essential trust is quickly lost.  Along with the sale.

You might be tempted to use social media to over-highlight the best parts of your product in the hopes that the disappointing parts won’t be noticed.  But even the best social media relationships can’t perform magic… they won’t make up for a less-than-great product.

However, the good news is that when your product is strong and does carry through on your brand promises, Advocates, through their social media relationships, can skyrocket your product sales.  Advocates engage, word gets out, and sales happen.  As Seth Godin said in his recent blog post, (Consider the category of ‘without apology’) “People will go out of their way to buy and recommend products that don’t require an apology.”   They will go out of their way for you.  Because they want to… because your product is what it is supposed to be and has passed Social QC.

Don’t waste your time trying to hide your product flaws.  Invest your time in making a flawless product, and give your Advocates something to get excited about!

The holiday season has always been the make or break time for retailers. In order to come out on top, retailers should be leveraging their Brand Advocates to spread positive Word of Mouth (WOM), especially for large-ticket items like cars and technology/electronics.

A recent study by S. Radoff Associates found that:

One half of consumers indicate Word of Mouth as a key influencer for cars (50%) and technology and electronics (49%).

(Already covered in some of our previous posts, WOM is also the #1 influencer in the hotel industry and B2B purchase decisions.)

President of S. Radoff and Associates, Sandy Radoff, states that during this holiday season, the companies “that can secure authentic positive reviews from their customers will have a clear advantage. They will get higher returns on their marketing dollars.”

So how should a brand go about “securing authentic positive reviews?” Identify and energize your Brand Advocates! Just make it easy for them to share their enthusiasm for your brand/product and they will create organic content and share their recommendations with their social networks. Plus, once you’ve identified your Advocates, you can go back to them even after the holiday season and they still be willing to spread the word about your brand.