Imagine this scenario: You've just launched a new product that your team has worked on for months. The features are exactly what your market research indicated customers wanted. But despite growing traffic, conversion rates are disappointing, with many visitors abandoning their carts at the last minute.
In many cases, what's missing is customer input and social proof, specifically customer reviews that turn hesitant browsers into confident buyers.
Most businesses today collect customer reviews in some form, but too often, those valuable testimonials sit unused or are displayed randomly across the website, social media, and other marketing channels. The truth is, reviews are far more than just validation of your product quality. They're powerful marketing assets that can dramatically impact your conversion rates and build trust in your brand.
Why Customer Reviews Matter in Today's Marketing Landscape
According to Podium’s State of Online Reviews, 93% of customers say online reviews influence their purchasing decisions. Today's consumers have grown increasingly skeptical of traditional brand messaging. They've been marketed to their entire lives and can spot a sales pitch from a mile away. What they trust are authentic experiences of people just like them. Your potential customers are more likely to believe what current customers say about you than anything you say about yourself.
But the value of reviews extends far beyond just convincing hesitant buyers. Reviews offer unfiltered insights into what your customers value about your products and services. This can help you identify your strongest selling points, which you can then emphasize in marketing, and highlight areas for improvement before they become larger issues.
Reviews also help humanize your brand and show customers how you embrace both positive and negative feedback. Companies that respond thoughtfully to critical reviews often build stronger customer loyalty than those showcasing only five-star ratings.
Strategically Placing Reviews on Your Website
Showing customer reviews throughout your website can significantly boost conversions by providing social proof at critical decision points in the customer journey.
1. Choose the Right Spots for Reviews on Your Product Pages
Your product pages are where purchasing decisions happen, making them prime real estate for effective review placement. Especially in e-commerce, brands should have the associated rating displaying on every individual product page. Position your star ratings and total review count near the product name and price. Displaying product ratings can be done by using widgets from your site hosting service or a reviews platform.
Another is adding review snippets that address common questions about durability, fit, ease of use, or other category-specific considerations.
For example, The North Face product pages have a review summary that shows the fit, customer satisfaction, and other relevant details.
The number of reviews often builds customer confidence as much as the rating itself. A 4.7-star rating based on 2,458 reviews carries significantly more weight than the same rating from just seven reviewers. For other industries like technology services, best practice would be to include a testimonials section on key product and pricing pages. Highlight reviews that mention specific benefits relevant to each page.
2. Use Reviews to Reduce Cart Abandonment
Placing brief testimonials about smooth transactions, fast shipping, or excellent customer service directly on checkout pages reassures customers about the post-purchase experience. Reviews specifically mentioning "fast shipping," "careful packaging," or "on-time delivery" directly address any delivery fears. To reduce cart abandonment, show key review highlights for each product in a customer's cart.
3. Create Effective Homepage Review Elements
Displaying your reviews front and center can increase engagement and conversions. On eCampus.com, the homepage search module features their strong rating directly beneath the main call-to-action.
This placement delivers instant credibility by anchoring the experience in social proof from the first interaction, encouraging action. This tactic is especially effective for high-intent, low-familiarity users—exactly the kind of traffic most homepages attract.
Beyond customer testimonials, consider broadening your credibility signals. For instance, HubSpot shows quantitative results from customers as well as G2 award badges on the homepage:
Featuring industry awards or certifications alongside customer testimonials speaks to customers who value different types of credibility. Similar to the product pages, adding a "What customers say" section can build brand trust and surface testimonials that appeal to different customer profiles.
4. Leverage Reviews on Services and Contact Pages for B2B Credibility
While product-focused businesses benefit from reviews on product pages, B2B service providers should strategically place testimonials on both services and contact pages where decision-makers are likely to convert. On services pages, include industry-specific case studies paired with executive testimonials that highlight measurable outcomes and ROI. For example, a marketing agency might feature a manufacturing client testimonial stating: "Their industry-specific approach increased our qualified leads by 43% within the first quarter."
Your contact pages should include testimonials that specifically address concerns about responsiveness, communication quality, and long-term partnerships. Consider adding a "Hear from our clients" section near your contact form to provide reassurance at this crucial decision point.
5. Optimize Reviews for Mobile Devices
Use collapsible sections, clear typography, and thumb-friendly controls so customers can see review content on mobile devices. If you have review carousels, enable the swipe feature, rather than tapping or scrolling, as it's more intuitive on mobile. Mobile users have less patience for scrolling. Use relevance algorithms or "most helpful" voting features to surface the most valuable reviews first on mobile displays.
6. Combine Reviews with User-Generated Content
Encourage customers to submit photos or videos in addition to written reviews. Seeing and hearing from customers is more compelling than reading what they think of a product or service. B2C: Amazon does a good job of curating images and videos in the product review sections. B2B: 99designs displays user-generated videos on its website alongside star ratings.
Create customer spotlight features that pair in-depth reviews with user-submitted content, telling more complete success stories. This type of longer-form content works particularly well for complex products or services where the customer journey involves multiple touchpoints.
Using Reviews in Your Email Marketing
Incorporating customer reviews into your email campaigns can significantly increase open rates and conversions by building trust before prospects even reach your website.
7. Add Reviews to Marketing Emails
Include a short "Customer Spotlight" section in your newsletter featuring one standout review with the customer's name, photo, and a brief quote. This humanizes your brand while reinforcing product value. For example, the vitamin company Ritual highlights star ratings and customer quotes that speak to common pain points:
In product recommendation emails, add 1-2 specific reviews related to each recommended item. For example, a travel company could add destination-specific reviews to their "Places to Visit" email series. You can use Sitejabber'sKlayvio integration to get reviews automatically placed into each email.
8. Use Reviews in Sales Recovery Emails
Abandoned cart emails often perform better when they include reviews specific to the products left behind. Address potential objections by selecting reviews that highlight quality, value, or ease of use.
For marketing campaigns targeting dormant customers, showcase reviews mentioning recent improvements or long-term satisfaction. Testimonials that begin with "I've been using this product for years..." resonate particularly well with customers who haven't purchased in a while.
For follow-up emails after sales calls or demos, reviews can reinforce how your solution solves a prospect's pain point. When nurturing a potential customer, social proof carries more weight than feature recaps. B2B companies might feature testimonials from companies of similar size or industry, and B2C companies should match reviews to the recipient's demographic or purchase history when possible.
Social Media Review Tactics
Leveraging customer reviews across social media platforms expands your reach and turns positive feedback into shareable content that speaks to your audience.
9. Share Reviews Effectively on Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok
Turn written reviews into eye-catching quote visuals. These perform better than simple text posts and can be saved as templates for regular use. For example, Sendible spotlights notable customer quotes on Instagram and also uses it as an opportunity to ask for more customer reviews and testimonials.
Create short video clips (under 30 seconds) that highlight the most compelling testimonials. These perform particularly well as Instagram Reels or Facebook Stories, where brevity is key. Customer success stories that pair before/after scenarios with review content are particularly successful.
10. Leverage Reviews on LinkedIn and Forums
When sharing reviews and customer stories on LinkedIn, focus on measurable results and specific benefits relevant to the business audience. For example, a company targeting B2B decision makers could create carousel posts that pair customer challenges with review quotes describing how your solution helped.
Engage on industry forums and discussion boards, and when it's relevant, answer questions by referring to social proof. This feels more authentic than direct promotion while still highlighting customer experiences.
Instead of saying “Our CRM software has the best integration capabilities,” you could speak from experience with customers. That might look like: “I've seen several companies struggle with this exact issue. One financial services team I know documented its processes after switching systems. They ended up saving significant time on onboarding. The solution might not be universal, but I'm happy to share what worked in their case if it might help your situation.” This approach positions you as a knowledgeable community member rather than someone with an agenda.
Search and Local Marketing
When potential customers are actively searching for information about your industry and related solutions, you want to be at the top of the page to improve your visibility.
11. Boost Your Google Visibility with Reviews
Respond to both positive and negative Google reviews within 24-48 hours. With Sitejabber’s monitoring feature, you can stay on top of what customers are saying to make sure you don’t miss any reviews. Google's algorithms favor businesses that actively engage with their reviews, and potential customers notice these interactions. Keep responses genuine rather than using canned templates.
When asking customers for reviews, provide a direct link to your Google Business profile to make it easy. You can also use review content in your Google Business posts to highlight customer experiences alongside promotions or announcements.
12. Improve Local Search with Review Strategies
For businesses with multiple locations, create location-specific pages on your website with reviews from local customers. This strengthens your presence in local search results and builds community connections.
When requesting reviews, encourage customers to mention your location or neighborhood in their feedback. These location-specific keywords in reviews can boost your visibility in "near me" searches. And keep mentioning the location in your responses. For example, "Thanks for visiting our downtown location! Our team there will be thrilled to hear your feedback."
13. Use Reviews in Your Advertising
Optimize Google Ads to display star ratings directly in your search results. Tip: Google partners like Sitejabber can help your business quickly set up and start displaying star ratings. This can significantly improve click-through rates by providing instant credibility.
Create ad copy that echoes common topics from your positive reviews. If customers frequently praise your "fast shipping" or "knowledgeable staff," incorporate these exact phrases into your ad text. Carry the same messaging through on your landing pages to improve conversion rates. Test different review highlights in your ad variations to identify which customer benefits drive the strongest response.
In its Facebook ads, AdEspresso harnesses the power of social proof by highlighting multiple quotes from customers:
Boosting Sales Enablement with Reviews
Equipping your sales team with curated customer testimonials will help them address objections and speed up the decision making process for the potential customer.
14. Turn Positive Reviews into Sales Enablement Assets
Create industry-specific one-pagers featuring relevant testimonials and concrete results metrics grouped by pain point or business type. For instance, a software company might create separate marketing materials with relevant social proof for healthcare, finance, and retail clients.
Add review highlights to sales presentations, specifically selecting testimonials that address common objections your team encounters. Place these strategically after introducing features that typically raise questions or concerns.
15. Prepare Your Sales Team to Use Reviews Effectively
Build a searchable review database categorized by industry, company size, use case, and specific features. Sales representatives can quickly find relevant testimonials during prospect conversations. Rather than awkwardly reading testimonials verbatim, coach the sales team to reference customer experiences naturally. For instance, they might say, "Many of our healthcare clients mention that this feature has reduced their reporting time by half."
Schedule regular review update sessions where sales teams learn about new testimonials and discuss effective ways to leverage them. Add new compelling reviews monthly to keep the database fresh.
Managing Your Review Ecosystem
As the number of reviews increases, creating a centralized system for managing the reviews becomes more important so you can use the reviews in the right place at the right time. Find a review management platform, like Sitejabber, that aggregates reviews from multiple sources, including Google, Facebook, industry-specific sites, and your own website. Look for review platforms that can analyze sentiment and reveal subtle trends that star ratings alone might miss.
Understanding What You Can Share
When using reviews from third-party platforms, always maintain proper attribution by including the source name and reviewer's identity (as displayed on the original platform). For example: "From [Reviewer Name] on Google Reviews." While you can generally quote from public reviews, some platforms have specific terms of service regarding how their content can be repurposed. For example, Yelp's terms of service specify that businesses cannot use Yelp review content in any advertising materials without explicit permission. Even if a customer writes a glowing 5-star review on your Yelp page, you cannot feature that exact review text in your email newsletter or website without getting Yelp's approval first.
It’s best practice to get permission when featuring specific reviews prominently, especially if you're using their full name, photo, or identifiable information beyond what's publicly displayed in their review. Maintain documentation of all permissions received, including screenshots of public reviews and any additional consent communications. This protects your business if questions arise about proper usage.
Making Reviews Work for You
As people become more skeptical of traditional marketing, authentic customer voices will become more important to your brand's marketing strategy. Companies seeing the greatest impact aren't those with perfect five-star ratings, but those who weave authentic customer voices throughout their marketing and product.
