E-commerce: Roll Out the Red Carpet

Opening your site to customer involvement

June 2007 By Molly Joss

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Even negative reviews—one of marketers’ biggest fears when it comes to online comments—can work in your favor. “Negative reviews are a gift,” says Hurt. They can help companies spot problems with new products quickly, he explains, like an early warning system. Burke points out that these comments also can lend credibility to all the reviews on a site, which makes sense intuitively. If every review for a product was a glowing testimonial, you would suspect the marketer either faked this feedback or only posted the favorable consumer comments. Plus, a few middle-of-the-road critiques can increase your comfort level with your purchase decision because you feel as though you did due diligence.

Although it can give some merchants higher sales and happier customers, a site open to dialogue or comments isn’t appropriate for every product and company selling online, Burke warns. For example, he says, a company that sells high-end or designer apparel wouldn’t necessarily benefit from comments and reviews because the products might appeal to people with eclectic tastes, who are not likely to follow the beat of anyone else’s drum.



Potential Pitfalls

Although General Motors (GM) characterized a 2006 interactive online marketing project for its Chevy Tahoe SUV a success, other companies might see it as an online customer-interaction exercise that went horribly wrong. The carmaker launched a Web contest that allowed people to use digital video clips and sound tracks it had produced to write their own text and create their own digital ads for the car. During a single weekend, hundreds of people used this digital content to create and publish on the Web ads that claimed GM and the Tahoe contribute to global warming. Other ads contained sexually explicit messages or profanity. Many of these ads still are on the Web. Of course, most of the 30,000 contest participants sang praises of the Tahoe in their ads, which convinced GM and Campbell-Ewald, the agency behind the Web contest, that the benefits of consumer interaction online can outweigh the negatives.

Thinking ahead and having procedures in place to catch problems before they arise are must-haves for merchants considering any type of online customer interaction. Software or human filters that block inappropriate, profane or untrue posts are mandatory defenses. Schmitt suggests software filters that function automatically, which work well when there’s the potential for heavy interactive traffic on a site; sites with lower traffic volumes can use staff to manage the filtering process.

Other useful controls include requiring site visitors to register before they post or allowing users to report posts that they don’t find helpful. Marketers also should consider authorizing appropriate personnel to respond to comments or blog posts. As long as responses from company representatives don’t come across as defensive, they actually can foster a feeling of authentic, two-way communication.



Communication Costs

You either can host the consumer-generated content on your own site and manage it internally, or you can opt to work with a company that provides these services. The former option works for large companies that want total control over their site content and have sufficient resources to keep up with the workload. Emily Albright-Miller, senior strategist at Resource Interactive, a Web site development firm based in Columbus, Ohio, says that when marketers find it cost-prohibitive to handle this process on their own, they can turn to partners to provide part or all of the functionality.

Bazaarvoice is an example of such a partner. The company hosts and manages customer-generated reviews and provides clients with reports and statistics on this site activity. Pricing for services is based on several factors, including the amount of communication traffic on a site, but he says the lowest packages range $2,000 to $4,000 a month.

Burke notes that some merchants use PowerReviews, an online review service that is free to retail and brand sites. PowerReviews is a start-up company in Millbrae, Calif., that plans to use posted reviews from its merchant customers’ sites to populate its own online offering, establishing itself as a single-stop site for product reviews. To generate revenue, PowerReviews will sell advertising on its site.

Burke says that the review and comment functionality of soliciting online consumer feedback comes built-in with many retail site design contracts today. “The technology is a commodity,” he says, and does not provide the analytics and insight that marketers need to optimize their online review features. If marketers do not have this expertise in-house, they will want to plan for such support when assessing their technology options.



Integration and Management Are Key

Allowing consumer interaction online can improve a company’s image and increase sales, but only if the interaction is a carefully managed part of the overall marketing strategy. Plan carefully and choose appropriate communication avenues. Allow for testing and adjustments, but don’t fear a total loss of control. Customers are talking about companies online, so companies might as well make themselves part of the dialogue.



Molly Joss is a freelance writer.

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