So, your Amazon product reviews suck. Anything less than 3 Stars is an epic fail (and even 3 Stars is borderline), and you’ve done just that.

Pick yourself up, dust your product off, put your big girl panties on, and set a plan to improve your Amazon image. Applying focus to Customer Experience – not only their out-of-box product experience, but also their post-purchase engagement through the Amazon platform – is the only way to resurrect your product’s image.

Here’s how:

Respond to comments. Staying on top of reviews from Day 1 gives you the power to influence them. If user experience improves through this interaction, ask for an updated/better review. Whether you’re a bootstrapped company on Launchpad or an established consumer electronics brand, you MUST assign a human to monitor and respond to reviewers’ comments.

Short-cut: While it seems a daunting task, a service like Review Monitoring automates the process so that you (or your Marketing team) don’t miss a chance to engage.

Seek out keywords. If a number of reviewers cite the same issue with your product, fix it. Many user experience flaw fixes don’t have to require a complex development cycle. If 25% of reviewers say they can’t find the power button, the fix could be as simple as changing the color of the power button to make it stand out. Then, go back to step 1, let your reviewers know about the improvement and ask for a review update.

Short-cut: Analytics tools like Channel Signal group keyword trends within reviews to make feedback easy to share with your product management team.

Participate in Amazon Vine. Generally used at product launch, another way to pick up reviews is with Amazon’s own Vine Program. This well-established network of product reviewers will give a good product a legitimate base of reviews. The $10K price of admission (cost differs depending on the global region) could be worth it. Remember to include the cost of the free product fulfillment in your budget.

Twister products (or un-twister them). Amazon’s option to apply product variations can release one product from the drag of another’s reviews or, alternatively, can help to boost a lagging product’s ratings. If your product comes in versions (“Standard” and “Pro”, capacity, or various colors are a few examples), consider linking them in this way. Reviews will be shared by the combined product page, and consumers will only see reviews for a specific product if they take the time to drill down to the detail.

Start over. Take this step ONLY as a last resort. If worse comes to worst, you may need to consider discontinuing the current product and bringing it back as a new SKU with a new UPC, with key improvements to make the user experience better the first time.

Comments welcome 🙂

About the author:

Suzanne Oehler is an energetic, driven business leader with 15 years in consumer and enterprise tech Sales. Widely regarded for opening and expanding business in brick-and-mortar Retail and digital E-Commerce for consumer technology hardware start-ups, she designs and implements winning Sales strategies that navigate the complexities of Consumer markets.

Read more at www.suzanneoehler.com