Facebook recenly released a guidebook for businesses titled: Facebook Insider’s Guide to Viral Marketing. Don’t get too excited about the title, just because you set up a Fan Page for your business and buy a few social ads does not mean you’ll unleash a profit-virus, or even make a ripple in the pond. But the guide does help you understand what Facebook has made available for you and how to get a Page all set up.

Considering the price (free) it certainly isn’t a bad idea to put one up. Especially since any of your fans can set up a page on your behalf without anyone knowing it wasn’t you, so it’s a good idea to be the first out of the gate so there’s no confusion and you can control your introductory message and the way your Page functions yourself. Other users of Facebook could still set up unauthorized Pages, but at least the early fans won’t be usurped by the unofficial Page.

Get Reviewed on Facebook

Unlike Facebook Groups and Sponsored Groups, Facebook Pages are like people — they can add applications. One application that is useful for online retailers and other businesses is Reviews. Reviews can only be added to Pages, not individual profiles, so you won’t find it in your regular applications search, but you can view the application page through the link.

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According to a recent study by the Society for New Communications Research, 59% of consumers use social media to vent their frustrations about customer service experience, and research other companies’ customer service before dealing with them.

• 74% choose companies/brands based on others’ customer-care experiences shared online

• 72% research companies’ customer care online prior to purchasing products and services at least sometimes
• 84% consider the quality of customer care at least sometimes in their decision to do business with a company
• 81% say blogs, online rating systems and discussion forums can give consumers a greater voice regarding customer care, but less than 33% say they believe that businesses take customers’ opinions seriously
• Search engines are the most valuable online tools for this research. Those rated of no value include micro-blogging sites like Twitter or Pownce (39%), YouTube (27%) and social-networking sites like Facebook and MySpace (22%)

Via: Consumers Using Social Media to ‘Vent’ about, Research Customer Service

Do you know what consumers are saying about you?

More than ever I strongly believe each online retailer needs a dedicated social media representative who can perform reputation management by monitoring the conversation on the Web and responding to each concern as effectively as possible. This could be handled internally or by a consultant.

ReadWriteWeb has a great roundup of (free and paid) tools you can use to monitor your online reputation, including Google Alerts, Trackur, Naymz and Monitor This.

Can You Clear Search Results from Negative Word of Mouth?

Because negative comments on popular social networks, review sites, blogs and forums can rank top 10 in search engines for your company name, it can be very easy for customers to find this information on you. Although you cannot demand, beg or bribe search engines from removing these pages from their indexes for you - you can often join the conversation yourself and speak to customer concerns directly.

You can also contact the owners of the websites and negotiate removal or modification of the content. Some will co-operate, others won’t. Some will ask for money. You may think wiping out the content is the preferred approach, but remember that the community is watching you. It’s possible that the thread starters will be notified of their threads’ removal and warned about mentioning your company negatively in the future. These posters can just as easily move their rant to another website, recruiting other members to repeat your company’s keywords and link to each others’ threads and posts to take you down. I’ve seen this happen.

Turn It Into a Crisitunity

I learned from the Simpsons that the Chinese use the same word for crisis as they do for opportunity. Homer coined the term “crisitunity.” I would say the same thing for online reputation management - the seeming crisis is actually an opportunity to show that you listen to your customers and are willing to make good on bad experiences.

You can boast about your commitment to customer service in your marketing all you want, but until you have a chance to demonstrate your service, it’s all hype. So I wouldn’t get too hung up that some people had a bad experience with you, but I would certainly do everything possible to make it right with the customer. When consumers click to read the dirt on your company and read how you handle problems, it gives them more confidence that should something go wrong, they can expect you to fix it.

Glen Allsopp has good advice on how to respond to negative blog posts and how to deal with a RipOff Report listing. Glen also does reputation management consulting for a living.

Bury the Hatchets

Another opportunity is to push negative results lower in search engines by creating content that will outrank it. From my experience helping a national retailer clear the top 3 pages of Google, Yahoo and MSN I have shared a few suggestions on how to create pages on other sites about your company that are likely to rank well. Online retailers can also take advantage of shopping comparison engines, affiliate programs, coupons and deals sites. You want to choose websites that will allow your company name to appear in the title tag of the page, and you’ll also want to link to these pages from other pages to build up their Page Ranks. You have to get creative with this.

You can research which sites to go for by Googling other retailers and see what ranks highly for their names.

Further reading

38 Must-Reads on Online Reputation Management

We talk about Amazon often here on Get Elastic, because you’ll always find some innovation, design or usability improvement to blog about there.

Amazon sometimes attracts more reviews than customers want to read. So Amazon provides tools to filter reviews by star rating and displays the “most helpful” positive and negative review as determined by Amazon’s community.

Plus, you can also search reviews by keyword.

Which is helpful, because you don’t want to buy a product that sucks unless it’s a vacuum or a Flowbee.

File this one under “why didn’t I think of that?”

Shoes.com enables customers to ask and answer each others’ questions right on product pages using the Ask & Answer tool from Bazaarvoice.

Considering the popularity of both online forums and product reviews, it makes sense that customers ask and answer questions of each other about a product right on the product page. Shoes.com provides Q&A for every product it carries.

To encourage participation, Shoes.com requests it in a post-purchase email. The questions in the email are specific to the product and based on what would be most helpful to a shoe-buyer: “Do they run wide or small?” or “Are these heels formal enough for the prom?”

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As customer reviews become more and more common on ecommerce sites, we can expect innovations to emerge in design, usability and quality.

It’s always a good idea to keep an eye on Amazon for usability innovations. Today we’ll look at an example of how Amazon helps customers filter product reviews when there are literally hundreds of them. Not only does Amazon help customers hone in on specific types of reviews, it also takes the opportunity to show relevant merchandising based on the customer reviews themselves. In this post I’ll also suggest something that Amazon isn’t doing yet that could help you save sales when review content actually discourages a customer to purchase the item in question.

I’m going to use the example of a book that’s going to be a top-seller on Amazon simply because it’s endorsed by perhaps the most influential television personality in the world - Oprah Winfrey. Most people will not feel the need to read reviews because they trust her opinion so much. Others will be so excited about the book they will read the reviews just to tide them over until the book arrives at their door.

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Here’s a tip on how to turn your customers into blogging evangelists: make it very easy for them to post customer reviews written for your site to their own blogs. Elastic Path is doing this with the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Store.

After a customer has filled in his review, there is an option to blog the review, which is a simple process that takes about 30 seconds to port the review right to the blog.

I decided to do the bulk of my Christmas shopping for the family through Olympic Store last year. So I’m going to use an example of one of my own reviews to show you how this works:

After you complete your review you see this screen:

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Kelly Mooney from Resource Interactive recently shared an email her friend received from apparel retailer Boden.

Soliciting customer reviews is a challenge because you want to tread carefully in asking for them. Including an incentive with your request is a good strategy, but some experts advise against offering discounts on future purchases. Jay Shaffer from Power Reviews recommends offering a chance to win something, rather than a $ or % discount which may serve as paid user reviews.

Boden uses this strategy in follow-up emails after a customer has made a purchase.

(click to enlarge image)

Here’s what I believe Boden does well:

• Good subject line. Review your Boden order and enter our prize draw. The subject line communicates exactly what is being asked for, with an incentive to encourage click through. Using the store name in the subject line indicates this is not a “thank-you-for-your-order-that-you-didn’t-make-please-enter-your-credit-card-information-again-to-avoid-deleting-your-account” spam scam.

• Opening the email copy with a “A big hearty thank you” sets a warm tone, and the choice of font sizes add character to the message.

• “Did you know that underneath my ginger head of hair lurks two unusually large ears, which are all the better for listening with?” This is a fantastic intro. The reader gets a humorous image of the writer of the email, while communicating that the sender of the email is personable and genuinely interested in customer feedback.

• “…starting with a chance to win $200 to spend at Boden…” That ain’t a bad prize at all. The link to the terms and conditions is also a good idea.

• “…it takes no time at all…” Reassuring the customer that this is not a labor-intensive task. We know that time is a huge deterrent for signing up for anything or contributing to anything.

• “…it will also help other lovely customers…” Appealing to the altruism of the customer is a good idea, and studies suggest customers love to help each other out.

• The personal signature is a nice touch. It’s coming from a real person, Boden founder Johnnie Boden.

• Images of purchased products and links to where to write a review is great usability and looks nice too.

Boden also solicits customer feedback from its website for a crack at a $500 spree.

Do we give you satisfaction?

We know the Rolling Stones couldn’t get any – but that’s probably because they weren’t shopping at Boden.

We’d really love to know what you think of our website. Please help us improve our service by taking this quick 10-minute survey.

And as a thank you we’ll enter you into a free prize draw to win $500 of Boden clothes.

Thanks very much for your time.

The page links through to a survey customers can do right on the website, using a tool from eCustomerOpinions. Again, Boden injects personality into its web copy, and adds the personal touch from the head of the company. Including the average length of time to complete the survey is another best-practice.

In fact, there’s a lot of light-hearted information about Johnnie Boden on the site. It’s nice to see a family business branded in such a friendly way. There is consistency between web copy and email communication. This warm and fuzzy email might appear less authentic if the website wasn’t the same way.

Today, we all know how important customer reviews are to retailers and customers alike. They help convert buyers by building trust and confidence in the product, they reduce returns, draw long-tail search traffic and are a simple entry into on-site communities for ecommerce websites.

But there was a time when no one had them. It makes you wonder what we’re missing today that we don’t know we’re missing.

Let’s take another effective merchandising tool: cross-selling. Currently, ecommerce marketers are banking that their personal cross-sell suggestions or algorithmic-based recommendations will be relevant and attractive to shoppers. This *can* be really hit and miss. But what if we gave customers a crack at cross-selling?

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I recently sat in on a Webinar with Lauren Freedman of The Etailing Group and Power Reviews. The Webinar covered a lot of ground, and a companion white paper is available for download if you’d like to drill down into the Webinar’s content.

The Webinar and white paper are based on a study conducted by the Etailing Group involving 1,200 consumers who shop online at least four times per year, and spend $500 or more annually.

We all know review content has many benefits – customer trust, long tail search engine benefits, reduced returns and so on. Customer reviews are a sensible entry into social shopping – the review thread is like an online forum. But populating your site with review content is a challenge for most if not all online retailers. Most customers are annoyed by entering credit card information. How can you motivate them to take time contribute product reviews?

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From Amazon.co.uk:

941 of 947 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Very good if you need to write on paper, 7 Mar 2007
By M. Williams “Matt Williams” (Essex, England) - See all my reviews

Since taking delivery of my pen I have been very happy with the quality of ink deposition on the various types of paper that I have used. On the first day when I excitedly unwrapped my pen (thanks for the high quality packaging Amazon!) I just couldn’t contain my excitement and went around finding things to write on, like the shopping list on the notice board in our kitchen, the Post-it notes next to the phone, and on my favourite lined A4 pad at the side of my desk.

My pen is the transparent type with a blue lid. I selected this one in preference to the orange type because I like to be able to see how much ink I have left so that I can put in another order before I finally run out.

When the initial excitement of taking delivery of my new pen started to wear off I realised that I shouldn’t just write for the fun of it, this should be a serious enterprise, so by the second day of ownership I started to take a little more care of what I wrote. I used it to sign three letters, and in each case was perfectly happy with the neatness of handwriting that I was able to achieve.

I have a helpful tip for you that you might not know about - if you let the ink dry for a few seconds you can avoid the smudging that sometimes happens if you rub the ink immediately after writing. Fortunately the ink used in this particular Bic pen seems to dry very quickly.

Via Lonny Paul, who’s posted a couple other good examples of bright Brit Bic reviews.