Guest post by Chris Dunne from FeedbackExpress
I was looking to book a hotel for an upcoming holiday but was overwhelmed at the number of different options available. To help me decide, l researched recent feedback left by guests on TripAdvisor.
Similarly, a customer arriving on Amazon to make a purchase will be presented with a plethora of different buying choices. If a customer hasn’t purchased from you before, they are very likely to want to know what others think — so they’ll check your seller rating and skim through your recent feedback.
According to a consumer review survey by BrightLocal, 91% of consumers regularly or occasionally read online reviews and 84% of people trust online reviews as much as a personal recommendation.
The success of a seller/products on Amazon is greatly influenced by the quality and number of reviews. This is why paid reviews and incentivised reviews became so popular. However, in October 2016 Amazon banned this practice and seems more determined than ever to create an honest review policy.
If you’ve ever purchased an item on Amazon and left feedback, you’ll be aware that it’s much quicker to leave seller feedback than a product review.
For seller feedback, all a buyer is required to do is leave a star rating between 1 and 5, answer three yes/no responses, and then leave a short comment.
Getting great seller feedback ratings can help your search ranking on Amazon, which means more sales. Unfortunately, an unhappy customer is much more likely to leave feedback than a happy one.
Customer service is a vital part of Amazon’s business and this is reflected in their seller metrics. With top sellers rated 100% or very close to it, sellers should aim for a feedback rating of 95% or higher whilst ensuring an order defect rating < 1%, pre-fulfilment cancel rate < 2.5% and a late shipment rate < 4%.
All sellers should be working towards achieving and maintaining a level of customer service that meets Amazon’s performance targets. Failure to do so may result in an account suspension.
You can ensure you get great seller feedback by responding promptly to messages and shipping orders quickly (if not using FBA). If you’re a serious Amazon seller you should be checking for messages from customers every day including weekends.
Amazon feedback software like FeedbackExpress is designed to prevent negative feedback before it happens. However, if you do receive a neutral or negative feedback on your Amazon account, the software will alert you via SMS and/or email.
5 Quick Tips for Amazon Feedback
- Keep an eye on your messaging and respond promptly, ideally within a 24-hour period.
- Check your Buyer-Seller Contact Response Time in Seller Central to make sure you’ve keeping on top of messages.
- Personalise your emails to customers. Many do not realise they are buying from a third-party and assume they are purchasing from Amazon itself. With great Amazon feedback software tools such as FeedbackExpress, you’ll get access to lots of different templates proven to increase customer engagement.
- Make it easy for the customer to contact you if they have any issues. In many cases, this helps prevent negative feedback before it happens and protects your precious seller metrics.
- Once you’re sure the order has arrived on time and the customer is satisfied with your service, ask for feedback. If the order has arrived late for whatever, do not request feedback as these customers are more likely to leave a neutral/negative feedback. If you’re a FBA customer, Amazon will take responsibility for any late shipment.
That last point is one of the main advantages of using FBA over MFN and the reason many sellers opt to outsource fulfilment to Amazon. It means they don’t have to worry about their seller metrics being affected by any shipment issues such as late delivery or issues with packaging, as Amazon takes responsibility and will strike through the feedback and add a note stating, “this order was fulfilled by Amazon”.
The Value of Negative Feedback
Negative feedback can be very valuable. It can help identify an area of your business such as fulfilment or customer service which you need to improve on. Using feedback in this way will improve your business processes and prevent further negative feedback in the future.
According to a study of Reevoo, 95% of customers suspect fake or censored reviews when bad scores aren’t present. So, a bad review can be beneficial and make your business appear more credible. Just make sure that the large majority of your reviews are positive!
Did you know that Amazon can and will remove negative reviews? For example, if a customer leaves a product review but complains about shipment or customer services, Amazon will remove it as has nothing to do with the product itself.
If you do get negative feedback that is valid, you can work with a customer to resolve his/her issue and then ask them to consider removing the negative feedback. If you solve their problem in a timely manner, most reasonable customers will remove their comment.
You can ask them politely to consider removing it, but you shouldn’t be pushy or pressurise them into doing so. However, it’s worth noting that this needs to be done within 60 days of the order date.
As touched on earlier, responding quickly to customers is good practice on Amazon. At the very least, you should aim to respond within a 24-hour time period but ideally within a 12-hour period.
One of the neat features with FeedbackExpress, is the ability to create a blacklist of sellers who you don’t wish to request feedback from — this can be for various reasons, perhaps they’ve previously left negative feedback.
How does FBA seller Stephen Smotherman maintain 100% seller feedback rating?
Many sellers on Amazon have the perfect feedback score, 100%. But, how do they do it? Our friend and expert FBA seller Stephen Smotherman from Full-Time FBA shares his four secrets to feedback success below.
Firstly, when choosing the condition of a product, round down, not up. If the item you’re listing is between very good and good condition, choose good to increase your chances of received positive feedback.
Secondly, think twice about selling an item in acceptable condition. Stephen will rarely sell acceptable items due to the increase chance of negative feedback.
Next up, when you do get an unfair negative feedback (and you will), act quickly. If you get a seller feedback related to a product review or price, you can have it removed as this is against Amazon’s TOS. Simply, open a ticket with Seller Support and concisely ask them to remove it.
Finally. when you get a legitimate negative feedback (and you will), act quickly, apologetically, and generously. Again, time is an issue, so do your best to resolve the customer’s issue quickly.
Once they are satisfied, remind them how as a small seller, how important your feedback score is and politely ask them to consider removing their negative feedback.
About FeedbackExpress
FeedbackExpress is an automated feedback tool for Amazon which helps you get more product reviews and protects your seller rating. Plans start at £14.95/$20 and include a free 30-day trial for you to try out and see if it works for you.
By using the promo code “FEX10”, you can enjoy 30 days of Amazon feedback software (up to 10,000 message) for free (no credit card required), then get a 10% discount on your first month’s subscription.
If you have any further feedback queries, get in touch via sales@feedbackexpress.com and one of our great customer support team will get back to you asap.
