Think you’ve got fake TripAdvisor reviews?

Trying to get better TripAdvisor reviews?

Understandable! TripAdvisor and other review sites are one of the best places for your customers to find you and your competitors. Online users are more prone to checking what your other customers are saying before popping in for their first visit.

By getting better and better reviews, this means you’re likely to be ranked higher on TripAdvisor- and therefore more likely to get customers as a result. But getting all 5-star reviews can be a real challenge! Even if you’re giving your best service, best food, best everything.

Why is it so difficult to get to the tippity-top of the rankings on review sites like TripAdvisor?

Fake (or unverifiable) reviews can be a pain

It can be difficult to get further up the TripAdvisor rankings or use your reviews to learn and improve if you think some of them might be a little bit phoney. The problem with TripAdvisor reviews and Yelp reviews too is that you can’t actually confirm that these people have been in your restaurant or shop in Glasgow.

Whether it’s grumbling competitors trying to get a one-up on you, or even reviews where the reviewer has mistaken you for a different place (believe me, it happens). On top of all that, actual customers you’ve had may have an over-active imagination and decide to bend the truth a little.

What can you do when these fake reviews happen?

Well, with many platforms, not a lot! You can reply to reviews and dispute their contents, but you need to be acutely aware that everything you say is very much in the public eye. Plus, you can’t rely on many of these platforms to portray an accurate and reliable image of your business anyway. Yelp has been the target of major drama recently with the release of the film Billion Dollar Bully, which highlights Yelp’s “aggressive sales tactics” and inaccurate (and sometimes falsified) reviews. This is not what we want for the independent, local businesses we’re trying to serve!

So Swipii decided to bring something to the table to help combat situations like this and give businesses a better option. One that is trustworthy, verifiable and useful!

How does Swipii solve the problem?

On the Swipii app, we’ve got a feature which allows shoppers to leave a star rating (between 1 and 5 stars), and some feedback for the local Swipii participating businesses they visit. Once their transaction comes through and their loyalty points are allocated, we prompt them to give a little feedback!

Similar to Uber’s Rate My Trip, we want to give our participating businesses valuable, real-time reviews from their customers. Not just those that shout the loudest, but all users- and often your most loyal ones. The ratings and feedback that your customers can leave you on the Swipii app are each linked with a verified transaction, and you can see all of this data in your Swipii dashboard.

Did you know that only 15 in every 1000 customers (on average) will leave a review?

If we combine this with the fact that only 1 in 10 happy customers actually leave a review, then we’re left with a very small percentage of happy people shouting about your product. Add on to that, customers who had a bad experience with a business are 50% more likely to share it on social media than those who had good experiences and 52% more likely to share it on an online review site– it’s not looking good.

If we can prompt and remind your happy customers to leave reviews and can see a more genuine list of reviews from all of your Swipii transactions- your average rating will be a fairer reflection of your business.

What’s the catch?

There is no catch. Of course, I imagine you expected me to say that. Both our Grow and our Premium packages for Swipii loyalty programs include the ability for you to see the ratings and feedback that your customers have left for you.

You can see how much they have spent on their linked card, when they completed the transaction, and what kind of feedback they give you.

So, you’ll be able to say “Hey, we were understaffed that day- that explains the feedback on our waiting time” or “Wow, 5 stars during our busiest period, I’ll make sure to thank my staff for that”.

Of course, this all comes along with our classic loyalty program (1 reward on the Grow package and 3 on the Premium). So you’ll be able to align your feedback with your rewards and transactional data too. Way more powerful than relying on — potentially unreliable — TripAdvisor reviews.

Okay. Sound good! Sign me up!

Glad to hear you’d like to come on board. You can sign up for a free loyalty program in just a couple of minutes here.

Or if you’d like to ask us a few more questions about Swipii for Business and how one of our Grow or Premium loyalty program packages (complete with customer ratings and feedback) could work for you, just drop us an email via hello@swipiicard.com. Can’t wait to hear from you!

Originally published at swipii.com on September 4, 2019.