How to improve your response rate
Real people. Real reviews. Real insight.
Reviews are valuable, and the more reviews you can collect, the better. After all, more feedback means more insight, and finding out what your customers really think is what this whole review business is all about, right? We know that grabbing the attention of your customers can be tricky, so improving your response rate to gain as many reviews as possible should be high on your to-do list. In this guide, we’ll share some tried and tested techniques to help you optimise your feedback requests to improve your response rates and get those precious reviews flooding in!
How to improve your response rate
Still struggling? Contact support@feefo.com
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Subject lines Before you can even begin to think about response rates – let’s work on getting people opening those feedback requests as often as possible. This sounds simple, but with 270 billion emails being sent globally every day, standing out in a crowded inbox is no mean feat!
Putting some thought into your subject line could be the key to getting your customers to engage. Here’s what we suggest you do to get them clicking:
→ M ake sure the subject line reflects what stage your customer is at in their buying journey
If your customer has just booked a holiday, you don’t want to ask what they thought of the accommodation way before they’ve packed their bags and found their passport!
→ A sk open questions to provoke a reaction
People like having the opportunity to voice their opinion. We find that questions like ‘How did we do?’ and ‘What are your thoughts?’ have encouraged customers to click
→ T ailor the subject line to your customer Whether this means including their name or a specific location, a bit of personalisation will make your email stand out. You can find out how to do this using the Dynamic Variables tool here
→ K eep your subject lines clear, to the point, and most importantly - relevant!
How to improve your response rate
Still struggling? Contact support@feefo.com
3
Time of day Sending out your feedback request at the right time of day is an important part of making sure it has the best possible chance of being seen.
Email response rate per time of day Response rate
0.22
Generally, commuting times are a good time to send requests, as you can catch people before they’re too busy.
0.165
Response rates are usually at their highest in the later hours, so consider sending your request in the afternoon or early evening, rather than earlier in the day.
0.11
0.055
→ TOP TIP!
0 12am - 4am
4am - 8pm
8am - 12pm
12pm - 4pm
How to improve your response rate
4pm - 8pm
8pm - 12pm
Consider what countries your customers are in! The system won’t identify the differences in time zones, so make sure you work out when your request will pop up in your customers’ inbox.
Still struggling? Contact support@feefo.com
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Personalisation Just like in the rest of your marketing, making sure your feedback requests are as personalised as possible can be the key to keeping your customers engaged.
Here’s how to personalise your requests:
→ Tailor questions to the product or service that
your customer has experienced, so that the email is instantly relatable and doesn’t feel like ‘just another marketing email’!
→ If you’re selling a variety of products or services,
it’s likely that you cater to a lot of different types of customers too. Think about how you speak to each type of customer, and adapt how you word your email and feedback form
→ Think about where your customers are from when
writing your feedback requests. Try to localise the wording and alter the tone of voice so it resonates with who you're speaking to
How to improve your response rate
Still struggling? Contact support@feefo.com
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Here's how to get customising:
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Head to the ‘Campaigns’ tab in the Feefo Hub and select ‘Manage Campaigns’
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You will then be able to see all your live campaigns. Find the one you want to edit, go to the ‘Actions’ drop-down menu, and click ‘edit’
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Select the blue button labelled ‘Feedback preferences’. This is where you can change everything from the time that your request gets sent to the contents of the email and the feedback form
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To change the email part of your feedback request, select the blue button called ‘Customise email’, which will take you to the default email template. This is where you can think about everything we’ve mentioned: who your customer is, what they’ve bought, and what stage they’re at, so you can craft the perfect feedback request for them You can use Dynamic Variables to change all of these details to suit your customer. Learn how to do it here!
How to improve your response rate
Still struggling? Contact support@feefo.com
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Click ‘Save template’ in the top right to save all your changes
Did you know?
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Next up is changing the feedback form itself. In the same way, click on ‘Customise form’, which will show your feed
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Click the pencil icon in each of the blocks to change your wording and adapt the form to your customer. Give it some thought, just as you did when personalising the email
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Again, click ‘Save template’
The Training Room increased response rates by 331% using Campaign Manager Tool
Voila! These changes will now be applied to your campaign.
How to improve your response rate
Still struggling? Contact support@feefo.com
7
A bit about Campaign Manager Tool… Feefo’s Campaign Manager Tool allows you to set up individual campaigns for different types of customers, as well as collect reviews at any touchpoint in the customer journey to get a complete snapshot of the entire customer experience.
Campaign Manager Tool can help boost your response rate by asking feedback from the right people, at the right time, with all the right messages.
How to improve your response rate
Still struggling? Contact support@feefo.com
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Feedback reminders In our opinion, sending feedback reminders are an absolute must! They give your customers another chance to respond to your request – after all, how easy is it to miss an email, or to think ‘I’ll do that later’, and forget? Feedback reminders give customers the little nudge they may need to respond to your request.
→
90% of our merchants with the best response rates use feedback reminders
Here are some things to remember when setting up your reminders:
→ D on’t send your feedback reminders too soon after your first request. Around 5-7 days is a good amount of time to wait - you don’t want to bug your customers!
→ T he reminder emails can be personalised, just like the
original requests, giving you a second opportunity to capture their attention. Why not try something like ‘Don’t forget to let us know how we did!’ as a subject line?
How to improve your response rate
Still struggling? Contact support@feefo.com
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Here's how to do it:
01 Like before, you’ll need to head over to ‘Feedback preferences’. Scroll down to the bottom of the page to find the ‘Feedback reminder request’ section
03 Click ‘Save feedback preferences’ at the bottom of the page
02 Here, you can uncheck the ‘Don’t send feedback reminder’ box, and then choose how many days you want to wait before sending it out after your first request
04
You then need to click on ‘Customise email’ to customise the content of your feedback reminder
How to improve your response rate
Still struggling? Contact support@feefo.com
10
Monitoring the success of your feedback requests You’ve made all the changes we’ve suggested, but it’s not time to kick back and relax just yet. Monitoring the performance of these changes can be the key to fine-tuning your emails and crafting the perfect feedback request!
Experiment with changing each of the following to see the impact they can have on your response rates:
→ S ubject line → G reeting → B randing →
→ Sender name → B ody content → C all to action
Don’t change too many things at once! The more you change, the harder it will be to determine what is affecting the performance
To measure the success of these, you’ll need to work out which metrics you’re interested in. These will usually be:
→ Open rates
How many times your feedback request was opened, so would be affected by the subject line and the time it was sent
→ Click to open rates
How many times a customer has clicked through to the feedback form, so would depend on the wording in the email
→ Form conversions
How many times your feedback form is completed, and would be affected by the wording in the form itself
How to improve your response rate
Still struggling? Contact support@feefo.com
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You can monitor all of these things from the reports tab in the Hub. Here’s what you need to do in the platform:
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Head to the ‘Reports’ section in the Hub and select ‘Response performance’
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This report will show the metrics we’ve already mentioned, such as open rate, forms opened, and response rate
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Change the time frame at the top of the report to cover the period in which you made the changes
How to improve your response rate
Still struggling? Contact support@feefo.com
12
Now you’re all clued up on how to get the best response rates possible from your feedback requests, but it’s important to keep the following in mind to make sure you’re doing all you can to collect as many reviews as possible:
→ M ake sure you’re regularly sending your sales data to us. We’ll invite every customer to leave a review
→ E nable photo and video reviews to give your customers as many ways to leave feedback as possible
→ R espond publicly to your existing reviews to let new
customers know that you notice and value their feedback
→ I f you have brick and mortar stores, use Feefo Places to collect service reviews from your offline customers
→ D isplay the Feefo logo and your rating wherever you can, from email signatures to your marketing material. This means that your customers will be more likely to respond when they see a Feefo email pop up in their inbox!
How to improve your response rate
Still struggling? Contact support@feefo.com
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To find out more, contact a member of our team
Email us: support@feefo.com
Call us: 0203 362 4209 (opt 2)
Live Chat in the Hub
Feefo Holdings Ltd Heath Farm Heath Road East Petersfield GU31 4HT