September 30, 2024
If you’re a brand or other marketplace seller trying to get your product into people’s hands, we don’t have to sell you on Walmart. So far in 2024, the global mega-chain has drawn 255 million customers per week and 433 million monthly visitors to Walmart.com. That’s a lot of eyeballs.
The only problem? You’re not the only one who knows it. A single product category on Walmart.com can include hundreds of brands. So you’ve got to find every way to stand out.
When it comes to turning casual browsers into committed buyers, nothing is as potent or consistently effective as quality User Generated Content (UGC) , such as reviews, ratings, and social content.
To move the needle at Walmart (both online and in-store), you need to take UGC seriously. Here are five essential tips to take your content strategy to the next level and drive shoppers to make a purchase.
Bazaarvoice surveyed 2,600+ Walmart shoppers from our Influenster community, and here’s what they had to say.
Pics win the prize
There are many kinds of UGC to have in your content mix – text reviews, star ratings and videos are all helpful ways to share product information with prospective buyers. However, according to our survey, one UGC type stands out when it comes to influencing purchase decisions, and that is a written review accompanied by photos. 48% of shoppers prefer them over other forms.
When a customer posts a review with images, shoppers get to envision your product in real life — not an idealized, branded setting. Showing your product in use gives the review a sense of authenticity that a brand simply can’t compete with.
Keep your review pipeline full
For most products, shoppers agree that newer is better. And that’s also true for reviews.
No matter how many reviews your product has on it, Recency is an essential element of trust-building: 77% of shoppers regard recent reviews as more reliable. And by “recent”, we mean anywhere between one and three months old.
That might seem aggressive, but consider the speed at which the market works. From a shopper’s perspective, the product in the eight-month-old review might not be today’s product, especially compared to competitors. Think about reviews like a product: always consider when the new model is coming out.
Quantify credibility
Think about it – would you feel more inclined to buy a product with a single, multi-paragraph review that breaks down the customer’s impressions in great detail? Or a product with 10 short, three-sentence reviews?
According to most shoppers, a product review section doesn’t start to seem credible until it has 10 reviews. 10-25 recent reviews is the sweet spot.
The number of reviews isn’t the only way to quantify what makes reviews credible and effective. Review length is important too. For most shoppers, the ideal review length is 3-4 sentences. This offers more detail than those bare-bones “good product” reviews we always see, but not so much that the reader tunes out (or the reviewer seems unhinged).
Embrace social shopping and reviews
Across the e-commerce world, social shopping is on the rise. You might think this is more true for smaller boutiques than for a behemoth like Walmart but you’d be wrong: 61% of Walmart shoppers have clicked on a link in a social post and made an immediate purchase.
This is especially true for Gen Z shoppers, the majority (67%) of whom start their searches on platforms like TikTok, Instagram and YouTube.
Brands can tap into this trend by partnering with creators and influencers to create reviews, demos, and other content. Your brand pages could even include UGC features, ideally syndicated across platforms for consistency. As stated above, text reviews (with images!) are the most effective social posts for converting shoppers into buyers (74%); videos are the next most influential.
Know your industry
Every industry vertical comes with its own considerations, which directly influence how we market products and the type of UGC you should be collecting.
If you’re a beauty brand, you’re at the very top of the categories list for which shoppers (88%) consider product reviews essential; followed by technology + electronics (86%) and home products (84%). Regardless of the category, shoppers rely on reviews to learn about performance, specs, and other essential information.
Categories with a lower risk associated with purchase tend to be least influenced by UGC – categories like non-alcoholic beverages, snacks and frozen foods. Does this mean you shouldn’t have a UGC offering if your product falls into one of these categories? Absolutely not (we’d never say that). But it might determine how much you invest in collecting it or the kind you solicit.
Here’s the recap:
We live in a review economy, and many of your customers will want to leave you a review without your prompting. As we talked about throughout this blog, there are many ways to efficiently gather high quality UGC on your product pages at Walmart.
As an approved partner of Walmart, Bazaarvoice is here to help you build a robust UGC strategy that can set you apart on Walmart.com!
To get started, please visit www.bazaarvoice.com/walmart and explore the benefits today!
