We can say whatever we want about ourselves, but it can’t hold a candle to what our customers say. When I joined the Knock CRM team in 2021, my primary goal was to tell customer stories. Case studies are great, but I was looking for quality and quantity. Our customers were obsessed with us, and I wanted as many diverse voices as possible to sing our praises from the rooftops.
In just a few short months, we went from 0 to 40+ G2 reviews at 4.9 out of 5 stars and earned seven badges, including High Performer, High Performer Small Business, Users Love Us, Easiest to Do Business With, and Best Support. We slapped those badges on our LinkedIn banner, in sales decks, email signatures, and so much more.
If you’re selling anything in the multifamily industry, you know how vital relationships are. Reviews are how you build that relationship network at scale. In this guide, you will learn:
How and who to ask for reviews
Build a set-it-and-forget-it review-generating machine
What to do with the reviews once they start pouring in
Asking for Reviews
“Exercise gives you endorphins, endorphins make you happy, and happy people just don’t kill their husbands!” - Elle Woods
What else do happy people not do? Leave reviews. It’s unhappy people who are the quickest to the keyboard. What are happy people doing? Minding their business and using your product. You don’t get what you don’t ask for. So when you have a good experience with a customer, ask for that review.
If you’re reading this, you might be a marketer who’s either been tasked with or feels strongly about building your reputation here on Revyse. In that case, your day-to-day interactions with customers might be limited, and this strategy is all about quantity, so let's talk about automation and scale first.
Here’s what you’ll need
A survey platform - Ask customers for their honest opinions.
A marketing email software - I know you already have this, duh.
A little baby budget - Your customer’s time is valuable. We have to sweeten the deal.
Getting Your Survey Set Up
There are several tools out there that range in price and functionality. You can always go with old faithful Survey Monkey, but it is best if the survey can live in the email's body vs. a survey link. That way, you can capture their answer directly from the email, making it as easy for them to answer. Here are some platforms that have taken my review game to the next level.
Your go-to for all things comprehensive. Seamlessly tie it with Salesforce, trigger surveys post-Quarterly Business Reviews, or after significant customer touch points. The beauty of branching logic? A stellar score could lead them to write a rave review, while anything less can be a discovery trail to unearth the ‘why.’ The cherry on top? Their real-time Slack alerts for CSMs. The intuitive dashboard, the direct email features, and the sleek design make it stand out. It's a bit of a splurge, but the value is undeniable.
For those who love a swift setup without skimping on efficiency, Iterate is the jam. The team behind it is refreshingly hands-on—the founders answer the support chat. Craft your survey, embed it directly into your email platform, and you're golden. It’s intuitive, capturing the essence of each review.
🧰 Pro tip: Wrestling with designing emails that pop? I've been there. When traditional tools leave you hanging, Beefree.io steps in like the unsung hero of the email design world. This user-friendly front-end builder is a breeze to navigate. Craft your design, then drop that HTML straight into your email tool of choice. And the sweetest part? It'll even play host to your images, so you’re not juggling uploads. Truly, a marketer's little secret!
Making the Ask
Once you've got a grasp on your current customers, slide them into a sequence nudging them toward your profile on Revyse. Here's a little trick from my playbook: dangle a $20 gift card their way. Consider offering a $20 gift card as a thank you. It acknowledges the value of their time, and it sweetens the deal. Don't believe me? Industry giants like G2 and Capterra are already playing this game, handling those gift card distributions themselves. See? You're in good company! 💅🏼
Since our customers are busy, I like to give them plenty of opportunities to share their experience with your product, so I drop them into a four-email series and send the email out in this order:
1st email: immediately after they’ve been added to your campaign.
2nd email: 48 hours if no action was taken from email #1
3rd email: 5 days after no action was taken from email #2
4th email: 7 days after no action was taken on email #3
👀 Looking for some email inspo? Check out my Promoter review solicitation email series [Template]
Dishing Out Your Rewards
Even though Bezos is an evil overlord, I like to use Amazon gift cards as a nominal incentive to reward users for their honest feedback because they’re easy to distribute in bulk. Because Revyse only allows verified buyers to leave a review, you can see which of your raving fans left a review. Then grab their emails and head over to Amazon’s eGiftcard page.
I like to upload a branded gift card image and write a generic note like:
Thanks for taking the time to share your [Your company] experience on Revyse! Hope you enjoy this gift card!
What to Do with Your Reviews?
There are a ton of benefits to having reviews on Revyse. Buyers may discover you there when they’re looking for a specific solution, or maybe they’ve heard of you but are looking for extra validation from a non-biased 3rd party review site. But what else are those reviews good for?
I’m a huge advocate of social proof and letting your customers tell your stories. After all, I was among the first to give a free apartment to an influencer. If you're going the extra mile on Revyse, let’s make that content hustle on the side. Here are some ways to sprinkle that social proof magic into your marketing:
Add badges to your LinkedIn banner or email signatures - This one’s a classic. We’ve seen it before, and it hits every time.
Include a “customers love us” section on your website - Opt for genuine review snapshots or integrate a live feed. A shoutout from an independent third party always carries more clout than our words, however catchy they might be. Use those LinkedIn mentions, Facebook raves, tweets, and of course, your glowing Revyse reviews.
Use a screenshot as a LinkedIn ad - This trend has been picking up steam on LinkedIn. Instead of using branded graphics for LinkedIn ads, they’ll screenshot a post or tweet from a customer talking about them and use that as the image. It gives, “Don’t take our word for it. Here’s the proof,” and I love that.
Build a grabber quote repository for your sales team - Extract the best one-liners from your reviews and organize them by what sets your company’s unique value props. Your sales crew can then sprinkle them in emails and social shoutouts or casually drop them in chit-chats.
Sprinkle them everywhere - Got your power quote collection ready? Now, plaster them everywhere:
Demo decks
At events (think banners, booth design, flyers)
Landing pages
Lead nurture emails
Templates for your Sales Development Reps (SDRs)
In Closing
Navigating the multifamily landscape and standing out amongst the myriad software solutions is no easy feat. But there's a secret sauce – your customers. Their experiences, stories, and validation are pure gold, and if leveraged right, they can catapult your brand's credibility to unprecedented heights.
Remember, in this digital age where word-of-mouth is online, every review is a narrative waiting to be amplified. So, tap into these stories, ensure they echo across all your marketing touchpoints, and let them build your brand. Because at the end of the day, no advertising is more powerful than a satisfied customer's voice.
Stay authentic, keep your customers front and center, and keep the reviews rolling. To many more stars and badges in your multifamily journey! 🌟
Cheers to building trust, one review at a time,
💚 Sydney
P.S. Do you have an idea of how to gather more reviews or where to use them that I might have missed? Drop it in the comments. I’d love to add it to the guide. Or better yet, create your own! IMO just like reviews, with great content, more is more.
About the Author
Sydney Webber has a decade of multifamily experience, with the majority being in marketing on both the operator and vendor sides. She is passionate about telling customer stories and building scalable, repeatable playbooks empowering scrappy teams to do less with more. In 2022, her podcast, Renter Obsessed, won the Platinum DotComm award and was the first official Multifamily Social Media Summit podcast. Sydney has shared marketing strategies as a mainstage speaker at multiple AIM conferences and featured in Globe Street, Multifamily Insiders, and Multihousing News.
All opinions expressed by Sydney Webber are her own and do not represent the opinions of her employer, Updater.