It is always essential to get feedback from your audience. Fortunately, the internet has made it easier than ever to get user feedback within the App Store and Play Store itself.
And responding to these reviews – be they positive or negative – shows your customers that you value their opinions.
While you might want to see more users posting reviews on the App Store, you may also want to know the best responses.
According to research, 97% of people who read reviews will read responses as well. So, before you give cold responses to your customers that scare them, kindly read on.
This blog will uncover how to give the best reply to reviews in the App Store.
Table Of Contents:
- Best Practices To Respond To Positive App Store Reviews
- Best Practices To Respond To Negative App Store Reviews
- How To Manage Reviews Using Statusbrew?
- FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions)
You can directly jump to a section of your choice or keep scrolling.
Best Practices To Respond To Positive App Store Reviews
- Thank The User For Sharing Reviews
- Address The User By Their Name
- Respond Promptly
- Be Brief
- Share Your Business Values
- Be Honest
- Add CTAs
- Share The Positive Reviews On Social Media
Thank The User For Sharing Reviews
You should appreciate your users for their kind words and for taking out the time to write a review. You should also thank them for remaining loyal to your company. Thanking your users for their good reviews shows gratitude.
Use a reputation management tool like Statusbrew to respond to your reviewers promptly. You can even enable the notifications options and bring in your team members to respond in the best way possible.
Book a free demo today to get a walkthrough of the platform.
Address The User By Their Name
It's always recommended to include the user's name in your response. This will show them how much their one review means to you and that you value the time they took to provide valuable feedback. You can either tag the account directly in your response or simply write their first name if their username does not include their name.
Respond Promptly
Respond as soon as possible, even to your positive reviews. Don't leave your customer's positive review hanging without a response for too long while you keep resolving the issue of negative ones.
You want to ensure that you are a good communicator and respond in time, so your customers know that you are a responsive brand that cares about its customer's opinions.
Responding promptly is especially recommended if the user asks for something in their reviews or addresses a complaint. While you try to respond to your customer's reviews, don't forget to maintain your brand voice and tone in your responses.
Be Brief
You don't have to get into great detail when responding to a positive review. Remember that the reviewers are not expecting a detailed response either. They only need acknowledgment. Respond with what you feel is appropriate and required for the review to resolve.
Positive reviews with suggestions should be taken extra seriously. If the reviewer has provided suggestions for improvement in their positive review, feel free to respond with your thoughts on how you plan to act on those suggestions.
Share Your Business Values
One of the best ways to show gratitude and respect for positive reviews is to include your business values in your review reply. It can be achieved by highlighting the things that make your business unique. Perhaps your services are top-notch with guaranteed satisfaction, or your business prides itself in offering the best products at affordable prices.
It should be conveyed positively, as it can go a long way in helping other potential customers make their decision on where they want to spend their money.
Be Honest
Be honest in your replies about the problems or concerns the reviewer has brought up. Try to be positive and encourage users to keep coming back or share their suggestions. You can also reply with how you plan on addressing those concerns in the future.
Be informed about how you will improve, and be patient. Positive reviews will not appear overnight. Many users may take some time to write a positive review – some take days, months, or years before writing a review.
Bonus Content: 10+ Ways To Get More Reviews For Your Business
Add CTAs
If a user has just posted a good review of your business, it means that they are pleased with your services. Now, you have the perfect opportunity to call them to a specific action.
For instance, if the user's review is about the quality of your app, you could ask them to update it, so they get access to new features. Or, if they have mentioned they want to tell other people about their experience with your brand, you could ask them to leave a review on other sites like Yelp, Google, or Facebook.
Share The Positive Reviews On Social Media
Your users have done their part. So you should too. After all, that's what reviews are meant for.
One of the best ways to use your positive reviews is to encourage more customers to share their reviews. This can be done by showing your customer reviews to your other customers.
Sharing positive reviews on social media is a great way to get the word out. You can take screenshots of positive reviews from the App Store and post them on your Instagram Story or as a testimonial on your website for potential clients to see.
Bonus Content: 10 Ways To Build A Better Reputation Online With Reviews
Best Practices To Respond To Negative App Store Reviews
- Take Responsibility
- Don't Pick A Fight
- Take The Conversation In Private
- Take Actions To Resolve Negative Reviews
- Offer A Token Of Gratitude
- Ask To Update Negative Reviews
Take Responsibility
Apologize to your customer. Provide an outline of your brand's steps to address its complaint. Not every customer complaint will have a resolution, nor will every complaint be your fault, but simply acknowledging a customer's negative experience with your business goes a long way.
Bonus Content: 3 Ways To Get Google Reviews Deleted [Always Work]
Don't Pick A Fight
Although negative reviews may be confrontational, disrespectful, and even rude, your response shouldn't be. Avoid escalating the situation or exacerbating the public confrontation by maintaining a professional and helpful tone at all times.
Take The Conversation In Private
Take the conversation to another platform once you have left a thoughtful public response on the App Store. Resolving your customer's issue may require their personal information, login details, or a lengthy back-and-forth conversation, all of which are best kept out of a public forum like the App Store.
Ensure you provide a direct point of contact in your response and expect to receive a private message from the customer. If they don't reach out, that means they most likely complained just for the sake of complaining, and their issue isn't a pressing concern.
Begin your private conversation with a brief apology. Remain sympathetic and polite as you ask the user for more details about their complaint. Explain in detail what you will do to make up for their unfavorable experience.
Take Actions To Resolve Negative Reviews
Just a heartfelt apology may not be enough to change a negative review to a positive one. However, if you resolve the customer's complaint, they are much more likely to change their negative opinion of your brand. In fact, almost 70% of customers who complain about a company will do business again if they act to resolve their problem.
Once you understand the customer's issue, consult with the department best equipped to handle it. For instance, if there's a technical glitch in your app, forward the complaint to your product or engineering team. Stay in contact with the customer. Let them know when their issue has been resolved. Similarly, if the complaint is about customer service, get in touch with your customer support team to resolve the matter amicably.
Bonus Content: How To Outsmart Fake Negative Reviews On Google My Business
Offer A Token Of Gratitude
Consider offering your customers an additional show of appreciation once you have resolved their issue. For instance, if you made a clear error in your app that caused the users to lose their valuable time or productivity, compensate them with a discount or extended trial.
With that being said, don't send gifts to every customer who voices a negative opinion about your brand. You don't want to reward negative reviews. You don't even want your giveaways to seem like an empty gesture. Your priority should be to fix the customer's problem. When it's appropriate, take an extra step to make things right.
Ask To Update Negative Reviews
Your first instinct may be to remove or hide negative reviews once they have been resolved. But here's the thing - your prospects want to see negative reviews. Check out these statistics:
- 72% of B2B buyers say negative reviews give insight into a product.
- 40% of B2B buyers claim that negative reviews help build credibility for a product.
- 95% of consumers are suspicious of fake reviews if there are no bad scores.
Rather than asking for a review to be taken down, ask your customers to update their review once you have resolved their issue. An updated review is clear evidence of your commitment to fixing mistakes and helping unsatisfied customers.
How To Manage Reviews Using Statusbrew?
Statusbrew is a reputation management tool that allows you to manage, track, and analyze your ratings and reviews not just from Google Play Store and App Store but also from other review sites like Google My Business, TrustRadius, Yelp, Trip Advisor and more from a single dashboard.
Here's how Statusbrew can help you to manage your reviews:
- Using AI-powered sentiment analysis to understand your customer's emotions at a scale.
- Respond to your customer review quickly by getting notified of all incoming reviews.
- Automatically route reviews of a specific category to a particular inbox/team member.
- Keep track of all your customers posting reviews across platforms using inbuilt CRM.
- Auto-assign reviews to different team members for quick response.
- Use controlled team member access and no password sharing to mitigate compliance issues.
- Collaborate with your team members in real-time from the same dashboard to handle customer queries quickly.
- Auto-hide spam and troll comments across your social real estate.
- Get in-depth brand reputation insights.
Sign up for a free demo today to learn how we can help! ?
Statusbrew is an all-in-one social media management tool that supports Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and even Google My Business.
FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions)
Here are some commonly asked questions on replying to App Store reviews:
How do I respond to an Apple App Store review?
Here's how you can respond to App Store review through the App Store's console:
Step 1: Select the app you want to leave a response for in the My Apps section.
Step 2: Click Ratings and Reviews from the left menu.
Step 3: Select the review you want to leave a response for and click Reply.
Step 4: Enter your response and click Submit.
Can developers remove reviews from the App Store?
No, you can't delete ratings and reviews as a developer on the App Store.
Should you reply to App Store reviews?
Yes, responding to reviews on your App Store product page can help you improve your app's rating and create a better user experience.
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