user - Internet Marketing News and Blogs

User product reviews are a must for retailers and when used well can enhance the credibility of a site and nudge customers towards buying a product.

Reviews can have the benefit of bumping up conversion rates and average order values, as well as providing some unique content for the search engines.

Here are some tips for retailers on providing user product reviews... 

Doritos, the tortilla corn crisp brand owned by PepsiCo, has launched a new online campaign to engage users with an interactive website, user generated content and strong links to social networking sites.

Historically, FMCG brands have been slow to embrace online marketing as they have struggled to deliver a compelling creative message and measure the effectiveness of their campaigns.

Here, we talk to web analytics expert Avinash Kaushik about the future of web measurement, online surveys and 'visitor experience optimisation' - something he predicts will be a life or death thing for websites to adopt in the next couple of years.

A recent study has shown that a lot of traditional publishing companies have struggled to implement and make the most of user-generated content (UGC), with costs and efficiency listed as the main reasons.

But those that worry that enough people aren't submitting UGC may be missing out on the much larger numbers who interact with it.

New research from the e-tailing group has reinforced the importance of user reviews for etailers, with 98% of shoppers reading reviews before making a purchase.

The US-based study (pdf) concludes that reviews are a 'must-have' for e-commerce sites, so why are some retailers still not adding reviews?

The concept of Tribewanted.com is to develop a community existing both on an island in Fiji and online.

The project’s success is due entirely to promotion via social networking, but this could also be its biggest risk of failure.

I spotted an interesting article in the Washington Post, which looks at online auction giant eBay and its plans to improve the user experience in 2008.

The story focuses on eBay’s proposed introduction of a shipping fees ratings scheme, to clamp down on sellers who charge bargain basement prices but make profits on exorbitant delivery ‘costs’.

All good, but what about the improvements that eBay’s website has been in need of for a considerable time? Adding functionality and tweaking its ranking algorithms are one thing, but what I think it needs is some proper usability testing and a bit of a makeover.

There was some lively debate at an E-consultancy Persuasion Marketing roundtable last month about whether this topic constitutes a separate discipline which should have its own processes and budget.

Two news stories caught my attention recently – the UK launch of the iPhone and the scandal at the BBC over naming Blue Peter’s kitten. 

You might not think they are related, or related to usability - but I beg to differ.

A new survey from Deloitte & Touche has provided more evidence of the influence of user-generated reviews on consumers, as well as their growing significance for brands and etailers.

The study focused on US shoppers, and found that of the 62% of respondents that read user reviews, more than 80% had been ‘directly influenced’ by them – i.e. the reviews had either confirmed their initial choice or changed their mind.