18 Surprisingly Easy Ways to Collect B2B Software User Reviews

Caroline Malamut profile picture
By Caroline Malamut

Published
9 min read

Customer reviews are incredibly important, especially for software buyers. 66% of software buyers say that reviews significantly impacted their final purchase decision. If you don't have any user reviews, how can those buyers make the right decision for their business? 

Some vendors have seen a lot of success in a short amount of time when collecting reviews, but it's still a difficult task to figure out the best way to reach your customers and encourage them to leave a review. There just isn’t a master list of reviews collection ideas or strategies out there to inspire your marketing team...until now!

Software Review Collection

We've found that listings with 10 or more Capterra reviews have a 1.5x higher conversion rate than those with no reviews. So as long as you continue to add more reviews to your Capterra profile, you’ll see fantastic results. To help you out, I’ve compiled a list of ways your team can easily collect a bunch of B2B software user reviews in a short amount of time. 

1. Email Blast

You have customers, right? You have their email addresses, right? So send them a simple email asking for a review! Just take a few sentences to explain why they should leave a review on Capterra and include the direct link to your reviews form.

You can send this email to all of your customers or a specific subset of them. This is a great way to remind customers of the great experience they have had with your product. Though negative reviews aren’t a bad thing - 52% of users say they actually trust a product more with a few negative reviews - if you’re just starting to collect reviews, your best customers are the ones more likely to actually respond to your request.

2. Email Newsletter

If you don’t want to do a one-time email blast, consider adding a reviews call-to-action in your customer newsletter. Whether you send it weekly, monthly, or quarterly, it provides a constant reminder for your customers that you appreciate their feedback and want them to share it with other potential users.  

3. New Customer Nurture

Use your marketing automation software to create an email nurture program to welcome new customers to your product. Use the program to set them up for success with your product, and then ask them to leave a review after a certain amount of time using the software has passed. Even if you don’t have a customer nurture program, send a one-off email to new customers after they’ve been with you for a while to check in and see if they’d be willing to share their experience by writing a review.  

I would recommend giving them at least three to six months with your product before asking them to review it, so they’ve had sufficient time to understand the strengths (and weaknesses) of the system and can properly review and recommend it to potential buyers.

4. Within Your Software System

Every day your customers are using your product, so consider asking for reviews somewhere within the actual system! Put a CTA on the login page, so they see it before doing anything else. If your product has a main dashboard, place it on that page, but don’t interfere too much with the actual usability of the system. Or, if you don’t want to constantly disturb your customers with the same CTA, have it pop up temporarily every few months. Who knows, maybe you’ll catch them on a day when they want to share their experience with others!

5. Twitter

Social media is a fantastic way to reach your customers. 

Use Twitter to promote the current reviews of your product, as well as to tweet a direct link to write a new review, making it that much easier for your users to complete the action. You can also share quotes from some reviews and tag the reviewer, which then promotes the company that uses your software, too.   

6. Facebook

Try the same strategy on Facebook: post a link to your reviews page on Capterra and ask people to leave a review. Again, since they “like” you on Facebook, they’re more likely to want to leave a review. I would also recommend including some type of image with your post, so it will stand out more on your followers' newsfeeds.  

7. LinkedIn

Since it’s a social network of professionals, LinkedIn is one of the best places to reach your customers when they’re actually in a business mindset. Post updates about the reviews you’re receiving and encourage those who haven’t done so to review your software. More than likely, they were just using your software, so it is a great opportunity to remind them to share their thoughts with others.  

8. Other Social Media Channels

Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn are definitely the big three when it comes to B2B software social media, but if your users are more engaged on other social channels, don’t ignore them! If the majority of your customers are on Instagram or Pinterest, post your reviews promotions there. But don’t just start a new social account just to collect reviews. If your audience isn’t there, don’t waste your time and effort on a social media channel that won’t perform.  

9. User Events and Conferences

If you host a user conference for your software, this is the ideal place to collect a ton of reviews in a short amount of time. Where else can you get your customers all in one place, fully engaged with your company?

Set up kiosks around the expo floor specifically for collecting reviews on Capterra; have some of your employees wander around the conference armed with iPads and a new reviews form always loaded and ready to go; include a CTA in your follow-up email after the event encouraging attendees to leave a review of your software. These people are here because they use your software and want to learn more about it. Make sure you offer them the opportunity to express their feelings in a review.

10. Incentivize Reviewers

43% of users will leave a review in exchange for some type of gift or reward. I know I would do just about anything for Starbucks coffee!

Offer your customers a gift card to their favorite store or fast casual Mexican restaurant; send them some company swag; you can even offer a discount on their current software subscription or a premium add-on for their account. Use whatever kind of incentive works best to get your customers to leave reviews.  

11. Incentivize Employees

Turn the incentive idea around and focus on your employees! Encourage your loyal workers, especially the ones who are customer-facing, to collect reviews from the users they interact with every day. Structure it in a way that makes sense for company and team goals, but give out prizes and rewards based on those goals, like you would with sales commissions.

For example, the client success manager whose clients have the most reviews wins tickets to a local sporting event. Or, to keep the whole company engaged, the winner gets to choose where the next company happy hour takes place! Just like user incentives, reward your employees with gifts or experiences they actually want and would work towards.

12. Run a Contest

Related to the incentives idea, consider holding a contest solely focused on collecting reviews of your software on Capterra. We do a March Madness-themed contest every year, but your contests can be built around anything that would pump up your customers and encourage them to leave reviews.

Is summer a slow month for sales? Instead of wasting time on prospects you can’t reach at the beach, focus on the customers you already acquired by asking them to leave reviews in a summer-themed contest. Or, instead of pushing for more revenue to reach end-of-year goals, get in the holiday spirit by offering to donate a certain amount to charity for every review collected. Combining the urgency of a deadline with the fun of a contest theme means you’ll collect more reviews during a short period of time.  

13. Customer Phone Call

More than likely, you’ve talked to at least some of your customers on the phone. If you’ve had a productive call with a lot of great feedback, ask them to leave a review. I also recommend sending a follow-up email with the link for leaving a review, to remind them of the recent interaction and provide an easy way for them to actually leave a review.

14. Product Support Interaction

Just like your client success team, your support team also has a lot of interactions with customers, from fixing bugs or assisting with complicated technical questions. Again, if your product support team has a productive call with a customer, they should also request a review. 

15. Email Signature

Do you email your customers? Even if it’s not every day, at some point during the customer’s lifetime with your software company they’ve received an email from someone within your company. An easy, automatic way to keep reviews top of mind, even if they’re not the topic of the email conversation, is to always include a link in your email signature to the reviews page on Capterra.

16. Write a Blog Post

Believe me, we’ve written a ton of blog posts about user reviews. Take a page out of our book and do the same on your blog! Highlight some of your best customers by featuring their reviews and how they’ve used your software to achieve their company goals. Not only will you promote your product, but you’ll give your customers some free promotion as well, and they’ll love you even more for it!

17. Promote Reviews on Your Website

Repurpose some of you best reviews as testimonials on your website. Trust elements are key to converting web visitors into leads, as 70% of web visitors will look for product reviews before making a purchase. Use the Capterra reviews you have to show these potential customers that your current customers love your product and recommend it to others. 

18. Add the Capterra Reviews Badge

Another fantastic trust element, embed the custom Capterra reviews badge on your website, which links right to the list of your product’s reviews. So not only do you have a badge that proves you’re well-reviewed, it links to your entire list of reviews, so potential users can see exactly what people think about your software. Login to your vendor portal now to access your product's custom badge. 

More?

Have you used any of the above tactics to collect B2B software user reviews? What other strategies have worked for your software reviews collection? Share your thoughts in the comments below.


Looking for Marketing Automation software? Check out Capterra's list of the best Marketing Automation software solutions.

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About the Author

Caroline Malamut profile picture

Caroline is the Vendor Marketing Manager at Capterra. Her love of marketing began while growing up in Philadelphia and has only grown since attending the University of Pittsburgh. In her free time she enjoys reading, spending time with friends and family, and cheering on her Philly and Pitt sports teams.

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