2 New Ways for Brands to Engage with Product Reviews on Amazon

Responding to reviews, regardless of where those reviews were written, is so important. When you respond to a negative review, you have the opportunity to turn a bad situation around and show the reviewer (and future prospective customers) that you care.

Here at 1440, we strongly believe brands should respond to reviews, regardless of where they’re posted. So we were shocked (and quite frankly, disappointed) that earlier this year, Amazon announced it was doing away with brands’ ability to comment on reviews.

In other words, brands were left with no way to connect with their reviewers.

At the time, Amazon said they were working on other opportunities for brands to connect with their shoppers via Amazon. And we’re excited to say they’ve delivered!

Effective immediately, Amazon Sellers who own a brand have two new ways to engage with reviewers via Seller Central. They can post public responses to reviews — as well as send a message to the reviewer to remedy issues mentioned in the review.

Commenting on Review via Amazon Seller Central

Brands’ ability to post comments on customer reviews has been restored! This is so important, as responses help not only the reviewer, but also future prospective customers. Per BrightLocal, of those who read reviews, 96% also read business’ responses to reviews.

To post a public comment on a review, the seller must be “internal to the brand and responsible for selling the brand in the Amazon store”. To identify as the brand owner, visit the Brand Benefit Eligibility page.

Once you’ve identified as the brand owner, navigate to Seller Central — and then click on the “comment” icon in the right corner of the review.

Easy peasy!

If you’re a Reputation Studio customer on Seller Central, you now (once again) have the ability to respond to Amazon reviews directly within the platform. That means you can manage all of your review responses (not just on Amazon) from one login — regardless of where each review was written.

For those of you on Vendor Central, stay tuned. Amazon should be providing a solution to review responses in Vendor Central soon.

Contacting Reviewers via Amazon Seller Central

Sometimes, a public response to a review is all that it takes. But in other cases, it makes sense for brands to “take things offline” to get more information about the issues brought up in the review. Brands now have the ability to do just that.

Reviews are now integrated into the Amazon messaging system. That means brands can send follow-up messages directly to customers who write reviews.

Three Messages You’ll See on Reviews in Seller Central

When you’re in Seller Central, you’re able to see all of your reviews. In the corner of each review, one of the following messages will appear:

1. Great Job! This is a message that appears next to four and five-star reviews because typically, it’s not necessary to send a message to customers who write positive reviews.

2. Unable to Contact Customer: You can only contact a reviewer if you’re the seller of the product and the order was placed in the last six months. If that’s not the case, this is the text that will appear.

3. Contact Customer: This will show up on reviews below four stars so you can get more information and resolve the customer’s issue.

When you click on the “Contact Customer” link, you’re taken to a page with a few options. You can either immediately offer a full, courtesy refund to the unhappy reviewer. Or you can send a message to the customer to discuss the issues they brought up in their review.

Customers can then respond to your message. And the entire conversation lives within the messages area of Seller Central.

Start Engaging with Your Shoppers on Amazon

It’s a great day for brands on Seller Central, as they now have two new ways to engage with shoppers who write reviews. Make it a priority to leverage these new features. Doing so will help you provide great post-sale service to your customers, boost your reputation on Amazon, and grow your sales.