The Impact of Negative Reviews: Do They Affect the Buying Decisions of the Customers of Your Online Sports Store?

You either have a growing interest in the online sporting segment or own an online sports store and wonder what impact negative reviews have on your business – Do they affect the buying decisions of the customers of your online sports store? Reviewsbird is an online platform that will offer you information that will cover your question based on opinions on online shops in the UK and what to pay attention to when buying new equipment.

Reviews are an essential aspect of any business; they show outsiders the existing customers’  experiences with a brand, a service, or a product. In addition, reviews offer potential customers insight into whether to engage with a business or not.

As reviews shape the attitude of a potential customer towards a company, reviews are a powerful tool for the company’s reputation. Reviews can be positive, indifferent, or negative. All three types of reviews influence the company’s success. Companies aim for positive customer feedback; however, negative reviews are often inevitable.

Individuals often place negative reviews as a warning to others. This can influence a potential customer’s buying decision. Negative reviews could harm its reputation and potentially affect its sales.

The Influence of Negative Reviews On Sports Stores

As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and the closing of gyms, nearly half of UK shoppers have bought sports items through online sports stores since March 2020. In addition, home workouts have become essential for most UK citizens as most started working out regularly because of the pandemic, and as they invested in-home workout equipment will continue to work out from home.

Due to the splurge of UK citizens purchasing Sportswear and equipment online, the impact of reviews does not seem to be as much of an influence as before the pandemic.

Coping With Negative Reviews

As customers are up to three times more likely to write negative reviews, which may lead to a loss of 30 customers. It is essentially what a business can do to cope with all reviews, including negative reviews. Even as the online sports segment is performing well due to the ongoing pandemic, the firms in this industry must still focus on retrieving reviews and coping with the negative reviews given by their customers. Businesses could invest in software that reminds customers to place online reviews and ranks the highest star (4-5) as a priority on websites such as  Google, Facebook, and TripAdvisor. This type of software is named Reputation Management Software. Furthermore, businesses could use the negative reviews as opportunities and see how they could optimise their online business, products offered, and services.

Reviewing the online sports market and the impact of reviews, it is inevitable not to receive negative reviews even as the pandemic has increased demand and sales for the sports industry. Therefore, businesses can contemplate using Reputation Management Software and use the reviews as feedback to optimise business.