How to Get Product Reviews on Shopify

Introduction

Customer reviews are one of the simplest, highest-impact growth levers for e-commerce. A steady stream of authentic reviews improves search visibility, reduces purchase anxiety, and raises average order value. Yet many merchants struggle with collection tactics, timing, and follow-up — and end up using multiple disconnected tools that create "app fatigue."

Short answer: The fastest route to more product reviews on Shopify is to ask the right customers, at the right time, with the right incentive, and to make it extremely easy for them to leave text, photo, and video feedback. A unified retention solution that automates review requests, rewards reviewers, and displays reviews where they influence purchase decisions will scale review volume without adding complexity to your tech stack.

In this post we’ll explain why reviews matter, break down proven strategies for getting more of them, provide practical email and SMS copy you can use, and show how to measure and scale a review program that grows lifetime value. Wherever it helps, we’ll point to how Growave’s retention suite brings these pieces together so merchants get "More Growth, Less Stack." We’re trusted by 15,000+ brands and hold a 4.8-star rating on Shopify, and we build for merchants first — not for investors.

Our main message: treat review collection as a coordinated retention play, not an isolated feature. Reviews feed discovery, conversion, and retention when they’re automated, incentivized appropriately, and surfaced in high-impact places.

Why Product Reviews Matter

Reviews Improve Conversion and Reduce Risk

For unfamiliar buyers, reviews replace the missing social context present in physical stores. They answer questions the product description doesn’t, showcase real use cases, and validate quality. That social proof directly lifts conversion rates on product pages and reduces returns.

Reviews Boost SEO and Fresh Content

Search engines reward pages that receive regular, user-generated content. Reviews add descriptive keywords, long-tail queries, and page updates — all of which help product pages rank for intent-driven search queries. Over time, more reviews mean broader discoverability.

Reviews Increase Average Order Value and LTV

Shoppers exposed to reviews — especially those with photos or videos — are more likely to buy multiple items or higher-margin variants. When you combine reviews with loyalty rewards or VIP programs, you create a feedback loop that raises customer lifetime value.

Reviews Inform Product Development

Reviews are a free R&D channel. They highlight recurring complaints, desired features, and improvement opportunities. Tracking themes in reviews can help prioritize product changes, packaging updates, and improved descriptions that reduce future negative feedback.

What Counts as a Product Review

Types of Reviews You Should Collect

• Star ratings and short text: the baseline. Quick to leave and highly scannable.
• Detailed written reviews: deeper insight and often includes actionable feedback.
• Photo reviews: visual proof that a product looks or works as advertised.
• Video reviews: powerful for explaining fit, use, unboxing — and highly persuasive.

Why Verified Purchases Matter

A "verified purchase" label increases trust. When reviews are linked to actual orders, shoppers trust ratings more and conversion increases. Wherever possible, use order data to tag reviews as verified.

UGC vs. Formal Reviews

User-generated content (UGC) like social photos tagged on Instagram complements formal review submissions. UGC is especially useful for lifestyle brands; pairing it with shoppable tags turns social content into direct revenue.

Legal and Trust Considerations

Transparency and Authenticity

Avoid incentivizing reviews in ways that bias content or violate platform policies. Offer rewards for leaving a review but avoid asking for only positive feedback. Clear disclosure of incentives preserves trust.

Compliance and Moderation

Have moderation rules in place for inappropriate content. Respond to complaints promptly and remove content that violates your terms. Keep records linking reviews to orders to handle disputes.

FTC Guidelines and Country Rules

Different regions have rules on incentivized reviews, endorsements, and influencer disclosures. Keep legal language transparent and avoid offering conditional incentives tied to positive wording.

Where to Surface Reviews on Your Shopify Store

Placement matters. Don’t hide social proof away.

• Product pages: the highest-impact location. Include star average, number of reviews, and a "read reviews" anchor near the add-to-cart area.
• Category and collection pages: surface average ratings to help with browsing decisions.
• Homepage and hero sections: showcase best-rated products or customer highlights.
• Checkout/confirmation pages: reinforce purchase confidence and encourage future reviews.
• Email and SMS: use snippets of reviews in post-purchase messages to nurture repeat buying.
• Social channels and shoppable galleries: display photo and video reviews as part of your shoppable UGC.

How to Get Product Reviews on Shopify: A Strategic Framework

Getting reviews is a multi-step conversion problem. You need to identify the right audience, ask at the right time, reduce friction, and reward appropriately. Here’s how we approach it.

Build Automated Post-Purchase Review Flows

Automation is the backbone of consistent review volume. Manual outreach works occasionally, but it doesn’t scale.

• Trigger timing: send the first review request when the product is likely in the customer’s hands. For consumables, this may be sooner; for furniture or complex items, wait longer.
• Follow-up cadence: send a friendly reminder if no response after the first request, and a final nudge later. Avoid excessive messaging that causes irritation.
• Channel mix: email is primary; SMS can be highly effective for higher-intent customers. Use both when consent exists.
• Personalization: reference the exact product purchased, order number, and expected delivery date to make the request relevant.

A retention platform that ties order events to review triggers removes manual effort and increases fulfillment accuracy.

Offer Value, Not Pressure

Incentives drive response, but they must not undermine trust.

• Reward options: reward reviewers with loyalty points, a small discount on a future purchase, or entry into a giveaway. Points-based incentives are a merchant-friendly option because they encourage future purchases.
• Avoid conditional phrasing: do not require a positive review in exchange for a reward. Make the reward unconditional upon submission.
• Loyalty integration: tie review rewards directly into your loyalty program so reviews fuel repeat purchase behavior.

When incentives are tied to repeat purchases, they both increase review volume and improve long-term retention.

Make Submission Frictionless

Lowering the effort required to leave a review increases completion rates.

• One-click ratings: allow star-only submissions that can later be expanded into full reviews.
• Mobile-first forms: ensure the review form is optimized for small screens.
• Social sign-in: let customers use existing credentials to speed submission.
• Photo/video upload: enable quick uploads from a phone or social account.

Simplifying the process — and enabling uploads directly from phones — dramatically increases UGC submissions.

Ask for Photos and Videos (and Show the Impact)

Visual reviews influence decisions more than text alone.

• Encourage media by offering a small loyalty reward or extra points for photo/video submissions.
• Use examples: include a short sample review with a photo to show what good submissions look like.
• Repurpose media: surface customer photos on product pages and in marketing with permission.

Shoppable UGC that links images back to product pages bridges discovery and conversion.

Segment and Target Your Requests

Not every customer should be treated the same. Tailor requests based on customer data.

• Repeat buyers: long-term customers are more likely to submit reviews and share detailed experiences.
• High-engagement customers: those who interact with your emails or social are good targets.
• First-time buyers: ask for short feedback quickly to capture initial impressions and reduce churn.
• High-ticket purchases: craft more personalized, human outreach for premium items.

Segmentation increases relevance and response rates while avoiding over-messaging.

Use Social Proof Loops: Reviews Feed Referrals and Loyalty

Integrate reviews into your loyalty and referral activities.

• Reward reviewers with points that can be redeemed, nudging repeat purchases.
• Invite reviewers to join a referral program or VIP community.
• Feature reviews in referral messaging to increase shareability.

A unified retention ecosystem connects review collection to downstream growth channels.

Surface Reviews in High-Impact Places

Once you collect reviews, make them visible where they influence decisions.

• Product page above the fold: show average rating and review count near the price and add-to-cart.
• PDP highlights: show most helpful reviews and customer photos near product descriptions.
• Dynamic snippets: use review ratings in search listings and schema markup to boost CTR.

Showing ratings early in the buying process reduces friction and increases conversion.

Practical Step-By-Step Implementation (No Coding Required)

Here’s a practical roadmap that merchant teams can implement quickly, avoiding fragmented tools and redundant integrations.

• Audit: inventory how and where reviews are currently collected and displayed. Note gaps in timing, media support, and moderation.
• Choose your workflow: decide on a review-request cadence and whether to include incentives.
• Configure automated flows: set triggers from order fulfilled to request timings, and tailor messages by product type.
• Build forms and widgets: design mobile-first review forms that accept text, stars, photos, and videos.
• Integrate with loyalty: route rewards for review submissions into your point system to drive repeat purchases.
• Moderate and publish: set filters and keyword rules for moderation, and publish high-quality reviews with media.
• Measure and iterate: track review rate, average rating, media rate, and conversion lift; optimize based on results.

A single retention platform that combines reviews, loyalty, referrals, and UGC eliminates the need for multiple integrations and synergies are immediate: points for reviews drive submissions, photo reviews fuel UGC galleries, and referrals amplify high-rated products.

Email and SMS Templates You Can Copy

Below are tested templates that merchants can adapt. Use branding and retain a conversational tone. Avoid asking for positive reviews only.

• Post-delivery email (friendly ask)
  • Subject line idea: "How’s your [Product Name]? Quick question"
  • Body guidance: Thank the customer, reference the exact item, ask for a short rating or photo, explain reward if offered, include a one-click link to review form.
• Reminder SMS (short, direct)
  • Text guidance: Keep it concise, mention product, and include direct link to review form. Include a small reward mention if applicable.
• Reward redemption follow-up
  • Subject line idea: "Thanks for your review — your points are ready"
  • Body guidance: Thank the customer, confirm points added, suggest a related product or discount to use points on.
• Photo request follow-up
  • Subject line idea: "Love to see how you styled it"
  • Body guidance: Invite photo or video submissions, mention a small extra reward for media, show example UGC to inspire.

These templates should be automated into post-purchase flows and linked into your loyalty logic so incentives are issued automatically.

UX and Design Tips for Review Widgets

A well-designed review display converts more visitors.

• Show aggregate rating and review count near the product title.
• Highlight recent photo and video reviews above the fold.
• Use “most helpful” and “verified purchase” badges to add weight.
• Include a prominent CTA to "Write a Review" on product pages and thank-you pages.
• Ensure microcopy clarifies approximate time to complete, so customers know what to expect.

Design choices that reduce uncertainty and increase ease of submission will lift completion rates.

Handling Negative Reviews

Negative feedback is inevitable. Your response approach matters.

• Acknowledge quickly: thank the reviewer, acknowledge their issue, and propose next steps.
• Take the conversation offline where appropriate: exchange contact details or offer a return/replacement pathway.
• Learn and iterate: look for patterns and fix product descriptions, sizing charts, or QA processes.
• Use negative reviews as trust signals: neutral and balanced review profiles are more credible.

Treat negative reviews as opportunities to improve product quality and customer service.

Measuring the Success of Your Review Program

Track these KPIs to ensure your investment pays off.

• Review rate: percentage of purchases that result in reviews.
• Media rate: proportion of reviews with photos/videos.
• Average rating: overall product rating and changes over time.
• Conversion lift: A/B test product pages with and without review elements.
• Repeat purchase rate among reviewers: do reviewers buy more frequently?
• Time-to-first-review: how long after delivery do customers leave feedback?

Set realistic targets and iterate campaigns based on real data.

Scaling Reviews as Your Brand Grows

Early-stage brands and mature brands have different playbooks.

• For new stores:
  • Prioritize seeding reviews through early customers, influencers, and sampling programs.
  • Reward first reviews with loyalty points that convert into repeat purchases.
• For growing stores:
  • Segment and personalize review requests by customer lifetime value.
  • Surface high-quality UGC across paid channels to increase ROI of ad spend.
• For mature brands:
  • Use advanced automations to trigger review asks at multiple product lifecycle points (e.g., after replenishment cycles).
  • Integrate review data into product roadmaps and catalog updates.

The common thread: scale collection in a way that enhances retention rather than creating transactional, one-off incentives.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

• Over-incentivizing positive reviews: this damages credibility and can violate policies.
• Asking too early: asking before customers have used the product leads to low-quality feedback.
• Fragmented tools: using separate platforms for reviews, loyalty, and UGC creates manual work and data silos.
• Ignoring mobile UX: many shoppers use mobile devices; poor mobile forms reduce submissions.
• Not following up: a single email rarely suffices. A gentle reminder increases response without annoyance.

Avoid these pitfalls by planning a review program that is automated, respectful, and tied into retention.

How Growave Helps You Get More Reviews With Less Stack

We believe review collection should be part of a broader retention strategy. Growave combines Reviews & UGC with Loyalty & Rewards, Referrals, Wishlists, and Shoppable Instagram so merchants get a coherent system that both increases review volume and turns reviews into repeat purchases.

• Automated review flows: link review requests to fulfillment events so you can ask at the right time without manual work.
• Earned rewards for reviews: issue loyalty points automatically when customers submit reviews — a sustainable incentive that encourages repeat buying. Learn how to reward repeat purchases by integrating review incentives into a loyalty program.
• Photo and video support: collect media-rich reviews and display them in product galleries to increase trust and conversion. Learn how to display photo and video reviews in a way that improves conversion and social proof.
• Shoppable UGC: turn customer photos into shoppable content, helping social proof directly influence revenue.
• One unified dashboard: moderate reviews, grant rewards, and measure impact from a single platform, reducing the need for multiple integrations.

If you want to see Growave live on your store, you can install Growave directly: install Growave on your store. For a deeper walkthrough, you can see Growave in action and book a demo. Our platform is built for merchants who want "More Growth, Less Stack" and we support stores of all sizes, including enterprise merchants.

Implementation Checklist

Use this checklist as a launch sequence to build your review program without guesswork.

• Confirm delivery timelines per product category.
• Decide on reward structure (points, discounts, entries).
• Configure automated review request timings per product type.
• Build mobile-first review forms with photo/video upload.
• Set moderation rules and automated responses.
• Integrate rewards issuance into your loyalty system.
• Surface review widgets on product, collection, and homepage.
• Monitor KPIs and iterate cadence and messaging.

A single platform that handles these steps reduces friction and avoids the worst type of tech bloat.

When to Consider Upgrading Tools

If your review volume is low and your team is juggling multiple disconnected services, it’s time to consolidate. Signs you should upgrade to an integrated retention solution include:

• Manual syncing between review, loyalty, and order systems.
• No support for photo/video reviews or shoppable UGC.
• Review requests are not personalized or timed properly.
• You’re chasing multiple vendor invoices and overlapping functionality.

An integrated solution reduces costs hidden in time and complexity and delivers better value for money by combining complementary features.

Measuring ROI of Review Programs

Track both direct and indirect returns.

• Direct: increased conversion on product pages with review widgets, uplift in AOV, and revenue per visitor.
• Indirect: improvements in organic traffic from fresh content, lower return rates due to better product fit communication, and higher CLTV driven by loyalty rewards tied to reviews.

Benchmark early and measure incremental lift by running experiments (A/B testing product pages with different review prominence or review-driven emails vs. control).

Final Tips From Merchant-Focused Growth Teams

• Start simple: begin with one automated flow and expand as you learn.
• Test incentives: points vs. discounts vs. sweepstakes — measure which increases quality and conversion.
• Promote media: reward photo/video more because it moves the needle on conversion.
• Keep the tone human: customers respond to friendly, conversational asks more than corporate requests.
• Integrate with loyalty: make reviews a meaningful step in your customer journey, not a one-off transaction.

Conclusion

Product reviews are a lever that affects discovery, conversion, and retention when treated as part of a unified growth system. By automating review requests, rewarding submissions with loyalty points, making forms mobile-friendly, and surfacing media-rich reviews where shoppers decide, you materially increase sales and customer lifetime value — without adding complexity to your stack.

We build for merchants first, and Growave’s retention suite pulls reviews, rewards, referrals, and UGC into one ecosystem so you can scale review volume while driving repeat purchases and saving time. If you’re ready to accelerate your review program and grow with less tech overhead, explore our plans and start a 14-day free trial today: view plans and start a trial.

FAQ

How soon after delivery should I ask for a review?

Timing depends on product type. For consumables, a few days after the first use is usually right. For items that require setup or extended use (like furniture or electronics), wait longer — often one to three weeks. Test different timings and measure response rate and review quality.

Can I reward customers for leaving reviews?

Yes. Rewarding customers with loyalty points or small vouchers for submitting a review is an effective tactic. Ensure the reward is not conditional on a positive review; make it available for any submitted feedback to preserve authenticity and comply with regulations.

What type of review content has the highest impact?

Photo and video reviews typically drive the biggest lift in conversion because they show the product in real life. Encourage media by offering extra loyalty points and making uploads frictionless from mobile devices.

How do I prevent fake or biased reviews?

Use verified purchase tags, moderation rules, and rate-limiting for submissions. Offer unconditional rewards to avoid bias, and monitor review patterns for suspicious behavior (e.g., many reviews from one IP in a short time). Automations and moderation workflows help maintain trust without manual overhead.