It’s one thing when we’re touting the importance of error-free writing—after all, that’s our business! It’s something entirely different when a retail giant like Zappos says that proofreading and editing the reviews on their site has boosted sales.
The Quality of All Content Impacts Your Bottom Line
When customers want to make a purchase, one of the first things they do is read reviews. Years ago, this meant reading professional reviews by journalists—and many still do this. However, as the web has evolved, more and more of us have taken customer reviews into consideration.
Zappos discovered that a product’s rating mattered less than the quality of its reviews. Put another way, a five-star product accompanied by reviews littered with errors simply didn’t sell as well as a similar product with a similar rating that had well-written reviews. In some cases, products with lower overall ratings but well-written reviews even outsold more highly rated products.
Why? New York University associate professor Panos Ipeirotis has researched the economic impact of product reviews, and he says writing quality can make a huge difference in sales. This is true both for positive and negative reviews. Regardless of the content, if a review is well written, it will sway readers. In fact, according to Ipeirotis, demand for hotels rises when their TripAdvisor and Travelocity reviews are well written—and this is true whether the reviews are positive or negative.
Good Writing Matters
It comes down to the fact that well-written, error-free content affects purchasing decisions—and Zappos was rewarded with a substantial revenue increase after using a proofreading service to improve their content.
Is your business losing sales because of errors on your site? The answer is most likely yes. To avoid these mistakes and improve your bottom line, click the button below to get a website proofreading quote.
