Bazaarvoice
Branding a self-service tool for the web’s top recommendation engine
B2C: concept & copy, video scripting/production, presentation, site design/copywriting
Collaborators: Keith Tanski, Brian Williams, Iva Zugic, Molly Guyton
You likely interact with Bazaarvoice (BV) every day without knowing it.
It’s the review engine behind thousands of retail sites. On Walmart, Target, and about 80% of sites, the reviews you submit and browse are powered by BV’s back engine. Reviews are powerful: 92% of people trust online reviews over advertising.
Instructing product manufacturers on the value of reviews and empowering them to sign up was Bazaarvoice’s challenge.
I led a team that gave them the tools to do just that.
Building a new paradigm:
“Review Marketing”
In a stroke of brilliance, strategist Keith Tanski came up with an entirely new term: using a coordinated method of encouraging reviews (through BV) to drive product sales through retail sites. “Review Marketing “was a methodology for product manufacturers to stimulate sales of their stuff through online stores.
Their target wasn’t Proctor & Gamble (they already do this). Think Higdon Duck Decoys — brands with strong product but miniscule advertising and marketing budgets.
We gave Bazaarvoice a new way to appeal to small manufacturers, then built the framework for them to market the offering to those manufacturers.
Communications flows, touchpoints, sites and sales materials… a complete system.
Building a home base for “Review Marketing”
We had a short six weeks to get a baseline site into market in time for a critical launch date on BV’s calendar. We raced to produce a site that defined the idea and gave manufacturers a clear path to a “self-service” site they could get up and running generating reviews for their products on top ecommerce sites.
Extending the framework
In the same six week sprint to get a site up introducing “Review Marketing,” I also led development of identified marketing materials for their sales teams to take to the field.
Extra credit: I did a webinar
To assist Bazaarvoice’s teams talking about Review Marketing, I recorded myself doing a spec webinar. It helped them gain context on how to talk about their product through this new paradigm.
Hang in there. I talk for 20 minutes.