What is Social Proof in Ecommerce?

People buy from people.

As marketers, we know that having a human touch is key in being able to relate and connect with our audiences. Consumer's often don't want or like buying from faceless brands; especially when they are investing money in a premium or luxury product. But when we say "people buy from people", we no longer just mean this premise. We mean actual people. And this key is social proof.

What is social proof?

Social proof is the means of consumers judging or researching your product by looking at how it is perceived or judged by other people. It's proof from the wider public that your product is valuable and worth making a purchase.

Having a strong social proofing is a major influencer in the decision making process and can often be make or break over other cognitive biases that might be in play.

Types of social proof.

There are a few different ways that you can showcase or implement social proofing for your products; some of which you are probably running by default.

Product reviews.

Encouraging your customers to review your products is one the easiest ways that you can collect vast amounts of social proof.

Managing your reviews is important. You want to ensure that you are showcasing your best reviews for each product. However, if you do have a handful or reviews containing feedback, responding and acting on that feedback in a public and positive way can be very powerful for a brand in showing that you care about your customers.

If you are running a Shopify website you can use the Product Reviews app to collect and manage all product reviews. Other review platforms include: Feefo, Stamped.io and add ons within Klaviyo.

User-generated content.

User generated content can be a effective way of pushing your social proofing out to audiences at the very top of the funnel.

Use paid content creators to film unboxing and product review content within a written brief supplied by you which can be used within your paid media strategy.

Repurpose and repost any organic videos that feature your products from your own customers. Not only will your audience be excited about being featured on your socials, the authentic and truthful nature of that content specifically resonates far better with a wider audience. They see themselves in the "real people" who are already buying and finding joy from your products.

Website messaging and add-ons.

Using social proof messaging onsite can help conversion rate if you're clever about it.

Software like Flockr can be added into your website to display customised social proofing for each of your products. Dynamically, it can display information such as how many have been purchased or added to cart over a certain period of time, bestsellers or highly rated products or product recommendations based on previous searches or purchases.

Audiences want to be reassured that what they are going to buy is worth it. And the people they trust the most are other consumers. Social proofing is fast becoming the most effective and authentic way of showcasing this and brands who are investing in social proof will continue to reap the benefits of higher website conversion rates, increased traffic to site and growth in revenue.