Video: Why these 4 startups could propel e-commerce in 2018
New York-based product discovery and reviews platform Influenster[1] hopes to help consumer brands take advantage of the non-incentivised reviews that ordinary consumers leave on its platform.
Read also: What trends will dominate influencer marketing in 2018?[2]
Its ReviewSource platform syncs reviews made on its platform to brand sites. ReviewSource is an always on 'turnkey' SaaS that continuously supplies organic, non-incentivized Influenster reviews to brand and retailer websites such as PepsiCo[3], L'Oreal[4], and Dunkin' Donuts[5].
Its aim is to provide reviews on consumer shopping pages in order to drive purchase intent. It aims to empower brand loyalists and shoppers to tell the story on behalf of the brand and improve its placement on Google and retailer searches.
Like Bazaarvoice, Influenster encourages reviews from its members who test products, receive boxes of products to test, and write reviews about the products they try.
Its partners are encouraged to donate product items that it sends to a subset of its members in exchange for a review.
(Image: Influenster)
The company says that it received over one million organic reviews each month that can be syndicated through platforms such as Bazaarvoice and PowerReviews through to brand sites such as Walmart, Target, Walgreens, Nordstrom, Bloomingdale's, and Macy's.
Influenster says that it has over 25 million reviews across around 2.5 million products on its site, and is growing by one million new organic reviews each month.
The reviews are synced with brand e-commerce sites, or are syndicated to retailers. This presents the opportunity for brand marketers to leverage the thousands of reviews their brands are already receiving on a