A family run business, Ivel Valley Bird Food has been selling bird food and wildlife accessories since 2015, and had built itself a strong reputation with company reviews collected through the Trusted Shops platform.
What its strategy lacked though was informative product reviews.
The brand knows that the suitability of bird food is variable. It depends on where you live, and the wildlife in that area. By publishing product reviews, it would give customers more of the information they need to make informed purchase decisions.
So when it partnered with Aware Digital to improve its online presence, it sought a robust review platform. One that would integrate with its new Magento 2 site, with advanced tools for both company and product review management.
Aware took the lead on Ivel Valley’s digital transformation, starting with its migration to Magento 2 and a new Hyvä theme that would significantly enhance store performance. The result was a 330% increase in page speed, with sub 1.5 second load times.
The next step was to introduce a more user friendly way to collect, manage and publish reviews. A key consideration here was site speed. Having made such an improvement, it was crucial to choose a product that wouldn’t compromise this.
As Magento experts, Aware recommended REVIEWS.io as the best solution for Ivel Valley's new and improved store.
“There are so many products on the market but we have no hesitation in positioning REVIEWS.io as our preferred platform. Our developers love using it. It's easy to install and doesn't impact site speed and performance in the way that some competitors do.” - Chris Munrow - Marketing Director, Aware Digital.
REVIEWS.io also gave Ivel Valley more advanced features and functionality compared to Trusted Shops.
The brand's chosen package gave it the required number of product review requests at an affordable price point. This has seen it move from collecting 100% company reviews to a 50/50 split, with over 3,000 product reviews already collected.
Fully customisable widgets keep everything on brand, and offer a range of publication options. These integrate seamlessly with its Magento 2 store to further enhance the on-site experience.
Customers can now browse a fast, responsive storefront, and have easy access to trusted review content throughout their buyer journey. For Ivel Valley, this means increased engagement and higher conversion rates.
“Their previous reviews provider was doing the job, but lacked any additional features that would allow Ivel Valley's strong reputation to really shine through. With REVIEWS,io, they're able to showcase their great feedback across product pages, fly outs and other on-site widgets to give customers an extra nudge of confidence throughout the check out process.” - Chris Munrow - Marketing Director, Aware Digital.
It’s not just the on-site experience that’s improved since the switch. There’s been a positive impact behind the scenes too.
Product reviews are proving particularly useful for Ivel Valley, helping it develop the quality of its bird food. By analyzing feedback, the development team is able to make data-driven decisions to enhance its product range, and better meet the needs of its customer base.
“Product reviews are a new format for us and have been integral in our product development plans. The product data we get has helped us improve our recipes and make key business decisions with real time customer feedback.” - Robyn Mason, E-commerce and Marketing Manager, Ivel Valley.
Beyond this, there are additional benefits helping to drive the brand forward by enhancing customer engagement and business performance:
UGC collection: with REVIEWS.io, it's easy to collect and publish UGC like customer photos and videos. This authentic content brings the product experience to life and helps to build a brand community.
Marketing integrations: REVIEWS.io offers seamless integration with Dotdigital, the brands chosen email marketing tool. With this, it sends thank you follow ups to 5 star reviewers, and adds product star ratings and UGC to email campaigns.
Net Promoter Score (NPS): the switch allowed Ivel Valley to start collecting NPS data. With our Competitor Analysis feature, it's now able to monitor this quantitative metric against several key competitors.
Instant review analysis: the brand also leverages our AI Insights feature. This allows it to produce instant, in-depth reports from review data to make informed business decisions.
“REVIEWS.io’s AI Insights function allows us to quickly analyze verbatim feedback, by product, saving our team hours of time. The Strengths and Weaknesses fields provide valuable, top-level data that gives the team insight into which areas to delve further into.” - Robyn Mason, E-commerce and Marketing Manager, Ivel Valley.
Aware Digital continues to support Ivel Valley with web development and marketing. And thanks to the agency's knowledge, expertise and recommendations, the brand is going from strength to strength.
Meanwhile, Aware and REVIEWS.io continue to work together, helping eCommerce merchants with Magento stores elevate their online presence, boost their reputation, and convert more customers with authentic social proof.
“The partnership we have with REVIEWS.io is incredibly valuable, both for us and the merchants we work with. The huge range of features and integrations helps our marketing team get as much value as possible out of the platform for our clients, while our clients value its approach to transparency of costs, allowing merchants to be able to protect their brand's reputation and actually own their reviews too. We know that recommending REVIEWS.io means that we're putting forward a solid platform with a well backed partnerships and support team.” - Chris Munrow - Marketing Director, Aware Digital.
Are you an eCommerce merchant looking to optimize your Magento site? Book a live product demo to explore REVIEWS.io and have all your questions answered by one of our product experts.
Digital agency? Check out our partnership program and discover how working with REVIEWS.io can drive success for your clients.
