The voice of the customer is indispensable when your product is outstanding.
From sourcing amazing quotes to highlighting market sentiment and everything in between, so many options are available for you to choose from. But it’s easy to get overwhelmed by the countless opportunities that lay before you.
G2 is the world’s largest B2B marketplace, where software buyers go to assess a diverse range of products and services. Software vendors that realize the power of customer advocacy find success on G2 for numerous reasons.
Any software brand can use G2 to acquire new buyers and keep existing customers. With a bit of know-how, you can find your way to the top of the Grid Report in no time.
As part of Reach 2022, our very own Katlin Hess and Emily Malis Greathouse gave a masterclass on customer advocacy on G2. This session was packed with a ton of excellent best practices and information sellers can use to maximize review collection and improve their overall presence along the way.
Didn’t get a chance to catch the masterclass? No worries – this article breaks it down for you.
The anatomy of G2 Scores and Grid Reports
The world of B2B software constantly changes. Customers’ feelings about a product or service may shift in weeks or months. G2’s scoring methodology considers this and attempts to create scoring that reflects the dynamic nature of customer software reviews.
For new and established sellers who want more from G2, it’s crucial to grasp the components of your G2 Score. Emily Malis Greathouse, Director of Market Research, spoke about this and other concepts at length, so let’s look at how G2 processes data, which will help us understand G2 Grid Reports later.
What is a G2 Score?
A profile’s G2 Score is the calculated average of two other proprietary scores: Satisfaction + Market Presence.
If a company has an average Satisfaction score of 70 and a Market Presence score of 60, its G2 Score is 65. In other words, improving satisfaction and market presence gives a profile a greater chance of performing better on G2 Grid Reports.
How G2 calculates satisfaction scores
The satisfaction score considers multiple indicators from G2 review
data to provide a single score beyond star ratings that shows how happy reviewers are about using your solution.
Listed in order of importance, the following elements impact satisfaction scores.
- Customer satisfaction with end-user product attributes based on reviews
- Popularity and statistical significance based on the number of reviews received by G2
- Quality of reviews received
- Age of reviews
- Customers’ satisfaction with administration-specific product attributes based on user reviews
- Overall customer satisfaction and Net Promoter Score® (NPS) based on ratings by G2 users
How can I improve Satisfaction score factors?
Many G2 sellers ask how they can improve their G2 Score. Malis Greathouse answers that question with some key considerations.
- Review count: The more reviews G2 has for a product, the more confident we can be in the scores. Gather more reviews!
- Review recency: Software changes quickly; recent reviews provide more relevant, up-to-date information. Gather more reviews!
- Review quality: Reviews with more questions answered and more details are more helpful. Ask your customer to leave longer, more detailed reviews when requesting reviews. Also: Gather more reviews!
TL;DR: Gather more reviews!
How G2 calculates market presence scores
Market Presence is a combination of 15 metrics from G2’s reviews, publicly available information, and third-party sources. Here’s a look at some of the most critical information G2 uses to measure Market Presence.
- Overall review count
- Review count from the last 90 days
- Number of employees
- Web presence
- Social presence
- Employee growth and web presence growth
- Seller age
- Employee satisfaction and engagement
How can I improve market presence factors?
Since market presence combines different metrics beyond G2 data, there’s only so much a seller can do to affect these factors. Nevertheless, read on to learn which aspects sellers can influence.
- Review count and recency: Two metrics that are also calculated in your Satisfaction score, review count and recency, play a role in market presence. The best solution is to scale the review collection or have a review generation strategy for ongoing collection.
- Web presence: Every brand knows the importance of growing awareness online. Your web presence can be impacted by improving SEO rankings, increasing page views on your site, and keeping an eye on branded search query growth.
- Social presence: Similar to a web presence as a long-term effort, social presence should reflect your organic social media footprint. A comprehensive social media strategy should encompass organic follower and subscriber growth.
- Employee satisfaction and engagement: Ask your employees to leave a review of your company on sites like Glassdoor. Just like when you request reviews on G2, don’t look for only positive reviews but rather honest feedback.
Tip: To learn more about some of the data in your Market Presence score, make sure to open your my.G2 dashboard and navigate to “Analytics” > “Competitors” to see a breakdown of certain metrics.
Understanding G2 Grid Reports
Released every quarter, G2 Grid Reports represent the crème de la crème of B2B software. Grid Reports contain data from both verified user reviews and vendor information from trusted online sources comparing products based on Satisfaction and Market Presence scores.
But ranking high on reports isn’t just for pride. Your inclusion in reports heavily influences how prospects decide on a software platform. Here’s a breakdown of the different types of Grid Reports:
- Category Grid Reports
- Momentum Grid Reports
- Regional Grid Reports
- Segmented Grid Reports
- Small and Medium-Sized Businesses
- Mid-Market
- Enterprise
How many reviews do I need to be on a Grid Report?
For inclusion on any Grid Report, a software vendor must have at least 10 reviews in one target software category. In addition, a Category Grid Report needs at least 150 reviews overall and at least 6 software.
Because some software spans multiple categories, ensure that you have at least 10 reviews in a given category. You can check this by going to your G2 Profile page and filtering reviews by category to see how many you’ll need to qualify for a Grid Report.
The last concept to understand about Grid Reports is how decay affects your reviews. Essentially, the older the review, the less valuable it is.
Building a review generation strategy
For the remainder of the masterclass, Katlin Hess, Director of Customer Marketing, focused on sharing tips and best practices for utilizing G2 reviews to drive customer advocacy. To start, you’ll need more reviews, and Hess lays out a couple of great ways to ramp up your collection.
The four pillars of review collection
We’ve mentioned how the recency of reviews plays a big part in your profile performance in G2. Consider that 85% of consumers consider reviews more than three months old irrelevant.
If you want to get a high G2 score or claim the top spot on a Grid Report, review collection should be an ongoing effort, not a one-and-done exercise. To provide a general framework for your efforts, Hess briefly discusses the four pillars of review collection.
- Ask everyone for reviews: Customers turn to reviews for social proof to help validate their purchasing decisions. Because of this, reviews need to be verified and authentic. Positive and constructive feedback both provide opportunities, so ask everyone!
- Ask for reviews consistently: Explore different ways to automate review requests and reiterate the importance of reviews with internal team members.
- Ask for review updates: Lean on strong relationships with long-time customers for review updates. You’ll gain insights into what keeps them returning and their reviews contribute to recency.
- Provide customer service by responding to reviews: Constructive feedback is as valuable as positive. This allows you to acknowledge the customer’s concerns and validate what they’re experiencing while also bringing attention to their issues.
Tip: Don’t just send review requests to customers with high NPS scores! Reviews should be as authentic as possible, meaning you want to collect reviews from as many customers as possible.
Types of review campaigns
You can try three distinct ways to collect more reviews on G2. Consider utilizing all of them simultaneously; each is a proven method worth considering.
- G2-managed campaigns: If you upload a list of your customers, we’ll send three emails on your behalf asking for reviews. These review gen campaigns can expedite review collection significantly and are excellent for preparing for upcoming Grid Report releases. Also, you can now request to set up a review campaign in your my.G2 dashboard!
- Self-run campaigns: You reach out to your customers to solicit reviews across your customer touchpoints.
- Always-on collection: You can embed review asks directly into your product using our native API or an integration partner. Check out this case study to see how Truckstop increased reviews using Pendo.
Asking for reviews
Not sure where to start with asking customers to submit a review? Bookmark this quick list of 12 ideas!
- After implementation
- On your sign-in screen
- At renewal or quarterly business reviews (QBRs)
- Through your partner networks
- Outreach from our team
- During webinars or at events
- After a support ticket
- Following an NPS/CAT response
- In your email signature
- In your customer community
- In-product pop-ups
- Through G2’s customer newsletter
How to respond to customer reviews
When you’re capturing authentic feedback and reaching out to your customers, you’re probably going to get some reviews that aren’t exactly favorable.
In truth, you should respond to all reviews if you take customer feedback seriously. Doing so
- Builds trust with customers and prospects
- Humanizes your brand
- Gets ahead of potential churn
- Shows your customer that you value their input
- Lets prospects know that you take care of issues and listen to customers
The 4 Ws of responding to reviews
Hess shares some tips to keep in mind when creating a review response process for your team. Just ask who, what, where, and when!
- Who should respond? Pay close attention to the aspects highlighted in the review and have someone from the appropriate team respond. This shows customers that you’re listening.
- What should be included? Your response should thank the reviewer, address them by name, and highlight specific points they mentioned.
- Where should you send it? Your response should be tied to a specific review and published in the same place the review was sent.
- When should you respond? Ideally, you should respond to all reviews within a week. This way, you’ll be able to close the feedback loop more quickly.
Metrics for measuring success
With review collection firing on all cylinders, software vendors ultimately want to know how these activities on G2 drive success in other areas. To justify their efforts, marketing and sales teams must quantify and measure the return on investment (ROI).
It all comes down to the goals you’re trying to achieve. Below you’ll find the metrics that matter most with regard to your success on G2.
Measuring ROI on G2
G2 helps software brands connect with their ideal customers to achieve success in three areas.
Brand building:
- Traffic to your G2 Profile
- Number of G2 reviews
- Number of G2 Badges
- Ranking in your category
- Report performance
- Number of comparison reviews
Traffic and conversions:
- Traffic from G2 to your website
- Traffic from your website to G2
- Quality of traffic (pageviews, time on site, bounce rate)
- Goal conversions (leads, trials)
Pipeline and sales:
- Pipeline created or influenced by G2
- Closed sales
- Conversion rates for buyers researching on G2
Become a customer advocacy powerhouse
G2’s Reach had a ton of great information. In this masterclass, attendees got the inside scoop on how to better utilize the customer voice and prioritize authentic feedback.
With these tips, you’ll scale your reviews, understand your G2 Score, and figure out how to respond to customer reviews with intelligence and kindness. In no time, you’ll reach the summit of the Grid Report and prove why your customers love you.
Interested in seeing more from Reach? Watch all of the on-demand recordings of all the sessions to get great insights from the experts.
