Can You Offer a Discount for a Review? The Rules on Incentives

Yes, you can offer a discount for a review, on two conditions: the reward must be given whatever the customer says, and the review must be shown with a clear disclosure that it was incentivised. What you cannot do is reward only positive reviews, or make the reward depend on a star rating. This guide explains where that line sits in the United States, the United Kingdom and the European Union, how to word the offer, how to disclose it beside the review, and whether an incentive is worth running at all.

What do the rules say?

The principle is the same in the main markets: an incentive may buy a customer's time, but not their opinion.

• United States. The FTC's rule on consumer reviews and testimonials bans paying for reviews that must be positive. Incentives are allowed only if they are offered whatever the customer says, and are disclosed.
• United Kingdom. Undisclosed incentivised reviews are a banned practice under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act, and businesses are expected to take reasonable steps to prevent them.
• European Union. A store that shows reviews must state whether and how it checks that they come from real buyers. An incentive scheme is part of how your reviews are collected, so describe it there.

These points are summarised from our guide to collecting verified product reviews on Shopify. This article describes good practice and is not legal advice. Check the current rules for each market you sell in.

What counts as an incentive?

Anything of value given because the customer wrote a review. A discount code is the usual form, but you should treat these the same way:

• loyalty points or store credit;
• a free product, sample or gift;
• entry into a prize draw;
• a product supplied free in the first place, in return for a review.

If the customer would not have received it without reviewing, treat it as an incentive and disclose it.

What is banned?

Any arrangement in which the reward depends on what the review says. The obvious version is 'leave us five stars and get 10% off'. The less obvious versions fail the same test:

• Rewarding only after you have seen the rating. Sending the code to four- and five-star reviewers and not to the rest.
• Hinting. 'Loved it? Tell us and claim your reward.' The offer is addressed only to happy customers.
• Rewarding a change. Offering a refund or voucher if a customer removes or raises a low rating.
• Gating. Asking customers privately how they feel, then inviting only the satisfied ones to review and collect the reward.
• Hiding the incentive. Paying for reviews, even neutrally, and showing them as if they were unprompted.

How should you word the offer?

Say three things in the offer: what the customer gets, that it does not depend on their rating, and that the review will be marked as incentivised.

Wording that works:

Review your order and we will send you 10% off your next one. The code is yours whatever you write, good or bad, and whatever rating you give. Reviews written with this offer are marked as incentivised on our site.

Avoid any wording that names a rating or addresses only satisfied customers, such as 'happy customers get 10% off'.

Send the reward automatically when the review is submitted, before anyone has read it. If a person decides who gets a code after seeing the reviews, the scheme is conditional in practice whatever the email says. More on writing the request itself is in review request subject lines and wording.

How should you disclose the incentive?

Put the disclosure on the review itself, where the shopper reads it. A line in your terms and conditions does not do the job, because nobody reading a product page sees it.

Good practice:

1. A label on each incentivised review, such as 'Received a discount for this review' or 'Reviewed in exchange for a free product'. Use words that describe what was given, not an icon alone.
2. A sentence in your review policy describing the scheme: what is offered, to whom, and that it does not depend on the rating.
3. The label travels with the review. If you quote an incentivised review in an email or an advertisement, the disclosure goes with it.

An incentivised review from a real customer can still be a verified purchase, since the two labels answer different questions: one says the purchase was real, the other says a reward was given. Show both.

In Marka Reviews, review incentives are part of the paid plans and are run with the disclosure that Shopify and consumer law expect.

Is an incentive worth offering?

Sometimes, and less often than merchants assume. An incentive costs margin, and a shopper may give a review labelled as incentivised a little less weight than an unprompted one. Try the free measures first: a well-timed request, a clear email and one reminder.

Here is a worked example with made-up round figures. Say a store sends 1,000 review requests a month and receives 60 reviews. It adds a 10% code on a typical next order of $50, so each redeemed code costs $5. If reviews rise to 150 and half of the codes are redeemed, the scheme costs 75 times $5, or $375 a month, for 90 extra reviews.

Whether that is a good trade depends on how short of reviews you are. Incentives are easiest to justify in three cases:

• a new product with no reviews yet;
• a store with few orders, as discussed in getting reviews when you sell few, expensive products;
• encouraging photos, where you are asking for extra effort.

Once a product has a healthy number of reviews, switch the incentive off for it.

A short checklist

1. Offer the reward to every reviewer, whatever the rating.
2. Say in the offer that it does not depend on what they write.
3. Issue the reward automatically on submission.
4. Label each incentivised review where shoppers can see it.
5. Describe the scheme in your review policy.
6. Keep the label when reusing the review in marketing.
7. Check the rules for each market before you launch.

An incentive is defensible and useful when it is unconditional and visible, and a liability when it is neither. To run one with the disclosure in place, see Marka Reviews. For the wider set of obligations, read fake review rules every Shopify merchant should know.