A common misconception of ‘social media’ is that it only takes place on ‘social media’ websites like Facebook or Twitter. Just as social bookmarking websites (Digg, Reddit, Newsvine, etc.) are important components of a holistic social media strategy, so to are consumer driven comments.

The broad ‘social media’ sphere includes other tactics that includes the vastly important customer review.

Whether you have a produce or service, if customer reviews fit then you should use them.

Take for example the purchase of an alarm clock; a no frills alarm clock that has a clock and an alarm.

Two competing websites have many options. You end up finding one you like that fits the no frills criterion. Two websites, two prices that are the same, same pictures, everything, BUT one has a customer review while the other has none.

In fact, not only is there a review, it’s negative. The previous consumers laments how, “basic and simple this alarm clock is, but it was cheap and did the job.”

Cheap, simple, and does the job are exactly what you’re looking for. The site with a review, even though it was perceived as negative, actually made the sale.

Obviously there are times when you need to pay attention to negative reviews as they are an indication that something is wrong with your product or your purchase chain. Either way, you receive valuable insight by enabling consumer reviews on your products and services.

Unless of course you know you offer inferior goods.

Don’t ignore the social aspect of consumer generated reviews. It’s not as interactive as a running Facebook thread, but it does give the impression of activity and increases the perception of trust with your business.

A couple of additional things to consider. You may want to code in an option that will prevent displaying customer review sections that have zero reviews. Only showing the option to complete a review rather than showing ‘zero’ reviews won’t give the impression the product is inactive.

You also want to stay away from manufacturing your own customer reviews be it on your website on on consumer rating websites like Google Places or Yelp (both are free). Customers can sniff out fake reviews and don’t care for the vain attempts of manipulation.

If you offer great stuff then why not reap the rewards of reviews? If you make it easy for reviewers to find you online they’ll be happy to do some PR work for you. What’s better than free PR?!