If you do not want to collect eTrusted reviews automated or if you want to manually invite customers to submit reviews in addition to the automated dispatch of invites, you can use the Review Collector. The Review Collector allows you to collect reviews with just a few clicks and without any technical integration.
Where do I find the Review Collector?
In the main navigation of the Control Centre, click "Invites" (
) and "Send manual invites" (
) in the top right.
1. Step: Uploading a CSV file
After you have created a CSV file with customer data, drag the file into the upload area. Alternatively, click "Choose from computer" to upload from your device.
To make things easier, use our example file by clicking "Download CSV example".
Trusted Shops offers you the opportunity to choose a pre-organised CSV template with required columns for a service or for a product review.
After the Download, you need to fill the offered CSV template files with the required data. You decide if you want to either collect a service or a product review, but you can also combine them within the CSV file.
If you have uploaded the wrong file, click "Choose different file" to upload a different file or proceed to the next step.
If you have problems with your file, you can find help here: How to create a CSV file to send manual review invites.
If your customers' names include special characters (e.g. Umlaute like ä, ü, ö), the Review Collector will replace them with a � symbol. Therefore, your customers' names will also appear with the � symbol on your review profile. This issue is caused by Excel and will occur in different systems, including:
- Office 2011 for Windows 7
- Office 2011 for Windows 10
- Office 2016 for Mac
In the following cases, the special characters will be formatted correctly:
- You are using Office 2016 and you have saved your file as "CSV UTF-8 (comma-separated values) (*.csv).
- You are using Google Docs.
- You are using Open Office.
If your customers' email addresses contain special characters (e.g. Umlaute) the email addresses will not be recognised upon uploading the CSV file. You cannot send review invites to such email addresses via CSV file upload.
2. Step: Data match
Click "Proceed" to see a preview of the invites you are about to send.
After uploading your CSV file, you will get to the next steps. The data of the CSV file will automatically be sorted into categories. Here you check the displayed data and match or correct the columns.
3. Step: Data Check
In the next step, you will get an overview of the inserted and checked data. If some data isn’t correct, the errors will be highlighted with an orange attention triangle.
If errors are detected, you can start over and upload a new file or go further in the process. The incorrect data is not taken into account.
4. Step: Send review Invites
You can check the data here one last time, however, you cannot correct it here. To correct the data, click the "Back" button and upload a corrected file.
The preview shows:
- The sender information (sender name, sender email address).
- Language and available template options.
You choose the language and the different template Versions Trusted Shops offers for the Review Invites.
What sending options do I have?
At the bottom, you'll find two sending options:
- Schedule for later
If you want to schedule your invites for a later date and time, click "Schedule for later". Please note that once scheduled, you will not be able to edit the chosen date and time any more.
- Choose the date and time for sending the invites.
- Click "Send x invites".
- Your invites are now scheduled and will be sent out at the chosen date and time.
- Send now
If you want to send the invites to your customers immediately, click "Send now".
Legal note
By using this feature, you certify that you received your customers' prior consent to submit their data to Trusted Shops, specifically for the purpose of sending them review invites via email.
If you have not collected your customer's consent, email recipients (private or business), competitors of Trusted Shops, and Consumer and Competition Protection Associations are entitled to damage claims and to cease-and-desist orders.
Further information on this topic can be found here: Consent for review invites
While the Review Collector is a convenient way to invite customers, you will benefit even more in the long term from sending out review invites automatically on the basis of events. Find out more in these articles:
- What is an Event?
- How to send invites to my customers automatically?
- First steps with eTrusted APIs