By Barbara Hagen • May 08, 2022
Back in 2014, when ThriftBooks.com was in its early years, we established a relationship with Trustpilot, an independent third-party review site. Trustpilot sends out a survey to ThriftBooks customers a few weeks after they have purchased from us for feedback on how their experience was shopping with us. Customers who choose to participate do so by rating ThriftBooks from 1 to 5 stars, with 5 being the best, and they can also provide written feedback. I'm sure many of you reading this blog have participated in these surveys over the years.
We've continued with our partnership with Trustpilot in the years since and as ThriftBooks.com grew as a company, the number of ratings we have has increased as well. These ratings and reviews serve a dual purpose: internally, they provide us a metric we use to measure and track how we are performing and areas we may need to improve upon; externally, they provide a proof point to new customers or those not familiar with ThriftBooks what they can expect from us so they can shop with confidence.
Recently we hit a new milestone with Trustpilot. This year, on April 19, we announced that ThriftBooks had hit 1 million reviews on Trustpilot! ThriftBooks is the first company on Trustpilot to ever have 1,000,000 reviews! "We applaud ThriftBooks on being the first company to cross the million-review threshold with us," said Meg MacCune, Director of Customer Success at Trustpilot. "We take great pride in working closely with customer-centric brands that embrace and learn from direct, public feedback...We congratulate ThriftBooks on achieving this important honor through its unending dedication to serving customers." So yes, an amazing accomplishment, but wait, that's not all.
The other part of this to highlight is our "Excellent" 5-star rating. That means that across all 1 Million (and growing!) reviews, we have average rating of 5 stars! Throughout the years we had moments where we fell a bit short of 5 stars, but your feedback on the surveys is something we take very seriously. When a less than 5-star rating comes through, we have a process to dig in and not only solve the issue for that customer but to also address any systemic concerns so that we minimize future issues. My award-winning Customer Service team made up of superstar representatives proactively reaches out to every customer who submits less than a 4 or 5 star rating, addresses their concerns with them, and brings longer term solutions as needed to other parts of the organization.
Last year I wrote a blog about A Real Brand, A Real Promise. That blog begins with a question I still hear occasionally, "Is ThriftBooks a real company?" 1 million Trustpilot reviews with a 5-star "Excellent" rating is a great proof point that ThriftBooks is, indeed, a real company.
But we didn't get here without each and every one of you, our treasured customers, so we want to share this milestone with each of you, who are the real stars of this celebration. How does ThriftBooks say thank you? With free points! That's why today, if you're an active member of ReadingRewards, you received 100 points. Thank you for being a customer. Not yet a member? We're still giving you points! Join ReadingRewards (it's free!) and place an order between May 9–14 and we'll give you 100 points too, with no minimum purchase. Check out the full offer details to make sure you get your points.
When I was growing up, I used to listen to Casey Kasem's "America's Top 40" every Sunday where he would count down the week's top 40 songs. Some of you may even remember that radio segment that went on for many years. At the end of each week's segment, Casey would always say, "Keep your feet on the ground and keep reaching for the stars." As a 10 year old I did not really fully understand what that meant, but I couldn't turn off the radio until I heard him say that.
Today, I understand more what that means. When I think about this amazing accomplishment that all of us have accomplished together, please know that we will celebrate it this week, but we don't consider this to be any type of finish line. All of us at ThriftBooks are just as dedicated to delivering the best 5-star "Excellent" experience to each one of you, our valued customers, tomorrow as we were this past year. 1 million is just the beginning. We will keep our feet on the ground and keep reaching for those stars and 2 million reviews. I hope many of you will be joining us!