When it comes to building trust for a business, product and service reviews play a vital role. Customer feedback and reviews serve as social proof that can attract new prospects and customers to your business.
Ultimate Reviews, a review plugin for WordPress developed by Etoile Web Design, is designed to help you establish trust and social proof. This plugin enables your visitors and customers to leave reviews for any products and services directly on your website.
Ultimate Reviews simplifies the process of accepting and managing reviews. It offers various advanced features such as access controls to regulate who can submit reviews and the ability to select specific products for review.
Moreover, the plugin is compatible with WooCommerce, allowing you to enhance the default WooCommerce review system with premium features for gathering customer feedback on the products and services showcased in your online store.
In this review, we will delve into the features of the plugin, guide you on setting it up and utilizing it effectively, and offer our final thoughts and recommendations.
Key Features of Ultimate Reviews
Here are the main features of Ultimate Reviews:
Shortcodes
Ultimate Reviews utilizes various shortcodes for functions like review submission forms and review display.
WooCommerce Compatibility
The plugin seamlessly integrates with WooCommerce, enabling you to substitute the default WooCommerce Reviews tab with the enhanced features of Ultimate Reviews. This integration empowers you to utilize advanced review functionalities on WooCommerce product pages and provide customized ratings for visitors in your WooCommerce store.
Review Organization and Management
- Create review categories to categorize and manage reviews effectively.
- Filter reviews based on score, product name, or review author.
- Group reviews by product.
- Assign different weights to reviews to influence rating averages.
- Determine the products eligible for reviews.
- Integrates with Ultimate Product Catalog plugin to restrict reviews to catalogue products.
- Approve or reject reviews as required.
Explore various options for enabling user reviews such as:
- Admin approval before display.
- Reviewer’s email confirmation.
- WordPress login requirement.
- Facebook or Twitter login.
- FEUP (Front-End Only Users plugin from Etoile Web Design).
Customization Options
Ultimate Reviews offers numerous settings for customization, allowing you to tailor the plugin to suit your requirements. You can opt for text or star-based review scoring, incorporate images and videos in reviews, limit reviews to specific products, and set preferences for email notifications and login protocols.
- Create and select review styles, including the ability to apply custom CSS.
- Personalize labels, fonts, and colors.
- Various review layout options including Standard, Expandable, Thumbnail, and Image layouts.
- Diverse rating systems like points and percentages.
- Configure maximum scores for reviews.
- Different methods for users to input scores (e.g., text, drop-down selection, star ratings).
- Multiple review formats to align with your site’s content.
- Display review author and date.
- Implement pagination or infinite scroll for reviews.
- Customize review fields such as quality, value, appearance.
- Incorporate custom fields like text, checkboxes, radio buttons, and drop-down menus.
Statistics
You can choose to group reviews by product and activate full or limited summary statistics. These statistics are showcased at the top of the product grouping, featuring the average score, distribution of ratings, and a graphical representation depicting the rating distribution.
Social Interaction
Ultimate Reviews facilitates commenting on reviews and allows users to vote (up or down) on the helpfulness of reviews. Users can also flag reviews as inappropriate.
SEO and Search Optimization
Generate aggregate microdata for WooCommerce, Ultimate Product Catalog, and review display pages to enhance search engine visibility and rich review listings. Enable visitors to search reviews by keywords and make specific review fields filterable to help users locate the most relevant reviews.
Setting Up Ultimate Reviews
To install Ultimate Reviews:
- Within WordPress, navigate to Plugins… Add New.
- In the Search plugins… field, search for Ultimate Reviews.
- Click the Install Now button for the plugin labeled Product Reviews (by Etoile Web Design).
- Once the installation is complete, click the Activate button.
Post-installation, you will see the Reviews menu on the WordPress admin sidebar, along with these submenu items:
- Dashboard
- Reviews
- Add New
- Review Categories
- Import
- Settings
If you wish to commence with the free version of the plugin, you are ready to begin.
If you are interested in exploring the free 7-day trial or upgrading to the premium version, navigate to Reviews…Dashboard, input the relevant code in the field labeled Enter product key or free trial code here, and then click Upgrade.
In the Dashboard section of Ultimate Reviews, you will also find links to support and an overview of your reviews, detailing the number of reviews, latest review posted, view count, and a list of published reviews.
Utilizing Ultimate Reviews
Here are the basic steps for leveraging Ultimate Reviews:
Step 1: Creating the Review Submission Form
To allow customers to submit reviews for your products, create a submission form on your site. Simply insert the following shortcode into the WordPress visual/text editor of any page or post:
[submit-review]
To restrict reviews to a specific product, include the “product_name” attribute and specify the product name you want to be reviewed using this format:
[submit-review product_name=’your product name’]
Note: Replace your product name with the actual product name.
If you wish to redirect visitors to a new page after submitting a review, add the “redirect_page” attribute to the shortcode like this:
[submit-review redirect_page=’http://www.example.com’]
Step 2: Manually Creating a Review
- To manually create a review in the backend, click Reviews… Add New (from the WordPress sidebar) or click the Add New tab.
- Add the review title in the title section.
- Compose the review content in the visual/text editor.
- In the Review Details section below the main content, specify details such as product name, author, score, etc.
- Choose a Category for the review (optional).
- Select a review image in the Featured Image section (optional).
- Once done, click the Publish button.
Upon publishing the review, a shortcode will be automatically generated under the title area. If you want to display this specific review on another post or page, you can insert this shortcode into its visual/text editor.
Step 3: Displaying Product Reviews
To exhibit all product reviews, insert the following shortcode into the visual/text editor of any page or post:
[ultimate-reviews]
To display reviews for a specific product, utilize the “product_name” attribute like this:
[ultimate-reviews product_name=’your product name’]
Note: Replace your product name with the actual product name.
Alternatively, use the product’s Post ID to exhibit its reviews:
[select-review review_id=’x’]
Note: Substitute x with the Post ID number found at Reviews…Reviews.
To display all reviews alongside a keyword search box (a premium feature), employ:
[ultimate-review-search]
For presenting summary statistics of reviewed products with links to individual reviews (premium feature), use:
[reviews-summary]
Categories
The Categories tab (Reviews… Review Categories) enables you to add and manage review categories. To add a category, provide a Name, Slug (lowercase version of the name suitable for URLs), Parent (if adding a sub-category), and Description.
Import
The Import tab (Reviews… Import), a premium feature, allows you to import reviews in two ways:
- From WooCommerce (if WooCommerce integration is active in Options… WooCommerce)
- From a spreadsheet
Options (Settings)
The Options tab (Reviews… Options or Reviews… Settings) provides several customization features for Ultimate Reviews.
Basic
Basic settings include options for custom CSS, review stylings, shortcodes, product name autocomplete, clickable review titles, author links, comments, reviewable products selection, integration with the Ultimate Product Catalogue plugin, review dates, categories, page controls, pagination, and more.
Premium
Premium settings cover different review formats (Standard, Expandable, Thumbnail, Image), CAPTCHAs for spam prevention, weighted reviews, review voting (Review Karma), microdata, SEO-friendly URLs, email notifications, summary statistics, Thumbnail review configurations, reviewer restrictions (e.g., admin approval, author email, login requirements), among other settings.
WooCommerce
WooCommerce integration, a premium feature of Ultimate Reviews, includes options like replacing WooCommerce reviews with Ultimate Reviews, restricting reviews to WooCommerce products, custom theme overrides for WooCommerce, allowing only verified buyers to review, setting reviewer email reminders, and more.
Fields
Field options encompass configuring detailed reviews, adding fields to the review form, and including other field types like “radio” and “checkbox.”
Ordering
Ordering options enable grouping reviews by product, selecting review order criteria (e.g., date, votes, rating, review title), and setting the order type for grouping and ordering (ascending or descending).
Labeling
A premium feature, labeling options allow customization of default text on review pages, including altering labels such as posted, by, on, score, explanation, product name, review author, review title, author comment, category score, “Send Review” button, and more.
Styling
Styling options entail displaying or hiding the review score beside a review, applying review skin styles like Simple Stars, Thumbs, Hearts, Color Bar, etc., and defining layouts for detailed review categories. Premium styling options cover review titles, content, dates, scores, and color choices.
Video Tutorial: Setting up and Using Ultimate Reviews
Support & Documentation
Ultimate Reviews presents an easy-to-use plugin with an intuitive interface. The developers at Etoile Web Design commit to providing support responses within 24 hours on business days.
The documentation provided is extensive and well-structured, starting here. The inclusion of a Getting Started Guide and clear explanatory text within the interface simplifies user understanding and interaction with the plugin.
To explore Ultimate Reviews further, you can access their demo.
Additionally, you can visit their support forum at WordPress.org and view their video%20tutorials on YouTube.
Pricing
Ultimate Reviews offers various plans for users:
You can begin with the free version on WordPress.org or opt for a 7-day trial of the premium version via Reviews…Dashboard.
Premium options for Ultimate Reviews include:
Single Site License ($39)
The single site license includes:
- Lifetime updates
- 6 months of email support (followed by $19.99 per period for email support after the initial six months)
- A 2-week money-back guarantee
Highlighted features comprise WooCommerce integration, labeling and styling options, login necessity for review submission, admin review approval, email confirmation, and layout choices.
Developer License
Designed for developers managing multiple projects, this license offers options for 5-site or 10-site licenses.
Enterprise License
Future availability for the Enterprise license offering premium support to businesses where Ultimate Reviews is integral to their digital success.
Conclusions & Recommendations
Ultimate Reviews emerges as a user-friendly plugin that enables visitors to submit reviews for your products or services. Equipped with a multitude of tools for review management, including options to determine reviewable products and services and reviewer permissions, the plugin’s compatibility with WooCommerce enriches the customer experience by providing advanced product rating features for your e-commerce store.
The wide array of customization options for review layouts, styles, and ordering stands out. The plugin facilitates straightforward adjustments to ratings and scoring, incorporation of review categories, modification of review display, and implementation of varying login and email confirmation requirements for review submission.
Noteworthy is the plugin’s flexibility in setting review length and complexity. From allowing unlimited-length reviews to enforcing character count limits, Ultimate Reviews caters to diverse review preferences. Whether opting for simple reviews with an overall rating or detailed reviews with multiple sections, fields, and sub-ratings, the plugin ensures adaptability to varying review scenarios.
Overall, Ultimate Reviews emerges as a well-designed WordPress review plugin with an impressive feature set that remains user-friendly. If you’re seeking a review plugin to engage your site visitors effectively, Ultimate Reviews warrants thorough consideration. For further details, visit their website here.