Most ecommerce stores want more reviews. The question that trips everyone up: can you offer something in return?
The short answer is yes — but the rules matter more than you think. We've helped 500+ brands collect over 2.5 million reviews, and the biggest problems we've fixed aren't from stores that skip incentives entirely. They come from stores that offer the wrong kind of incentive, use the wrong language, or don't realize that each platform has different rules.
After reading this, you'll know exactly what the FTC requires, which platforms allow incentives (and which don't), the exact request language that keeps you compliant, and which incentive types actually increase volume without getting your reviews flagged.
What the FTC Actually Says About Review Incentives
The Federal Trade Commission doesn't ban review incentives outright. What it requires is disclosure. If you give someone anything of value in exchange for a review, you have to say so clearly.
Here's what that looks like in practice:
- Disclose the incentive next to the review. A disclaimer buried in your terms of service doesn't count. The disclosure needs to be visible where the review appears.
- Don't tie the incentive to a specific outcome. You can offer a reward for leaving a review. You can't offer a reward for leaving a positive review. That's the line.
- "Clear and conspicuous" is the standard. The FTC's language. If a customer has to scroll, click, or squint to find the disclosure, it's not clear enough.
Example of a compliant disclosure: "This reviewer received a discount code for sharing honest feedback about their purchase."
What Changed with the FTC's 2024 Rule
In 2024, the FTC finalized its rule on fake reviews and testimonials. The big changes:
- Fake reviews are now explicitly illegal — not just frowned upon. This includes reviews written by people who didn't use the product, AI-generated reviews, and reviews from insiders who don't disclose their relationship.
- Buying positive reviews carries civil penalties. Up to $50,000+ per violation.
- Review suppression is covered too. If you're only publishing positive reviews and hiding negative ones, that's a violation.
The rule didn't change the incentive disclosure requirements — those were already in place. But it raised the stakes for getting caught doing it wrong.
Platform-by-Platform Rules
Every review platform has its own policies, and they don't all agree. What's fine on your own site might get your reviews pulled on Amazon.
Amazon
Amazon has the strictest rules. No incentives of any kind — no discounts, no free products, no gift cards, no loyalty points. You can ask customers to leave a review, but you can't offer anything in return.
Amazon also bans review gating (asking only satisfied customers for reviews) and reviews from anyone with a financial or personal stake in the product — employees, family, business partners.
If you violate these policies, Amazon can remove your reviews, suspend your listing, or ban your seller account.
Google Reviews
Google prohibits incentivized reviews that could mislead consumers. You can ask customers for honest feedback, but you can't offer money, freebies, or discounts tied to the review.
Google also prohibits fake reviews, review spam, and posting from multiple accounts to inflate ratings. Violations can result in review removal or account suspension.
Yelp
Yelp takes the hardest line. They prohibit businesses from soliciting reviews at all — even without incentives. No review request emails, no "leave us a review" signs, no third-party services that send solicitations on your behalf.
Reviews on Yelp are meant to be entirely voluntary and based on firsthand experience. If Yelp detects solicitation, they'll flag or remove the reviews.
Trustpilot
Trustpilot explicitly forbids all incentives — discounts, loyalty points, gifts, coupons, or monetary rewards. You can invite customers to leave reviews, but the invitation must be neutral and unbiased. You can't influence the content or tone of the feedback.
Your Own Store (Shopify, WooCommerce, etc.)
This is where you have the most flexibility. On your own Shopify or WooCommerce store, you can offer incentives for reviews — discounts, loyalty points, giveaway entries — as long as you:
- Disclose the incentive (FTC requirement)
- Don't require a specific star rating
- Ask all customers, not just happy ones
This is why most brands collect incentivized reviews on their own site, not on third-party platforms.
The Practical Takeaway
If you're selling on Amazon, don't offer incentives for Amazon reviews. Period. For Google and Yelp, don't offer incentives tied to reviews on those platforms. For your own site, incentives are fair game — just disclose them and don't gate by sentiment.
Do This, Not That: Review Incentive Language
The exact words you use in review requests matter. Here's what compliant language looks like versus what gets you in trouble.
Do this:
- "We'd love your honest feedback about your recent purchase. All reviews help us improve, whether positive or negative."
- "Share your experience and enter our monthly giveaway. All customers who leave a review are eligible, regardless of rating."
- "Earn 50 loyalty points for leaving a review. Points are awarded for any review, not just positive ones."
Don't do this:
- "Leave us a 5-star review and get 10% off your next order!"
- "Rate us 5 stars to receive a free product."
- "Only customers who loved their purchase should review us."
The difference is subtle but important. The first set asks for any feedback and rewards participation. The second set asks for positive feedback and rewards the rating.
Common Language Mistakes
Don't offer discounts only for positive reviews. This violates FTC guidelines and platform policies. Offer incentives for any review, or don't offer them at all.
Don't hide negative reviews. Suppressing negative feedback violates platform policies and damages trust. Respond to negative reviews professionally instead. One thoughtful reply to a critical review does more for trust than 10 five-star reviews with no text.
Don't forget to disclose incentives. If you offer any reward for reviews, disclose it. A simple line works: "This reviewer received loyalty points for leaving an honest review."
Don't ask only happy customers. Request reviews from all customers, regardless of their experience. This is called review gating, and it's both illegal and ineffective.
Incentive Strategies That Work (Without Breaking the Rules)
Not all incentives carry the same risk — or produce the same results. These are the ones that consistently generate the most reviews across the brands we work with, all on owned platforms where you control the review display.
Discount Codes
The most common approach. Offer a small coupon (10-15% off) for the next purchase after a customer leaves a review. The key details:
- The discount applies regardless of star rating
- The coupon is delivered after the review is submitted, not before
- Disclosure appears next to the review
Do: keep the discount modest. A 10% code feels like a thank-you. A 50% code feels like you're buying the review.
Don't: make the discount conditional on review content. "Leave a review with a photo for 20% off" is fine. "Leave a 5-star review with a photo for 20% off" is not.
Giveaway Entries
Run a monthly or quarterly drawing where every reviewer gets an entry. Giveaways tend to generate higher participation than discount codes because the reward isn't guaranteed — customers don't feel like they're being paid for a review, they feel like they're entering a contest.
State the rules clearly: all reviewers are eligible regardless of rating, one entry per review, and include the drawing date and prize.
Loyalty Points
If you have a loyalty program, awarding points for reviews is a natural fit. Points are redeemable for store credit, not tied to a specific purchase, and the connection between "review" and "reward" feels less transactional.
This is especially effective for repeat customers. They're already in the loyalty program, and the points give them a reason to share their experience rather than just moving on to the next purchase.
Community Recognition
Some brands highlight top reviewers on their site or in their email newsletters. No monetary value, but customers who leave detailed, helpful reviews get recognized. This works particularly well for niche product categories where reviewers take pride in their expertise.
What About Handwritten Notes?
Personal touches — handwritten thank-you cards, surprise samples, exceptional customer service — often lead to organic reviews without any formal incentive. They're not scalable, but they're genuine. A customer who gets a handwritten note with their order is more likely to mention it in a review than one who gets a discount code.
Common Mistakes That Get Your Reviews Flagged
We've seen these patterns cause problems repeatedly. Most of them come from good intentions paired with bad execution.
Offering Incentives on Amazon
This is the most common mistake. A brand runs an incentivized review program on their own site (perfectly fine), then applies the same approach to Amazon reviews (not fine at all). Amazon's Terms of Service are clear: no incentives, period.
Review Gating
Only sending review requests to customers who gave high satisfaction scores, or routing unhappy customers to a support form instead of the review page. Platforms detect this pattern, and it violates the FTC's 2024 rule.
Do: send review requests to every customer. Don't: filter the request list based on purchase history, customer sentiment, or NPS scores.
Over-Incentivizing
When the incentive is too generous, two problems emerge. First, customers leave reviews they don't mean — they just want the reward. Second, a sudden spike in review volume with suspiciously positive sentiment triggers platform fraud detection.
If your average is 3.8 stars and you launch a 25% discount incentive, then suddenly you're getting 50 reviews a week at 4.9 stars — that pattern looks exactly like what it is.
Using the Same Incentive Across All Platforms
Each platform has different rules. What's compliant on your Shopify store might violate Google's policies. Keep your incentive program limited to platforms where you control the review display and can add proper disclosures.
Not Disclosing Properly
"We mentioned it in the email" isn't enough. The disclosure needs to appear where the review is displayed, not just where the review was requested. If a customer reads the review on your product page, they should see that it was incentivized.
How to Automate Compliant Review Collection
Managing incentives by hand works when you have 20 orders a month. At 200+ orders, things start slipping — late requests, coupons sent before the review, missing disclosure labels. That's when you need a system.
Here's the checklist for any review tool worth using:
- Post-purchase timing: Your review requests should trigger off delivery confirmation, not order date. Send too early and the customer hasn't opened the box. Too late and they've moved on.
- Incentive delivery after submission: The coupon or points hit the customer's inbox after they submit the review, not before. This keeps the incentive compliant and cuts coupon abuse.
- Automatic disclosure labels: Every incentivized review gets a visible disclosure tag without you adding it manually.
- All-customer sending by default: No filtering by satisfaction score or purchase amount. Every buyer gets the request.
RaveCapture does all four. Set up your campaign once in Campaigns → Default Review Campaigns, pick your incentive type (discount code, loyalty points, or giveaway entry), and every review request goes out on schedule with the incentive delivered after submission and the disclosure label already attached.
If you're collecting reviews manually or your current tool doesn't support compliant incentives, you're choosing between leaving reviews on the table and taking on compliance risk. See how RaveCapture automates compliant review collection.
If you only remember three rules from this guide: incentivize on your own site only, disclose every time, and never tie the reward to a rating. That's the line between more reviews and more problems.
