Partnering with Bazaarvoice, PETCO implemented customer ratings and reviews on PETCO.com in early 2006. The company jumpstarted their review volume through a home-page promotion featuring a $100 sweepstakes for reviewers. Participation increased 800% in less than a month.

As review volume rose, PETCO.com noticed that reviews were lowering returns for several products. The company began to investigate new ways to use this consumer-generated content to improve customer acquisition and retention. The company implemented an automated feed of negative and customer-service reviews to the customer service team in order to identify and respond to their influencers. PETCO also began to use review content in email campaigns and site merchandising efforts to spectacular effect:

* PETCO integrated ratings and reviews into email campaigns and realized a 5x increase in email click-through rates.

* PETCO integrated Bazaarvoice with its site search and navigation solution to create top-rated products paths that highlighted four- and five-start products in each category. These "Top-Rated Product" paths delivered 40% higher conversion and 60% higher average order value than their traditional shopping paths.