You can read the summary here. In short the study found that 58% of online shoppers prefer sites that feature ratings and reviews…

This is one more data point to support others (see our stats page):

• 71% of online shoppers read reviews, making it the most widely read consumer-generated content. (Forrester)
• 77% of online shoppers read consumer product reviews and ratings (Jupiter)
  
• Ratings and Reviews is the second most important site feature behind search and online buyers who site ratings and reviews most useful site feature has more than doubled from ’05 to ’06.  (Jupiter)
• 92% deemed customer reviews as “extremely” or “very” helpful and ~ 71% used keyword searches to find products. (eTailing Group)
• After their order, PETCO asked customers, "What online tool most influenced your purchase decision?" The #1 answer was Product Ratings & Reviews, with site search coming in a distant second. (PETCO)
• CompUSA exit survey: 81% consider the availability of customer reviews to be Very important (33%) / Somewhat important (48%) (CompUSA & iPerceptions study)
• 63% of consumers indicate they are more likely to purchase from a site if it has product ratings and reviews. (CompUSA & iPerceptions study)
• 39 percent of those who bought from sites with reviews cite the reviews as the primary factor influencing the purchase decision. (Foresee Results Study, 2006)
•  48% of online shoppers seek reviews before purchasing (eVoc Insights)

This is third party research. We also have about 20 case studies demonstrating different ways clients are using reviews to make impact in conversion, AOV, margin, loyalty and lower returns.

Is there enough support that ratings and reviews are effective. Um, yeah. But we are always looking for more!

Frankly, we expected a large number. Jupiter reports 77% of online shoppers seek product reviews and Forrester suggests reviews are the most widely read consumer generated content on the Web. And we learned from BuzzMetrics that 25% of google searches on top brand names bring up consumer generated content — that's where our SearchVoice SEO pages become very useful!

We're pleased that for our first big holiday there were no glitches or downtime. The origin servers and content distribution network are telling us to 'bring it on'! And so we shall.