Case Study: Manduka Increases Review Submissions 43% by Going Mobile first

Making a World of Difference

When Manduka started 20 years ago - they weren’t thinking about supply chain issues, technology trends, digital advertising costs & mobile optimization. They just wanted to make an amazing Yoga mat.

A mat built with precision and passion, designed by yogis for yogis, with roots in the principles of conservancy — creating responsibly sourced products while minimizing environmental waste. Manduka believes that a better yoga mat can make a world of difference, and they've been proven right.

Over 20+ years, they've become one of the worlds largest Yoga brands, but in scaling the business they've had to deal with that first list of problems as well.

The Problem

In 2021, the team was doing an audit of their ecommerce technology stack. The piece that stuck out like a sore thumb? Reviews.

The review management tool they were using was clunky & causing huge headaches whenever they wanted to do simple things like add a new product or display reviews across regional storefronts. Even worse than the operational issues, the consumer experience was simply falling short of the standard they set for the rest of the brand.

Their review collection process didn’t connect with the rest of their marketing tools & the experience of actually submitting a review was pretty hard to do from a mobile phone. Manduka’s customers live on mobile, they're not sitting at a desk waiting to share their thoughts, and the review platform they were using hadn’t kept up.

When they contacted Junip to make the switch, we worked with their team to identify three main areas we wanted to improve:

1. Gathering more reviews, especially those with rich media like photos & videos
2. Removing operational headaches & constraints, reviews needed to be something the team could easily work with (instead of fight with) on a day to day basis
3. Optimizing the performance & aesthetics of on-site displays, with a focus how reviews contribute to storefront conversion rate

Making the switch

Having moved ecommerce platforms in the past & operating three different regional storefronts, Manduka knew things might be a little bit messy. Their previous review platform certainly didn’t help the situation - providing a mess of different spreadsheets & conflicting product information when they exported reviews.

To get the things moving our implementation team started by setting up the basics of Manduka’s review request flows in Klaviyo and helping get the on-site installation started across Manduka’s three regional storefronts.

While Manduka’s team was putting the finishing touches on each of those (copy, graphics, timing etc) - our team went to work normalizing & formatting the review data for each storefront we received from their previous review platform. We imported that data to Junip & finally gave Manduka a unified dashboard where they could see all their review information across multiple storefronts.

No more uploading complex spreadsheets to manage product catalogs & information, they were able to do all that work within our Admin using Junip’s product catalog management features.

This improved visibility into their product catalog & self-serve management allowed them to improve the connection with Google Shopping, as well as share reviews across each regional storefront in real time.

Mobile first leads to a massive lift in reviews

With the basic operational headaches gone, Manduka’s team was able to focus on what really mattered: getting more reviews & displaying them for all to see.

Luckily, Junip’s mobile first submission forms were already hard at work on the first problem. In 6 months after moving, Manduka saw a 43% increase in reviews submitted and a 2x increase in reviews with rich media (photos & videos) included. When we asked Manduka’s CEO Paul Zaengle about these results, he had this to say:

“In my 20 years across ecommerce, the review submission rate we’re seeing now is almost unheard of. Our customers are busy & on the go, predominantly engaging with us on mobile - it’s no surprise that meeting them there led to this huge increase... I just wish we had done it sooner.”

- Paul Zaengle, Manduka CEO

As Paul mentions, Junip’s submission forms are built for mobile. Transitioning from an “in-email” submission to a progressive, animated mobile web experience allowed Manduka’s customers to submit their reviews without being overwhelmed.

Studies show consumers are also more willing to self-disclose on mobile & much more willing to share photos - so not only did Manduka gather more reviews, but the quality of those reviews was higher as well.

Sending using the Junip & Klaviyo integration also gave Manduka's marketing team more visibility into their broader communication strategy.

Putting reviews to work

The combination of more high quality reviews, paired with Junip’s performant on-site displays led to a 14% increase in on-site conversion rate for Manduka.

“With advertising costs more expensive than ever, a double digit increase in conversion is a huge win to help our teams grow the business. We see a direct correlation between our reviews & this conversion increase.”

- Paul Zaengle, Manduka CEO

Reviews weren't just used on Manduka.com, but with our real time syndication between regional storefronts - the Canadian & European teams could take part as well. Finally, Manduka was able to use Junip's status as a Google Shopping partner to easily share reviews into their Product Listings & Product Listing Ads.

Today

These days Manduka's officially free of any review related headaches & looking towards new initiatives, but they consistently continue to see dividends for making the move. When asked what he'd say to other brands considering a similar change, Paul simply shared this:

"Do it now"

If your brand is looking to gather more reviews, with fewer headaches & display them everywhere that matters - you can install Junip now for free, or reach out to our team for a personal demo.