3rd Party Reviews: Ride1Up vs Competing Brands

When making a purchase, the vast majority of us read the customer reviews. It tends to be one of the first things we look at to help make an informed decision. The 3rd party validation can help us get a first-hand perspective on the real buyer’s experience and know how satisfied they were with the product we are considering. Shopping for ebikes is no different. With so many ebike options out there with seemingly endless combinations of style, specs, performance, colors, and more, it can be a difficult task to come to a final decision and reviews can help understand not only the product but the company as a whole.

Ride1Up has the most glowing customer feedback when objectively compared to any of our competitors. It is important to note that not all reviews are created equal and it is important to review 3rd party platforms, such as Google and Facebook, that do not allow brands to filter negative reviews. This results in true unfiltered feedback which is extremely important in the buying experience. 

We’ve spent countless hours researching and consolidating this information to provide an objective view in one spot for you, the customer. When you look at the results, Ride1Up outperforms the competition as our primary focus is to provide high-quality, high-performing bikes at affordable prices and plan to support our customers for years to come. 

Authentic Reviews with Google and Facebook

Ride1Up places great importance on collecting both Google and Facebook reviews because this is where customers share unfiltered and honest feedback. In the chart below, you’ll see many of our competitors shy away from these platforms because they often communicate the cold, hard truths that they don’t want you to see. We think it’s invaluable to our customers to have access and visibility to these reviews because:

Authentic Feedback: Google and Facebook reviews are some of the best sources to provide authentic, unfiltered feedback. These 3rd party platforms are not curated by the company. This authenticity is valuable for those of you seeking unbiased opinions about our electric bikes. 

Ride1Up welcomes customer feedback as we are always looking to improve as a business and improve the experience of our riding community. 

Trustworthiness: Reviews on independent platforms like Google and Facebook cannot be influenced, filtered out or manipulated by Ride1Up or our competitors and provide a more accurate, holistic representation of the true customer experience.

Four of the brands listed in our chart do not allow customers to post reviews on Facebook, which should pose some concern to potential buyers. Were they turned off due to the inability to control and mitigate negative brand sentiment? Do they not have the team to support and engage with the issues? The jury is still out… 

Diversity, Visibility, and Accessibility: Google and Facebook have a hugely diverse range of customers. When you’re reading reviews on multiple platforms like this, it ensures that you are able to build a more comprehensive and authentic understanding of our electric bikes’ performance and appeal. You are more likely to encounter these reviews during your online research, contributing to our company’s online visibility and credibility.

Quality and Quantity: It is important to note that the number of reviews can significantly manipulate the overall rating of business. Ride1Up is proud to announce we hold a 4.6 rating over 750 reviews, which is evident from the number of happy riders on the roads today. Typically, most consumers do not go out of their way to share positive experiences but given the number of bikes we sold in comparison to the leading brands, more Ride1Up customers share their experiences. 

More Ride1Up customers share their experiences for a reason, they’re thrilled with their purchase and want you to know.

In summary, when you have access to authentic, independent reviews and customer feedback, the process of building trust, and continually improving our electric bikes is made all the easier. Other companies don’t want the hard truths and honest opinions of their customers visible or accessible. Instead of our competitors trying to hide the real experience, Ride1Up wants to improve and develop not only our products, but our relationship with you.

Making Support Easy

With a purchase as important as an electric bike, we know that great support is just as important as offering a great product. Most companies offer multiple methods of support (ie: Email, Phone, etc.). However, we found that customers of other brands weren’t actually getting access to great support, whether it was endless call waitings, long delays in email responses, or no responses at all. Ride1Up’s approach is customer-centric, offering multiple points of contact for accessible and timely support so you can feel heard, confident, and taken care of for the lifespan of your new ebike.

In today’s ebike market, companies are struggling and cutting costs due to slow down in demand. Unfortunately, many of these brands are reducing customer support departments by either reducing headcounts (ie: layoffs) and/or reducing availability (eg: reducing phone support hours, increasing call waiting times, etc). In contrast, Ride1Up understands how important customer support is when building trust in our community and the main reason why we are investing in support while others are cutting back as we are hiring more customer support agents and expanding our availability to support our riders. 

We Know Bikes: Our US based customer support agents live and breath bikes and are extremely passionate about products. Our team is composed of formally trained bike mechanics (eg: Barnett’s Bike Institute, UofQ, etc), former bike shop staff, ebike industry experts and DIY ebikers. We are not reading off a script at a call center or learning on the fly. We know the products intimately and know how to resolve your issues. 

Resolving your needs promptly: Different issues require different levels of urgency and attention. We are proud of our response turnaround times which are best in the industry. Our phone agents are standing by ready to resolve your issues and emails are answered within a few business hours at most. We hear countless horror stories of customers reaching out to brands and not hearing back for days or never in the worst cases. We also hear of customers calling brands only to reach automated phone systems with no live agents or leave voicemails that are never returned. 

Skeptical? Try us. Call 877-743-3187 during business hours (M-F, 9am-5pm PST) and you’ll get a live agent, who is a bike expert. In a rare instance, you receive our voicemail, leave one. Our agents always call back customers timely to ensure their needs are met. We advise our potential buyers to call the brands they are researching to understand if the brand supports their products. 

In summary, at Ride1Up we know multiple points of contact for customer support is important, but getting timely responses from dedicated techs is even more important. On paper, our competitors may say they have ways to contact them, but getting prompt assistance is rarely the case. When you need help, it is essential for an important purchase like an ebike to meet your diverse preferences, address the varying nature of your needs, accommodate you no matter where you are, and ultimately enhance your satisfaction as a valued customer.

Where You Buy Matters 

At first glance, there are many affordable ebike options in the market with good specs that appear to be US based companies. However in reality, these are international businesses with only local distributors that offer limited to no post purchase support. When comparing brands it’s important to note that international businesses are able to provide such low prices because they are not employing US based customers and do not plan to support the rider for years to come. 

Ride1Up not only provides quality bikes at affordable prices, but we stand by our product and employ a domestic team of 100% US based employees across the entire business. We do not offshore any customer support functions and we plan to support our thousands of riders for the long term. We’ve designed all of our products based out of San Diego, California, since the beginning, giving us a better understanding of the US market trends, preferences, and customer feedback. 

There are not many brands that offer quality at our price points that are also US based. 

Here are some reasons why it matters:

We Care About the Rider: We are not a fly by night company and we plan to be here for the long term. We invest in post purchase support and healthy component inventory for all models, so customers have the confidence that we will be around for any future issue. In today’s competitive ebike market, brands are not surviving and leaving customers with questions about their ebike investments. Our customers enjoy the fact that we are only a phone call or email away should anything happen. 

Easier Customer Support: Operating within your particular time zones and speaking the same language as you makes it easier to provide efficient and effective customer support. Communication is smoother, with a better chance of resolving issues promptly as compared to some of our competitors who are often unreachable by telephone or email, outsource support to call centers, or respond based on their local international hours, adding days to weeks for resolutions. 

In conclusion, Ride1Up is a domestically based company. We have a variety of operational, logistical, and marketing advantages that translate to a better experience for you, our customer, and contribute to the overall success and competitiveness of our business in the domestic USA.

Having a clearly communicated ethical mission with a focus on affordability and sustainability provides several benefits for you as compared to our competitors. You want to support a company that has purpose.

From the beginning, Ride1Up has been focused on redefining transportation and making access to high quality electric bikes more affordable to consumers. This is evident through our Ride1Up Pledge, which provides riders with discounts when the pledge is made to reduce car trips each month with your ebike. 

We are a team of bike experts, mechanics, and enthusiasts. We understand our customers and their needs because we believe in the mission and incorporate ebikes into our daily lives. 

Our goal is simple, we want to make ebikes affordable for everyone without sacrificing quality. We are creating products that will last a lifetime when maintained appropriately and value the rider experience and sustainability above other growth metrics. When researching competitors it is not uncommon to see brands that lack a true mission or value profit over sustainability. Too many brands are focused on profits today without the rider’s long term ownership experience or the impact on the environment in mind.  

Direct-to-Consumer Strategy: Value and Benefits

Ride1Up is direct to consumer (DTC) first and this brings you several advantages compared to our competitors who are structured for in-store pricing with a business-to-business (B2B) strategy. 

This is important because:

Getting what you pay for: Our direct-to-consumer model eliminates the need for intermediaries, such as retailers and independent bike shops, allowing Ride1Up to offer you incredibly competitive prices for such well-equipped products. Our cost efficiency benefits you directly and provides price transparency, making it easier to understand what you are paying for without the added markup from retail partners.

Online Savings and Convenience: Less and less of us want to drive to the store to buy anything in this new age of ecommerce. Offering online savings via our DTC strategy appeals to you who prefer the convenience of shopping from home on your own schedule. Selling online comes with reduced overhead costs, allowing us to pass on these savings to you through lower prices and exclusive online promotions.

Best Bikes for the Best Price: Ride1Up focuses on providing the highest quality bike for the dollars you spend. We do not build a wholesale mark up in our pricing strategy and therefore our customers get the best possible bike for their budgets. Rather than increasing the sales price for our bikes to support a retail network, we chose high quality components and designs which extend the ownership lifecycle and improve the experience of our customers. 

In summary, Ride1Up’s value proposition and direct-to-consumer strategy with online savings being passed on directly to you offers a myriad of advantages, including cost efficiency, closer customer relationships, and the ability to control our brand’s messaging and reputation. Ultimately, our D2C strategy is critical in ensuring that you not only get a product that you love and understand but also one that you know you got a great deal on.