Importing Shopify product reviews is a data-mapping task as well as a content move. A review of an older version should not quietly become evidence about a different product, and a total count will not reveal that mistake. Check what you are entitled to move, test a representative sample, and reconcile the published experience against the source records.
Confirm what you are entitled to move
Review the source, applicable permissions, and the terms governing reuse. Preserve authentic content and relevant context. Do not manufacture missing reviews, change ratings, or invent customer identities to make the imported collection look more complete.
Sendvio supports review imports. Prepare the data with clear product identifiers and the available original details. Keep missing information explicit rather than filling it with a plausible guess.
Build a product-mapping record before importing
List the source product identifier, destination identifier, relevant variant, and any known version change. Use stable identifiers where your import process supports them. Product titles can change, and two items can share nearly identical names while differing in material, size, or compatibility.
Imagine an old “Everyday Bottle” replaced by a version with a different lid. A review praising the original lid should not automatically become evidence about the new one. Decide whether the review belongs with the original product, needs clearly retained context, or should be held out. Document the decision instead of choosing the nearest title match.
Keep absent data absent unless you can recover it from a trustworthy source. A missing date does not justify assigning a convenient old one, and a missing customer name does not justify inventing an identity. Accurate incompleteness is preferable to a polished record that misrepresents its origin.
Test the mapping on a sample
Include products with variants, renamed items, and discontinued versions in the sample. Check that text, rating, date, media, and product association appear as intended. A matching product name alone may not be enough when several items have similar names.
Inspect duplicate handling and moderation status before the full import. Repeated copies of the same review can distort the presentation and make the collection look less trustworthy.
Reconcile records, not just totals
Start with a representative sample containing long text, media, different ratings, variants, and records with missing optional fields. Inspect the result in the management view and the actual widget. Confirm that line breaks, characters, product associations, and publication states survive the import as intended.
Track how many source records were imported, held for review, skipped, or rejected, using the statuses your process actually provides. Those categories should explain the source total. If the count differs, investigate before repeating the import; a blind retry can create duplicates rather than recover missing records.
Retain a private mapping of source records to their imported counterparts where possible. This makes a later correction much easier. You can identify the affected records instead of removing a broad group of reviews because one product association was wrong. Keep access and retention appropriate for the customer information involved.
Review the published experience
Check the widget on desktop and mobile, including filtering, long reviews, and media. Confirm that important context has not been hidden by the layout. Apply a consistent moderation policy to imported and newly collected reviews.
Keep an internal record of the source and import decisions for future maintenance. If a mapping is uncertain, hold that record for review rather than publishing it under the nearest-looking product. A smaller accurate review collection is more useful to shoppers than a larger one built on ambiguous associations.
After the full import, sample again across products rather than checking only the first page. Confirm that summary counts and ratings reflect the intended records and that imported feedback follows the same publication policy as new submissions. Finish with a reconciliation note so the next person can understand what moved and what deliberately did not.