Growth plan v3.4: the review asks, final wording

16 October 2026, updated four times on your notes: no checkout question, every ask from the delivery day at 7pm, weekends included, 27 December for the four Christmas titles, no fix-it promise in the asks, problems by email, photo or video asked for on day 7 and 27 December. Changes from v2 are in the first two cards; everything else from v2 stands and is kept below in short form. Older versions: v2, v1. Advert research: /adverts/.

What changed, and whether you were right

Meta: £10 a day, as you said. Optimised for "opened the order form" so it can learn at that budget. Stop rules unchanged.
You were right about the review ask, for about half the families. Of the 9 books that have arrived, 4 were Christmas books bought in August to October (Isabella, Owain, Poppy, Eliya). Those parents got "Has {child} met her book?" on the day a present for December landed. The honest answer to that is "not yet", and then it is forgotten. The other 5 were school and bedtime books read straight away, so timing does not explain all of it: 5 asks at normal rates still expects 0 or 1 reviews. Your call, and it is the right one: we do not wait for Christmas. Every ask goes out from the delivery day, the day they first hold the book, and asks about the book in their hands: the likeness, the print, the service. No ask ever assumes the child has seen it.
Trustpilot's own ask: yes, and here is exactly what it is. Their Automatic Feedback Service is on the free plan (50 invitations a month; we send fewer than 20). We BCC a Trustpilot address on our "it has arrived" email, and Trustpilot sends its invitation and labels the review Verified. Reviews from our own link never get that label. Two limits: the wording is Trustpilot's standard text (changing it is a Premium feature), and Trustpilot cannot text on the free plan (texting is a paid API add-on). So Trustpilot asks by email, in its own words, with the Verified badge; we ask by text, in your words, at the moment that fits the family.
Phone numbers, both stages answered. Order stage: stays optional. It was added so the samples link could be texted when emails go astray, and about 1 in 3 families give it when asked nicely. Making it mandatory there puts a wall in front of the free samples, which is the hook; a lost sample order costs more than the number gains. Stripe stage: mandatory, but only shown when we do not already hold a number. Families who gave it at the order stage see no extra field at all. Stripe shows its own phone field and checks the format, so it is one line for us and one field for them, at the moment they have already decided to pay. We watch the paid rate over the next 20 hardcover checkouts; if it drops, the field goes back to optional. That is a sum, not a guess.
The 25% off the next book: dropped. You are right: the families who want no second book are exactly the ones it does not reach, and it smells of a bribe. No money anywhere in the review flow.
The QR page in the book: in, and it uses Trustpilot's own QR code (one active code is free) so the scans are tracked on their side.

The review flow, redesigned

The rule

The review is about what the parent can see on the delivery day: did the painted child look like their child, how the book feels, how we treated them. That is true whether the book is read tonight or wrapped until Christmas. So every ask starts on the delivery day, nothing waits, and no ask mentions the child's reaction.

Two rules for the wording, from your notes: no ask promises to fix or reprint anything. The site already says "we'll put it right, free of charge" for a detail we got wrong, and "we will reprint" for print damage, on the homepage, pricing and returns pages. That is where the promise lives, scoped to our mistakes. An ask sent after approval that repeats it invites a change of mind to be treated as our fault. The asks say "tell us first" and nothing more. And problems go by email, not by text back: the texting gateway is ours to send with, not a line customers should rely on.

The moments

Moment	Who asks	How	What it asks about
Delivery day, 7pm (Ship24 says delivered; if it landed after 6pm, 10am next morning)	Our "it has arrived" email with Trustpilot BCC'd, plus a short text in your name if we hold a mobile	Email from us: the book is with you, reply if anything is not right. Trustpilot's own invitation lands the same evening (set to "immediately"), labelled Verified. The text points at it.	The parent's experience: the likeness, the print, the service. Nothing about the child's reaction.
Day 7 after delivery, 7pm	Us, in your name	Text if we hold a mobile, email if not. One tap to Trustpilot, and the ask for a photo or a short video of {child} with the book, by email, written yes before any use.	The book in their hands: "How do you find {child}'s book?"
27 December, 7pm (the four Christmas titles only: Letter from Santa, Night Before Christmas, Baby's First Christmas, Christmas Sleigh; worked out from the book name, nobody is asked anything)	Us, in your name	Text if we hold a mobile, email if not. One tap to Trustpilot, and the photo or short video ask again, by email, written yes before any use.	The moment the present was opened: "Did {child} like it?" This is also where the photos for the adverts come from.
Day 21 after delivery, 7pm	Us, in your name	Text or email, last time, with the "if you already did, thank you and ignore this" line.	A last gentle ask.
Any time	The book itself	The back page: "Did {child} love it? Scan to tell us" with Trustpilot's QR code.	Whatever they want to say.
Etsy buyers	Etsy, then us	Unchanged: Etsy's own prompts, then our three Etsy asks from the delivery day.	Same rule: the book, not the child's reaction.

Trustpilot's invitation sends once per BCC'd email, so the second-copy order does not trigger a second invitation. Our day-7 and day-21 asks pause the moment Trustpilot emails us that a review has landed, as they do now.

Every ask text, judged, and the replacement

Ask 1 today (email on arrival): subject "Has {child} met her book?", body "we hope the first read together was a special one... a short review would mean the world". Problem: assumes the child has the book; asks for a review of a moment that may be months away; "mean the world" is about us, not them. Replacement (the Trustpilot BCC rides on this email):

Subject: {child}'s book has arrived

Hi {first name},

The postman says {child}'s book is with you. Have a look at the cover and
flick to the page you liked best in the samples. If anything is not as
you expected, tell us first by replying to this email.

Trustpilot will send you a short invitation to say how you found us. It
takes a minute and it is how the next family decides to trust a small
studio.

Przemek
Little Tailor Books

Same evening, the text (only when we hold a mobile; it points at the Verified invitation rather than competing with it):

Hi {first name}, Przemek from Little Tailor Books. {child}'s book has
arrived. If you have a minute tonight, Trustpilot has emailed you a short
review link; a couple of honest lines would help us more than anything.
If anything is not as you expected, email info@littletailorbooks.co.uk first.

Timing, so it is written down: 7pm on the delivery day (the watcher's evening run moves from 6pm to 7pm). A parcel delivered after 6pm gets the 10am run next morning. The 9 October rule moved weekend asks to Monday because one study found weekend reviews come out slightly more negative. Your decision today replaces it: a Saturday delivery is asked on Saturday at 7pm, a Sunday delivery on Sunday. The parent who has just opened the parcel is the best version of that parent we will get.

Ask 2 today (day 7, email + text): "I hope {child} is still enjoying the book". Problem: same assumption; "still enjoying" is odd if it is wrapped under a tree. Replacement, text, day 7 after delivery:

Hi {first name}, Przemek from Little Tailor Books. You have had
{child}'s book for a week now. How do you find it? A couple of honest lines
here help a tiny studio more than anything: {link}
If you have a photo or a short video of {child} with the book, we would
love to see it: email info@littletailorbooks.co.uk. First name only, and
never used without your written yes.

Ask 3 today (day 21): "This is the last time I will ask, I promise... if {child}'s book found a place on the shelf". Verdict: honest, says it is the last time, carries the "if you already did, ignore this" line. One change: "found a place on the shelf" becomes "if you are happy with {child}'s book", so it works wrapped or unwrapped. Still day 21 after delivery.

New, 27 December, the four Christmas titles only (text; email if no mobile):

Hi {first name}, Przemek from Little Tailor Books. I hope {child}'s book
came out from under the tree. Did {child} like it? A couple of lines here
would mean a lot: {link}  And if you have a photo or a short video of
{child} with the book, we would love to see it: email
info@littletailorbooks.co.uk. First name only, never used without your
written yes.

Etsy asks 1 to 3: "We hope {child} has been enjoying the book" has the same fault. Same fix: ask about the book they received, not the child's reaction. Timing unchanged (days 4, 11, 25 after delivery).

What it will take

Stripe: phone required at the hardcover checkout only when the order holds no number, read back into the order. The sample form unchanged. 30 min.
The watcher: the new texts, the Trustpilot BCC on the delivery email with the name and reference snippet, the evening run moved to 7pm, weekend sends switched on, and the 27 December ask for the Christmas titles. 1.5 h.
The book file: the Trustpilot QR page at the back. 45 min.
You, 5 minutes: in Trustpilot Business go to Invitations, Invitation methods, Create an email, choose Automatic Feedback Service, set timing to "immediately", and send me the BCC address it shows. Then create the QR code under Invitation methods and send me the image.
Not built: any incentive. Not possible on the free plan: Trustpilot texting, Trustpilot wording.

Honest expectation: 10 to 20% of asked families leave a review when the ask is about what they can see and comes with a Verified invitation. At 6 to 8 paid books a month that is about one review a week from the first delivery after the change.

From v2, unchanged (short form)

Meta learning stage

50 results per ad set in 7 days. Paid book at £25: about £180 a day. Sample order at £8: about £57 a day. Opened the order form at £2: about £14 a day. We run £10 a day on the last one, measure the real costs over the first £100, and only then talk about more.

Visitor counter

Cloudflare's counter is on for the domain but its tracking line is not in the pages, so it has counted 160 American desktop scanners in 30 days and no families. Fix, all free: the analytics line in every page, Zaraz with the cookie banner and the Meta pixel, four funnel events, a Visitors box on the desk. "See where they leave" means: 1,000 arrive, 400 open a story, 60 open the form, 10 send a photo; today we only see the 10.

Second copy

Real Peecho price: one book delivered £15.40, two in one parcel £26.08, so the second copy costs £10.68. At £24.99 we keep about £13.50. Tick box at the hardcover checkout plus one tap in the arrival email. BookVault: if the proof is good, keep £39.99 and use the £6 for the adverts.

Partners

Electronic, not driving. The partner pastes one thing once; the parent does the rest; the partner is paid monthly without work. Nurseries as a fundraiser (£5 a book to the nursery fund, proven by Class Fundraising and Willow Printing), baby-class franchisees (15%), NCT branches, photographers via one referral line in their gallery email, bloggers at £8 a book. One build of about 2 hours, then the Pi mails 50 a day.

Pinterest stopped. Dashboard stays. No calendar.

The build order, my clock per item

#	Build	Mine	Yours
1	The eyes: analytics line, Zaraz + cookie banner + Meta pixel + funnel events, Visitors box on the desk.	2.5 h	-
2	Checkout: phone required, the second-copy tick box, Peecho quantity 2, the arrival email.	2.5 h	second-copy price
3	Reviews: new texts, weekends on, the 27 December ask, Trustpilot BCC, the QR page.	2.5 h	5 min in Trustpilot
4	The three adverts (see the adverts page).	5 h	20 min filming, or nothing
5	Partners: code, coupon, report, /partners/ page, the mailer.	2 h	approve the letter
6	Meta on at £10 a day.	1 h	ad account + card, 10 min
7	Read and decide at £100 and £210; BookVault proof.	-	the decisions

About 15.5 hours of mine in total. Items 1 to 3 in one go, 4 and 5 next, 6 the moment the ad account exists.

What I need from you

Yes to v3.
Second copy: £24.99 or £19.99.
Unboxing advert: your hands for 20 minutes, Veo for about £10, or both.
Trustpilot, 5 minutes: switch on the Automatic Feedback Service and send me the BCC address; create the QR code and send me the image.
Later: the nursery letter, the ad account.

Sources read today: the watcher and the site worker code; the desk facts; Trustpilot plans (free: 50 automated invitations a month, 1 QR code, custom templates on Premium only); Trustpilot: Automatic Feedback Service and its BCC setup; Trustpilot: customising templates (Premium and Enterprise); Trustpilot's help search listing the API add-on as the only route for SMS and WhatsApp invitations.