Build Your Reputation With User Testimonials And Reviews
Are you stuck in a cycle of doing what you’ve always done to attract and retain customers, only to get the exact same results? Most business owners don’t need to be told that finding effective ways of generating new business can be hard. Just trying to keep your business afloat takes a lot of your time, money and energy, and sometimes this can feel like it’s just not worth the effort.
In today’s digital economy, ignoring what your clients may be saying online about your business could be a costly mistake!
Ignoring what your clients may be saying online about your business could be a costly mistake!
By the same token, you may also be doing your business a disservice if you are not promoting the positive things your clients say about your services and products. User reviews, testimonials, and case studies are persuasive ways of marketing your products and services online and should be included as part of your content marketing.
In this article, you will learn how to improve your sales conversions with profit-boosting client testimonials.
Testimonials And Client Reviews
Phineas Taylor (Aka “P.T.”) Barnum, the great, legendary showman and successful promoter, is often quoted as having said that “Nothing draws a crowd quite like a crowd.”
P.T. Barnum obviously understood the power of “social proof”. Social proof-based content is a powerful way of getting your business promoted effectively. Quoting testimonials and reviews from satisfied users is existing clients are far more persuasive for drawing new clients than anything you have to say about your own products or services.
There is clearly an untapped source of business growth potential that most small businesses just aren’t utilizing, or utilizing correctly … reviews from your happy clients!
Reviews and testimonials are a powerful way to build credibility for your services and products.
Research conducted by marketing research companies all point to the same inevitable conclusion: adding consumer reviews and customer testimonials to your site helps to eliminate doubts potential customers may have about buying your products or services, helps users select products and helps increase sales conversions.
Here are just some statistics that support this:
- According to research findings by eVoc Insights, an organization known for researching and measuring user experience, “In general, 63% of users indicate they are more likely to purchase from a site if it has ratings and reviews.”
- According to Reevoo.com, customer reviews play a significant role in creating an average 18% uplift in sales and 50 or more consumer reviews per product can translate into a 4.6% increase in conversion rates.
- Web site visitors who interact with both user reviews and customer questions and answers are 105% more likely to purchase while visiting and spend 11% more than visitors who don’t interact with UGC. (Bazaarvoice, Conversation Index, Q2 2011).
- Customer reviews are significantly more trusted (nearly 12 times more) than descriptions that come from manufacturers, according to a survey of US internet users by online video review site EXPO. (eMarketer, February 2010).
(Source: eConsultancy.com)
Adding User Testimonials And Reviews – Managing Online Reputation
Adding positive reviews to your website from happy customers is important for growing your business online and creating a solid online reputation.
Consumer reviews and testimonials, however, can work both ways and impact your business both in a negative as well as positive way.
You see, people may not be saying bad things about your services directly to your face, but they could be posting disparaging remarks on Facebook about a bad encounter they’ve just had with one of your staff and this could be doing far more damage to your business than all the good work you’ve been putting into building it.
This is where online reputation management becomes vital to your business success.
Misconceptions about online reputation management, such as the process being too complicated or too time-consuming (or the belief that you just don’t need to worry about it) could be harming your business without you even being aware of it.
See this article to learn more about a WordPress plugin that allows you to legally and ethically manage user feedback:
Tips On Improving Your Sales With Knockout Customer Testimonials
User reviews, testimonials, and case studies are persuasive ways of helping you promote and market your products and services online and should be added to your content marketing strategy. When you quote responses from users in your content, you:
- Show prospects exactly what problems and pains your products and services can help to solve for them and how easily this can be done.
- Help your visitors identify and address their objections.
- Help prospects connect with their motivations and facilitate moving them further along the sales process.
Below are some useful tips on how to create compelling testimonials:
- Don’t over edit: Try to use your customer’s actual words as much as you can. Leaving grammatical errors and misspellings in the content helps preserve the authenticity of your testimonials.
- Use real photos: Images of people’s faces draw attention on a web page. Adding photos of your clients next to their testimonials and reviews can help increase visitor engagement with your site’s content.
- Tell a story: Stories are much more powerful and captivating than just providing statistical facts. Being able to present a customer’s horror story and how your solution came to the rescue will make a longer-lasting impression on those reading your content than presenting generic statements about excellent service and giving “two thumbs up” product recommendations that all of us have heard a “million times” before.
- Keep it in context: It’s good to add customer testimonials to your site copy where it makes the most sense to place them, and where you believe these can most effectively help sell your point. Think about the impact you will have on your visitor’s mind by adding a testimonial about what a “bargain” price your solution sells for before posting product or service pricing information, or testimonials about problems you’ve helped clients solve before talking about the benefits of your services, or testimonials where clients are truly ecstatic about your support when offering guarantees or addressing objections.
- Quantify your information: Which of the following statements is more powerful: “Since implementing XYZ solution, our net profits have grown by an additional $16,673 in the last fiscal year,” or “XYZ solution helped us grow our business?” Whenever possible, publish testimonials containing quantifiable data, like how much your solution helped to increase their sales or reduce their costs by in specific percentages or amounts, how many hours of work you have helped them save, how many new leads or new clients they were able to generate, what kind of things are they able to do or experience now that they couldn’t do before, etc.
- Use different customer testimonials on your site: Although this can be a little difficult when you are just starting out and don’t have many clients, it’s best to avoid using the same testimonial throughout your website. Depending on your business, you could try to obtain more testimonials by offering limited review copies of your product, or a special discount for clients in exchange for an honest review and permission to publish it if you decide to use it.
- Appeal to your ideal customer: As every infomercial featuring a celebrity endorsement, subject expert or “busy mom” knows, if you know who your ideal customer is, providing testimonials from people who your prospects can relate to is a really powerful motivator and influencer. People want to see and buy from “better versions” of themselves, so make sure to include testimonials that appeal directly to your best audience demographic.
- Reprint across different platforms. If you get a great comment on your Facebook page praising your products or services, ask them permission to reprint the comment or post on your site.
- Never use fake client testimonials. Many people can see through sites that employ copywriters to write their content. Outsourcing content is fine, but your potential customers need to believe that the testimonials published on your site are real. Don’t compromise your integrity with false testimonials.
How To Get Testimonials From Your Clients
Ask
Getting a testimonial from a satisfied customer can be as simple as just asking for it.
Follow these useful guidelines for soliciting testimonials from your clients:
- Make a point of contacting clients after a specific period of time, e.g. 30 days with an email request for a testimonial if you have not obtained one after completing your service.
- Add a field for testimonials in all client satisfaction surveys.
- Take out your phone next time you visit clients or hand over a completed project and if they are delighted with your services, ask them if they would be happy to record a very brief video testimonial/feedback interview. If they agree, while recording your video, explain to viewers what you have done for the client and try to capture the client’s positive reactions and responses.
- Make it easy and write it for them. Whenever a client sends you positive written feedback that contains snippets of useful testimonial material interspersed with the rest of their message, grab the juiciest sections (only use what they have given you – don’t put words into their mouth), and shape these into a testimonial, then contact your client and ask them for permission to quote them on your site. Explain that you have already prepared something to help them save time and let them know they are completely free to edit what you have written however they see fit before replying with their approval.
Offer To Publish A Link Back To The Source Wherever You Quote Their Testimonial
Offer to post a link to their site in exchange for their testimonial. This is a great incentive for clients to provide you with a testimonial. It also makes the implicit statement to visitors that your testimonials are not fake and can be verified.
Include Testimonial Requests In Your Auto Responder/Newsletter Messages
If you have a list of subscribers, include a request for a testimonial in a periodic newsletter message. This should be done as soon as your customers have had a chance to experience your products. Use words like “I need a quick favor” in the subject of your message and make the point of your email or message specifically about asking them to provide feedback, a testimonial, or a review.
Use LinkedIn
The LinkedIn “Recommendations” feature helps you obtain testimonials for your account. With LinkedIn, the process for requesting and providing recommendations is quite user-friendly and the person who provides the recommendation receives a link to their profile. If you get a recommendation on LinkedIn, ask their permission to reprint it on your website (and offer to publish a link back to their profile in exchange).
Create A Testimonials Section
Create a new section for testimonials and place a “read more client testimonials …” link to this section throughout your site.
Useful Tip: You can measure how effective client testimonials are by how long visitors stay on the section of your pages or posts where you have added the testimonial content. A great tool for measuring visitor behavior on your site are “heatmaps”.
We have written an article about adding heatmaps to your website to observe visitor behaviour here:
Useful WordPress Plugins
If you use WordPress, you can use a plugin to display testimonials. Some plugins also allow you to add a form to your pages where users can submit testimonials.
Once your testimonial plugin is installed and set up (make sure to provide simple instructions for using the testimonials submission form – if available), you can then send clients to your “Testimonials” section.
Here are a few useful testimonial plugins you can check out:
Easy Testimonials
Easy Testimonials is a free WordPress plugin that lets you add testimonials to your sidebar as a widget, or embed them into a Page or Post using a shortcode. Easy Testimonials also lets you publish a list of all testimonials or output a random testimonial, and include images with testimonials, which you can use for adding a photo of the testimonial author, a logo, etc.
The plugin also provides users with a “pro” version with additional features and developer support.
For more information about using this plugin, go here:
Testimonials Widget
Testimonials Widget is a free WP plugin that lets you randomly slide or list selected portfolios, reviews, quotes, or text with videos or images on your web site. You can insert testimonials via a shortcode, theme functions, or widgets with category and tag selections and have multiple display options such as random or specific ordering.
Testimonials Widget has loads more features available via a premium version, including built-in functions for improved search engine results and developer support.
To download and use the plugin, go here:
Testimonials WordPress Plugin
This is a premium WordPress plugin that offers many great features right out of the box, including:
- Responsive design that resizes for displaying correctly on any device or browser.
- Display options for your testimonials in a widget or as slideshows, sliders, list layout, grid layout, etc. via a shortcode
- Styling options (display image at the top, bottom, or side of the testimonial, display testimonial in a speech bubble, customize font and background colors, font types and more.
To download and use this plugin, visit this site:
To learn how to add testimonials in WordPress, see the tutorial below:
In Conclusion …
Client testimonials and customer reviews are great sources of content that can help your business add credibility, build authority, improve online reputation, and grow your sales funnel. Always ask for testimonials, reviews, and feedback from existing clients, and start publishing these on your website or blog.
Additional Info
The articles below are a great source of information about creating engaging testimonials and were also helpful in providing research and information for sections of this article:
- Ecommerce Consumer Reviews: Why You Need Them And How To Use Them
- How To Create Captivating Customer Testimonials
- 5 Tips For Knockout Testimonials
- Make Customer Testimonials Meaningful
- 7 Simple But Powerful Customer Testimonial Examples You Can Steal
- Your 5-Minute Guide To Writing an Amazing LinkedIn Recommendation
- How To Get Great LinkedIn Recommendations
We also recommend subscribing to our Free Content Marketing Email Training Series. You will receive regular training emails with actionable information that will show exactly how to drive more traffic to your website, save money creating high-quality content that will add value to your site visitors and grow your business online using content marketing. It’s not only a great course with loads of useful information, it’s also completely FREE!
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