Building Your Reputation With User Testimonials And Reviews
Are you stuck in a cycle of doing what you’ve always done to attract 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 extremely hard. Just trying to keep your business afloat requires a lot of time, money and energy, and sometimes this can feel like it’s just not worth the effort.
In today’s online economy, you just can’t ignore the significance of online consumer behavior, especially if they are posting comments about your business.
Ignoring what consumers 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 aren’t publishing the positive things your customers are saying about your services, solutions, client support, training, etc. Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are powerful when it comes to helping you market your products and services online and should be included as part of your content.
In this article, you’ll discover how to achieve better results online using profit-boosting user testimonials.
Client Reviews And Testimonials
P.T. Barnum, the great, legendary businessman and showman, is often quoted as having said that “Nothing draws a crowd quite like a crowd.”
P.T. Barnum understood the power of “social proof”. Using social proof as content is a powerful way of getting your business promoted effectively. Genuine testimonials from satisfied customers are far more persuasive when it comes to drawing new customers, clients or users than anything you say about your own products or services.
There is clearly a source of untapped business growth potential that most small businesses just aren’t utilizing, or utilizing correctly … client reviews and testimonials!
Reviews and testimonials are a fantastic way to build credibility for your business.
Research conducted by leading marketing research firms all lead to the same conclusion: user reviews and testimonials decrease doubts potential customers may have about buying products or services that you are trying to sell, help with product selection and increases sales.
Below are just some findings that support this:
- According to research findings by eVoc Insights, a company that researches and measures user experience, “In general, 63% of users indicate they are more likely to purchase from a web site if it has ratings and customer reviews.”
- According to Reevoo.com, consumer reviews are responsible for producing an average 18% uplift in sales and 50 or more customer reviews per product can mean a 4.6% increase in conversion rates.
- Web site visitors who interact with both consumer 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).
(The figures above were sourced from eConsultancy.com)
Adding Consumer Testimonials And Reviews – Online Reputation Management
Adding reviews to your website from clients is essential for growing your business online.
Testimonials and reviews, however, are like double-edged swords; they can impact your business both in a negative as well as positive way.
People may not be saying bad things about your business directly to you, but they could have posted disparaging remarks on Facebook or a discussion group about a bad encounter they’ve just had with you or your business and this could be costing you business.
This is where online reputation management becomes an important aspect of your online business success.
Misconceptions about managing your reputation online, such as the process being too complicated or too time-consuming (or the belief that you really don’t need to worry about it) may be causing damage to your business without you even being aware of this.
See this article to learn more about a simple tool for WordPress users that allows you to legally and ethically manage user feedback:
How To Create Awesome Client Testimonials – Useful Tips
Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are powerful ways of helping you promote and market your products and services online and should be used in your content marketing. When you quote your own customer responses in your content, you:
- Show prospects exactly what problems and pains your products and services can solve for them and how easily it can do this.
- Help potential customers identify and address their objections.
- Help prospects connect with their aspirations and motivations and facilitate moving them further along the sales process.
Here are some tips on creating captivating customer testimonials:
- Don’t over edit: You should try to use the actual words used by your customers as much as you can. Leave grammatical or spelling errors in the content. This helps keep your testimonials ‘real’.
- Use photos: Research shows that using images of people’s faces will draw the most attention of visitors on a web page. Adding photos of your clients next to their testimonials and reviews can help increase visitor engagement with your content.
- Tell a story: Stories are much more effective and memorable than simply 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 how “excellent” the service was and giving “two thumbs up” product recommendations that all of us have heard a “million times” before.
- Use it in context: It’s good to add testimonials in your web content where it best makes sense to place them, and where you believe these can most effectively help you 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 can be purchased for before posting price information, or testimonials about problems you’ve helped clients solve before talking about the benefits of your services, or testimonials where customers are truly ecstatic about your customer service when offering a money-back guarantee or providing content designed to help your readers overcome their objections.
- Quantify your information: Which of the following statements do you think is more powerful: “Since using your services, we have seen our net profit increase by $88,159 in the previous financial quarter,” or “XYZ software helped us grow our business?” If possible, publish testimonials containing quantifiable results, like how much your solution helped to increase their market share or reduce their costs by in specific percentages or amounts, how many hours of work they have saved, 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.
- Avoid using the same client testimonial repeatedly throughout your site: Although this can be a little difficult if you are just starting out or don’t have many clients, it’s best to avoid using the same testimonial everywhere on your site. Depending on the nature of your business, you could try to obtain more client testimonials by offering limited review copies of your product, or a special launch discount for clients in exchange for an honest review and permission to publish it if you choose to use it.
- Appeal to your target audience: As every infomercial featuring a celebrity endorsement, subject expert or “busy mom” knows, if you know who your target audience is, providing testimonials from people who your prospects can relate to can be a very powerful motivator and influencer. People want to see and buy from “better versions” of themselves, so make sure to include testimonials targeted to your ideal customers.
- Reprint across different platforms. If you get a great comment on your Facebook wall praising your customer service, contact them privately asking for their permission to reprint the comment or post on your site.
- Never use fake testimonials. Prospective customers need to see that the testimonials provided on your site are real. Don’t destroy your reputation with false testimonials.
How To Get Testimonials
Ask
When you complete a service for someone, or a customer says they are really happy with your product or service, ask them for a testimonial.
Here are some tips for soliciting testimonials from clients:
- Make it a part of your business processes to contact customers after 60 days with an email reminder for a testimonial if you have not obtained one immediately after performing a service.
- Add a field for entering testimonials in all client surveys.
- Take out your phone next time you meet with clients or hand over a completed project and if they are delighted with your services, ask them if they wouldn’t mind recording a very short video testimonial/feedback interview. During your video, explain to your viewers what you have done for your client and try to capture your client’s positive reactions and responses.
- Make it easy 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 best sections (only use what they have given you – don’t put words into their mouth), and use these to create a testimonial, then contact your client and ask them for permission to publish it. Explain that you have already prepared something to save them time and invite them to change what you have written however they like before replying with their approval.
Offer To Publish A Link To Their Site
Offer to post a link to their website in exchange for their testimonial. This is often enough of an incentive to get clients providing a testimonial. It also makes an 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 requests for a testimonial in one of your autoresponder mailouts. Preferably, this should be done as soon as your clients have had a chance to assess the results of using your services. Use words like “I need your help” in your email subject and make the point of your email or message specifically about asking subscribers to provide honest feedback, a testimonial, or a review.
Use LinkedIn
The LinkedIn “Recommendations” feature allows you to solicit testimonials for your account. With LinkedIn, the process for requesting and providing recommendations is quite simple and user-friendly and the person providing the recommendation receives a link to their profile. If you get a recommendation on LinkedIn, ask their permission to reprint it on your website (once again, you can offer to add a link back to their profile in exchange).
Create A Customer Testimonials Page
Create a new section for client testimonials and place a “more testimonials …” link to your main testimonials section throughout your site.
Useful Tip: You can measure how effective testimonials are by how long visitors remain on the section of your pages or posts where you have added the testimonial content. A great tool for monitoring what visitors are doing on your site are “heatmaps”.
We have written an article about a heatmap software you can add to your site to analyze visitor behavior here:
Testimonial Plugins For WordPress
If you use WordPress, you can use a plugin to add, edit and display testimonials. Some plugins also allow you to add a form to your pages inviting users to submit feedback and testimonials.
Once your testimonial plugin is installed and set up (remember to provide simple instructions for adding testimonials via the submission form – if available), you can then refer users to your “Testimonials” section.
Here are some great testimonial plugins you can check out:
Easy Testimonials
Easy Testimonials is a free plugin that lets you add user testimonials to the sidebar as a widget, or embed testimonials into posts and pages using a shortcode. Easy Testimonials also lets you publish a list of all testimonials or output a random testimonial, and include an image with each testimonial, which you can use to add a photo of the testimonial author, their company logo, etc.
Easy Testimonials also comes with a “pro” version that offers additional features and plugin support.
To download the plugin, visit this site:
Testimonials Widget
Testimonials Widget is a free WordPress plugin that lets you add random or selected portfolios, quotes, reviews, or text with videos or images on your blog. You can insert testimonials via a shortcode, theme functions, or widgets with category and tag selections and specify different display options such as random or specific ordering.
Testimonials Widget provides added features via a premium version, including built-in functions SEO functionality and technical support.
Go here for more information about the plugin:
Testimonials WordPress Plugin
This is a premium plugin that provides plenty of great features right out of the box, including:
- Responsive design that resizes for displaying correctly on any device or browser.
- Options to display your testimonials in a widget or as slideshows, sliders, list layout, grid layout, etc. by adding a shortcode
- Styling options (display image on top, bottom, or side of the testimonial, display testimonials in a speech bubble, customize font and background colours, font types and more.
Visit this site to download and use this plugin:
To learn how to add testimonials in WordPress, see the tutorial below:
In Summary …
Client testimonials and user reviews are powerful 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 customers or clients, and start publishing these on your web site.
Additional Info
For additional information about creating engaging clients testimonials refer to the articles below:
- 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 a comprehensive series of training emails with actionable information and practical tips that will teach you how to drive more traffic to your site, save money creating high-quality content for your visitors and grow your business online using content marketing. It’s not only a great course with loads of useful information, it’s also 100% FREE!
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