Build Your Reputation With Testimonials And User Reviews
Are you stuck in a cycle of doing what you’ve always done to attract and retain new customers, and getting the exact same results? As most business owners know, that generating new customers can be extremely hard. Just trying to stay in business takes up a lot of time, money and energy, and sometimes this can feel like it’s just not worth the effort.
In today’s digital, mobile and social-driven economy, you cannot afford to ignore the impact of what potential customers are doing online, especially if they are posting negative comments about your business.
Don’t ignore what consumers may be saying online about your business!
You could be doing your business a great disservice if you don’t promote the positive things your clients are saying about your services or products. Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are persuasive ways of helping you market your products and services online and should be included in your content marketing.
In this article, you’ll learn tips for converting more visitors into qualified leads using profit-boosting user testimonials.
Client Reviews
Legendary showman Phineas Taylor P.T. Barnum 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”. Using social proof as content is a powerful way of getting your business promoted effectively. Testimonials and reviews from satisfied customers are far more persuasive when it comes to attracting new customers than anything you can say about your own products or services.
There is a source of untapped business growth potential that most small businesses just aren’t utilizing, or utilizing correctly … consumer testimonials and reviews!
Testimonials and user reviews are effective for building credibility for your business.
Research conducted by many leading marketing companies all seem to lead to the same inevitable conclusion: testimonials and user reviews eliminate doubts potential customers may have about buying products or services, help with product selection and help increase sales.
Below are just some of the stats available to support this:
- According to research findings by eVoc Insights, a company known for researching and measuring user experience, “In general, 63% of users indicate they are more likely to purchase from a web site if it has ratings and user reviews.”
- According to Reevoo.com, consumer reviews can produce an average 18% uplift in sales and 50 or more consumer reviews per product can result in 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 user-generated content (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).
(Above figures sourced from eConsultancy.com)
Adding Customer Reviews – Online Reputation Management
Clearly, you should be adding great testimonials and reviews from existing clients to your website.
Customer testimonials and consumer reviews, however, are like double-edged swords; they can impact your business both in a positive as well as negative manner.
You see, people may not be saying bad things about your products directly to your face, but they could have posted updates on Facebook, or a forum or discussion group about an unpleasant experience they’ve just had using your products and this could be costing you business.
This is where online reputation management becomes a vitally important aspect of your 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 hurting your business without you even realizing this.
See this article to learn more about a simple plugin for WordPress users that lets you legally and ethically manage user feedback:
How To Create Testimonials – Useful Tips
User reviews, testimonials, and case studies are effective when it comes to helping you promote and market your products and services online and should be used in your content. When you quote responses from users in your content, you:
- Show prospects exactly with similar problems and pains how your products and services can help them.
- Help site visitors identify and address their objections.
- Help potential customers connect with their motivations and this facilitates moving them closer to a buying decision.
Here are some tips on how to create captivating testimonials:
- Don’t over edit: You should try to use your customer’s actual words as much as possible. Leaving little grammatical errors and misspellings in the content helps keep your testimonials sounding authentic.
- Use real photos: Research shows that using images of people’s faces draws the attention of visitors on a web page. Adding photos of your clients next to their testimonials and reviews can help your visitors and potential prospects take notice of your content.
- Tell a story: Stories are so much more effective and memorable than just providing facts and statistics. Being able to present a customer’s horror story and how your solution came to the rescue will make a more lasting impression on those reading your content than using generic statements about excellent support and giving “two thumbs up” product recommendations that all of us have heard a “million times” before.
- Use it in context: Add testimonials in your site copy where it makes the most sense to place them, and where they can most effectively help sell your point. For example, think about the impact you can create on your visitor’s perception by adding a testimonial about what a “bargain” price your solution sells for before posting pricing information, or testimonials about problems you’ve helped your clients solve before talking about the benefits of your products, or testimonials where customers are genuinely thrilled about your support when offering a risk-free guarantee or providing content designed to help readers overcome their objections.
- Quantify the information: Which of the following statements do you think your prospects would consider to be more powerful: “XYZ solution was directly responsible for helping to increase our revenue by $57,903 during the previous fiscal year,” or “XYZ solution helped us grow our business?” Whenever possible, ask clients to specify quantifiable results when submitting testimonials, like how much your solution helped to increase their market share or reduce their costs by in specific percentages or amounts, how many hours you have helped them save, how many new leads or new clients they were able to generate in a recent financial quarter, what kind of things are they able to do or experience now that they couldn’t do before, etc.
- Vary the customer testimonials on your site: Although this can be a little difficult when you are just starting out and have very few clients, try to avoid displaying the same testimonial repeatedly throughout your website. Depending on the type of business you run, 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 best customer: 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 aspire to become 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 solution, send them a message asking for permission to reprint the content on your site.
- Never use fake testimonials. Many people can see through sites that employ copywriters to produce their content. Outsourcing content is fine, but your potential clients need to see that the testimonials provided on your site are real. Don’t destroy your credibility with a ”made up” testimonial.
How To Get Testimonials
Ask
If you have just completed 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 useful guidelines for soliciting testimonials:
- Make a point of contacting clients after 60 days with an email reminder for a testimonial if you have not obtained one immediately after completing your service.
- Include a text box for entering testimonials in all your client surveys.
- Pull out your phone when you next meet with clients or hand over a finished project and if they are delighted with your services, ask them if they wouldn’t mind recording a quick video testimonial/feedback interview. If they agree, while recording your video, explain to your viewers what you have done for the client and capture your client’s positive reactions and feedback.
- Make it easy for them. If clients send 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 the client and ask them for permission to use it. Explain that you have already prepared something to help them save time and invite them 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 Publish Their Testimonial
Offer to publish a link back to their website in exchange for their testimonial. This is often enough of an incentive to get clients to provide you with 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 subscriber list, include a request for a testimonial in a scheduled newsletter broadcast. Preferably, this should be timed to reach subscribers just after your clients have had a chance to assess the results of using your solution. 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 subscribers for feedback, a testimonial, or a product review.
Use LinkedIn
The LinkedIn “Recommendations” feature lets you solicit testimonials from other members for your profile. 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 (you can offer to publish a link back to their website or profile in exchange).
Create A Testimonials Page
Create a “Testimonials” page and place a “more testimonials …” link to this page whenever you have added new testimonials on your content sections.
Tip: You can measure the effectiveness of your testimonials by how long visitors stay on the section of your pages or posts where you have added the testimonial content. A great tool for observing visitor behavior on your site are “heatmaps”.
We have written an article about adding heatmap analytics to your site to track visitor behavior here:
Testimonial Plugins
If your site or blog is built using WordPress, you can use a plugin to add, edit and display testimonials. Some plugins also let you add forms to your pages where users can submit feedback and testimonials.
Once your plugin is installed and set up (with instructions for adding testimonials via the submission form – if available), all you have to do is send clients to your “Testimonials” page.
Here are a few useful plugins you can check out:
Easy Testimonials
Easy Testimonials is a free plugin that lets you add testimonials to your sidebar as a widget, or embed testimonials into posts and pages using a shortcode. The Easy Testimonials plugin also lets you insert a list of all testimonials or output a random testimonial, and include an image with each testimonial, which is great for adding a photo of the testimonial author, a logo, etc.
The plugin also provides users with a “pro” version that offers additional features and technical support.
Go here for more information about this plugin:
Testimonials Widget
Testimonials Widget is a free plugin that lets you add random or 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.
The Testimonials Widget plugin makes loads of additional features available via a premium version, including built-in options for better search engine results and developer support.
For more information about using the plugin, go here:
Testimonials WordPress Plugin
This is a premium WordPress plugin that offers plenty of great features right out of the box, including:
- Responsive design that resizes to display correctly on any device or browser.
- Display options for 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 testimonials, display testimonials in a speech bubble, customize font and background colors, 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 great sources of content that can help your business in terms of adding credibility, building authority, improving online reputation, and growing your sales funnel. Always ask for feedback, reviews, and testimonials from your clients, and publish positive content about your business on your web site.
Resources
For additional information on 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 exactly how to drive more traffic to your website, save money creating useful content for your visitors and grow your business online using content marketing strategies. It’s not only a great course with loads of useful information, it’s also 100% FREE!
***
***
"If you're new to WordPress, this can stand on its own as a training course and will stay with you as you progress from beginner to advanced and even guru status." - Bruce (Columbus, Ohio)