Build Your Reputation With User Testimonials And Reviews

Are you stuck doing what you’ve always done to attract and retain new customers, only to get the exact same results? Most small business owners don’t need to be told that generating new business can be very hard. Just trying to keep your business afloat requires 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, mobile and social media-driven economy, it’s a mistake to ignore the effect of online consumer behavior, especially if they are posting comments about your business.

Ignoring what your customers may be saying online about your business could be a costly mistake!

By the same token, you are also doing your business a disservice if you don’t spread the positive things your customers say about your services or products. Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are effective when it comes to marketing your products and services online and should be an integral part of your content.

In this article, we’ll show you how to turn more visitors into prospects with engaging user testimonials.

Testimonials And Consumer Reviews

Legendary American showman and businessman P.T. Barnum 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 and effective way of promoting your business. Testimonials quoted directly from existing customers are far more persuasive when it comes to attracting new customers, clients or users than anything you have to say about your own products or services.

There is clearly an untapped source of business growth potential that most businesses simply do not utilize, or utilize correctly … testimonials and reviews from satisfied clients!

Customer reviews and customer testimonials are a fantastic way to build credibility for your products or services.

Marketing studies conducted by leading research firms all seem to lead to the same inevitable conclusion: adding customer reviews and customer testimonials to your site eliminates doubts potential customers may have about products that you are trying to sell, helps with product selection and helps increase sales.

Below are just some statistics that support this:

• According to a study 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, customer reviews are responsible for producing an average 18% uplift in sales and 50 or more reviews per product can result in a 4.6% increase in conversion rates.
• 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).

(The figures above were sourced from eConsultancy.com)

Adding User Reviews And Testimonials – Managing Online Reputation

Clearly, you should be adding reviews from happy customers to your site.

Consumer reviews and customer testimonials, however, are like double-edged swords; they can impact your business both negative and positive ways.

People may not be saying bad things about your services directly to you, but they could be posting updates on a forum about a bad encounter they’ve just had with one of your representatives 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 online business success.

Misconceptions about online reputation management, such as being too complicated or too time-consuming (or the belief that you really don’t need it) may be seriously harming your business without you even realizing it.

See this article to learn more about a simple WordPress plugin that can help you avoid the escalation of problem reviews about your products through effective user review management:

• Manage Your Online Reputation With Power Online Reviews

Creating Powerful User Testimonials – Useful Tips

User reviews, testimonials, and case studies are effective when it comes to helping you market and promote your products and services online and should be an integral part of your content. When you quote responses from customers in your content, you:

• Show others exactly what pains and problems your products and services can help solve for them and how easily this can be done.
• Help visitors identify their objections and address these.
• Help potential customers connect with their aspirations and motivations and this facilitates moving them closer to a buying decision.

Here are some tips on how to create customer testimonials:

• Avoid over-editing: You should try to use the actual words used by your customers as much as possible. Leave little grammatical or spelling errors in the content. This helps to keep things ‘real’.
• Use photos: Images of people’s faces draw the most attention to your content. Adding photos of your clients next to their testimonials and reviews will help increase visitor engagement with your content.
• Tell a powerful story: Stories are much more effective and memorable than just providing facts and statistics. The ability to present a customer’s horror story and how your solution saved the day will make a longer-lasting impression on those reading your content than using generalized statements about excellent customer support and giving “two thumbs up” service 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 makes the most sense to place them, and where they can most effectively help you sell your point. For example, 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 pricing information, or testimonials about problems you’ve helped clients solve before presenting the benefits of your products, or testimonials where customers are truly thrilled about your customer service before offering guarantees or providing content designed to help readers overcome their objections.
• Quantify your information: Which of the following statements do you think your prospects would find more powerful: “As a direct result of using your XYZ product, our profits grew by $45,336 during the last fiscal year,” or “XYZ product helped us grow our sales?” If possible, publish testimonials containing quantifiable results, like how much your solution helped to increase their profits or reduce their costs in specific percentages or amounts, how many hours 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 testimonial repeatedly throughout your site: Although this can be a little difficult when you are just starting out or don’t have many clients, try to avoid displaying the same testimonial everywhere on your website. Depending on the nature of your business, you could try to obtain more customer 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 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 can relate to is an extremely 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 ideal customers.
• Reprint content across different platforms. If you get a great comment on your Facebook wall praising your solution, contact them privately asking for their permission to reprint the content on your blog.
• Never use fake client testimonials. Prospective customers need to see that the testimonials you provide on your site are real. Don’t compromise your credibility with ”made up” testimonials.

How To Get Testimonials From Your Clients

Always Ask For Testimonials

When you complete performing a service, or a customer says they are really happy with your product or service, ask them for a testimonial.

Follow these tips for soliciting testimonials:

• Make it a part of your business processes to contact customers after 30 days with an email request for a testimonial if you have not obtained one immediately after performing a service.
• Add a field for testimonials in all client surveys.
• Take out your phone next time you meet with a client or hand over a finished job and if they are delighted with the results, ask them if they wouldn’t mind recording a very brief video testimonial/feedback interview. When recording the video, describe to your viewers what you have done for the client and make sure to record your client’s positive reactions and feedback.
• Make it easy for them. Whenever clients send you a positive email thanking you for a great job 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 – never put words into their mouth), and shape these into a testimonial, then contact the client and ask them for permission to quote them on your site. Explain that you have done this to help them save time and invite them to edit what you have written however they like before replying with their approval.

Offer To Post A Link Back To Their Site

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.

Add Testimonial Requests To Your Auto Responder/Newsletter Messages

If you have a list of subscribers, include requests for a testimonial in a periodic newsletter broadcast. Preferably, this should be done after your customers have had a chance to assess the results of using your services. Use words like “I need your help” in the subject of your email and make the point of your email or message specifically about asking customers to provide honest feedback, a testimonial, or a review of your services.

Use LinkedIn

The LinkedIn “Recommendations” feature helps you solicit testimonials that become part of your account. With LinkedIn, the process for requesting and providing recommendations is simple and user-friendly and the person providing the recommendation gets a link to their profile. If you get a recommendation on LinkedIn, ask their permission to reprint it on your site (tip: offer to publish a link back to their website or profile in exchange).

Create A Customer Testimonials Section

Create a “Testimonials” page and add a “read more testimonials …” link to this section throughout your content sections.

Useful Tip: You can measure how useful 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 monitoring what visitors are doing on your site are “heatmaps”.

We have written an article about a heatmap software you can add to your website to measure visitor behaviour here:

• How To Predict User Behaviour On Your WordPress Site With Heat Map Software – HeatMap Tracker Review

Testimonial Plugins

If you use WordPress, you can use a plugin to add and display testimonials. Some plugins also let you add forms to your pages inviting users to submit testimonials.

Once your plugin is installed and set up (with instructions for using the testimonials submission form – if available), you can then send users to your “Testimonials” section.

Here are some plugins you can check out:

Easy Testimonials

Easy Testimonials is an easy-to-use free plugin that lets you add client testimonials to the sidebar as a widget, or embed testimonials into your pages and posts using a shortcode. The Easy Testimonials plugin also lets you publish a list of all testimonials or output a random testimonial, and include images with testimonials, which can be used for adding a photo of the testimonial author, a logo, etc.

Easy Testimonials also can be upgraded to a “pro” version that has additional features and technical support.

Go here to learn more about the plugin:

• Easy Testimonials

Testimonials Widget

Testimonials Widget is a free plugin that lets you randomly slide or list selected portfolios, reviews, quotes, or text with videos or images on your website. You can insert user testimonials via a shortcode, theme functions, or widgets with category and tag selections and specify different display options such as random or specific ordering.

The Testimonials Widget plugin has plenty more features available via a premium version, including built-in options SEO functionality and technical support.

Visit this site to download and use this plugin:

• Testimonials Widget

Testimonials WordPress Plugin

This is a premium plugin that offers many great features right out of the box, including:

• Responsive design that resizes for correct display on any device or browser.
• Options to display your testimonials in a widget or as slideshows, sliders, grid layout, list layout, etc. using a shortcode
• Styling options (display image at the top, bottom, or side of the testimonial, display testimonial in a speech bubble, customized font and background colors, font types and more.

To download and use the plugin, go here:

• Testimonials WordPress Plugin

To learn how to add testimonials in WordPress, see the tutorial below:

• How To Add Testimonials In WordPress

In Conclusion …

Customer reviews and client testimonials are powerful sources of content that help your business add credibility, build authority, improve online reputation, and grow your sales funnel. Always ask for feedback, reviews, and testimonials from existing clients, and publish positive content about your business on your website or blog.

Resources

The articles below are a great source of information on creating engaging users testimonials and were 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 a comprehensive series of training emails with actionable information and practical tips that will show you how to drive more traffic to your web site, save money creating useful content that will add value to your site 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 completely FREE!

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