Build Your Reputation With User Testimonials And Reviews
Are you stuck in a cycle of doing what you’ve always done to attract customers, and getting the exact same disappointing results? As most small business owners know, that finding effective ways of generating new customers can be difficult, confusing and frustrating. 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 web-based and social-driven economy, you just can’t ignore the impact 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!
You could be doing your business a disservice if you are not boosting the positive things your customers say about your services and products. Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are persuasive when it comes to helping you promote and market your products and services online and should be added throughout your content.
In this article, you will learn how to improve your sales with powerful customer testimonials.
Customer Reviews And Testimonials
P.T. Barnum, legendary American showman and businessman, once 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. Testimonials from your satisfied users are far more persuasive for attracting new customers, clients or users than anything you can say about your own products or services.
There is clearly an untapped source of business growth potential that most small businesses simply do not utilize, or utilize correctly … reviews and testimonials from happy users!
Reviews and customer testimonials are a terrific way to build credibility for your business.
Studies conducted by many leading research firms all lead to the same conclusion: adding customer testimonials and customer reviews to your sales information pages helps decrease doubts potential customers may have about buying products or services that you are trying to sell, helps users select products and increases sales conversions.
Below are just some of the findings available to 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 site if it has ratings and reviews.”
- According to Reevoo.com, consumer reviews are responsible for producing an average 18% uplift in sales and 50 or more consumer reviews per product can mean a 4.6% increase in conversion rates.
- Website 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 user-generated content (UGC). (Bazaarvoice, Conversation Index, Q2 2011).
- Consumer 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 Client Testimonials And Reviews – Online Reputation Management
Adding positive reviews and testimonials to your website from clients who are delighted with your products or services is important for growing your business and creating a solid online reputation.
Reviews and testimonials, however, are like double-edged swords; they can affect your business both positively or negatively.
You see, people may not be saying bad things about your business, products or services directly to your face, but they could post negative words on Facebook, or a forum or discussion group about a bad encounter they’ve just had with one of your sales or customer support 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 engaging in online reputation management practices, such as the process being too complicated or too time-consuming (or the belief that you just don’t need it) could be hurting your business without you even being aware of this.
See this article to learn more about a tool for WordPress users that can help you avoid the escalation of problem reviews about your products through effective customer review management:
How To Create User Testimonials – Useful Tips
Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are effective ways of helping you market your products and services online and should be added to your content. When you quote your own client responses in your content, you:
- Show other users exactly what problems and pains your products and services can help solve for them and how easily it can do this.
- Help your visitors identify and address their objections.
- Help potential customers connect with their motivations and facilitate the sales process.
Below are some tips on creating client testimonials:
- Avoid over-editing: Try using your customer’s actual words as much as you can. Leaving little grammatical errors and misspellings in the content helps keep your testimonials sounding authentic.
- Use photos of real people: Images of people’s faces draw the most attention to your content. Adding photos of your clients next to their testimonials and reviews can help your visitors and potential prospects take notice of your site’s content.
- Tell a story: Stories are much more powerful and captivating than just providing facts and statistics. The ability to present a customer’s horror story and how your solution came to the rescue will make a far longer-lasting impression on those reading your content than using generic statements about excellent customer service and giving “two thumbs up” service recommendations that everyone has heard a “million times” before.
- Use it in context: It’s good to add testimonials in your site copy where it best makes sense to place them, and where they can most effectively help you sell your point. Think about the impact you will have on your visitor’s perception if you were to insert a testimonial about what a “bargain” price your solution can be purchased for before posting pricing information, or testimonials about problems you’ve helped your clients solve before discussing the benefits of your products, or testimonials where clients are truly ecstatic about your support when offering a money-back guarantee or addressing objections.
- Quantify the information: Which of the following statements do you think your prospects would consider to be more powerful… “Since installing XYZ solution, we we were able to grow our bottom line by $27,424 during the last financial quarter,” or “XYZ product has helped us grow our sales?” Whenever possible, publish testimonials containing quantifiable results, like how much your solution helped to increase their profits 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 in a recent period, 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 somewhat difficult when you are just starting out or have very few clients, it’s best to avoid using the same testimonial repeatedly throughout 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 launch discount for existing 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 powerful motivator and influencer. People want to see and buy from “better versions” of themselves, so make sure to include testimonials targeted to your best audience demographic.
- Reprint testimonials across different platforms. If someone publishes fantastic feedback on your Facebook page praising your products or services, send them a message asking for permission to reprint the comment or post on your blog.
- Only use genuine testimonials. Your potential customers need to see that the testimonials provided on your site are real. Don’t compromise your integrity or reputation with a false testimonial.
How To Get Testimonials
Just Ask
Getting a testimonial from a happy customer can be as simple as just asking for it.
Here are some useful tips for soliciting testimonials:
- Make a point of contacting clients after 30 days with an email request for a testimonial if you have not obtained one after completing your service.
- Add a text box for testimonials in your client satisfaction surveys.
- Pull out your phone next time you visit clients or hand over a completed job and if they are delighted with the results, ask them if they wouldn’t mind recording a brief video testimonial/feedback interview. When recording your video, describe to viewers what you have done for your client and make sure to capture the client’s positive reactions and responses.
- Make it easy for them. If a client sends you a positive email thanking you for a great service that contains snippets of useful testimonial material interspersed with the rest of their message, grab the best sections (only use what they have written – never put words into their mouth), and shape these into a testimonial, then contact your client and ask them for permission to use it. Explain that you have done this to save them time and let them know they are completely free to modify what you have written however they see fit before replying with their approval.
Offer To Post A Link Back To The Source Wherever You Quote Their Testimonial
Offer to publish a link to their website in exchange for their testimonial. This is a great incentive to get clients to provide a testimonial. It also makes an implicit statement to visitors that your testimonials are real and can be verified.
Include Testimonial Requests In Your Auto Responder/Newsletter Messages
If you have a subscriber list, include requests for a testimonial in one of your autoresponder mailouts. This should be timed to reach subscribers just after your customers have had a chance to assess the results of using your products or services. Use words like “I need a quick favor” in the subject of your email and make the point of your email or message specifically about asking subscribers to provide honest feedback, a testimonial, or a review of your services.
Use LinkedIn
The LinkedIn “Recommendations” feature allows you to solicit testimonials from other members that become part of your profile. With LinkedIn, the process for requesting and providing recommendations is quite simple and user-friendly and the person who provides the recommendation gets a link to their profile. If you get a positive recommendation on LinkedIn, ask their permission to reprint it on your site (and offer to add a link back to their website in exchange).
Create A Testimonials Page
Create a new page on your site for client testimonials and add a “more customer testimonials …” link to this page throughout your content sections.
Tip: You can measure the effectiveness of your testimonials by how long visitors remain 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 a heatmap analytics software you can add to your website to measure visitor behaviour here:
Testimonial Plugins For WordPress
If your website or blog is built using WordPress, you can use a plugin to add and display testimonials. Some plugins also let you add forms to your pages where users can submit testimonials.
Once your plugin is installed and set up (make sure to provide simple instructions for using the testimonials submission form – if available), all you have to do is send clients to your “Testimonials” page.
Below are some great testimonial plugins you can check out:
Easy Testimonials
Easy Testimonials is an easy-to-use free plugin that lets you add testimonials to the sidebar as a widget, or embed them into your pages and posts using a shortcode. Easy Testimonials also lets you publish a list of all your 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, a logo, etc.
The Easy Testimonials plugin also can be upgraded to a “pro” version with additional features and plugin support.
To download this plugin, visit this site:
Testimonials Widget
Testimonials Widget is a free WordPress plugin that lets you randomly slide or list selected portfolios, reviews, quotes, or text with images or videos on your blog. You can insert user testimonials using a shortcode, theme functions, or widgets with category and tag selections and specify different display options such as random or specific ordering.
The plugin provides a range of additional features via a premium version, including built-in options for better search engine results and technical support.
To download this plugin, go here:
Testimonials WordPress Plugin
This premium WordPress plugin offers a range of great features right out of the box, including:
- Responsive design that resizes for correct display 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 testimonials in a speech bubble, customized font and background colors, font types and more.
Go here to download and use this plugin:
To learn how to add testimonials in WordPress, see the tutorial below:
In Summary …
Testimonials and user reviews are powerful sources of content that help your business add credibility, build authority, improve online reputation, and grow your sales funnel. Always ask for testimonials, reviews, and feedback from your customers or clients, and start publishing these on your website.
Additional Info
The articles below provide useful information about creating engaging customer 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
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