Building Reputation With Testimonials And User Reviews

Martin Aranovitch

3 years ago

Table of Contents

Building Your Reputation With Testimonials And User Reviews

Building Your Reputation With Testimonials And User Reviews

Are you stuck doing what you’ve always done to attract and retain new 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 very hard and frustrating. 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, you just can’t ignore the effect of what potential customers are doing online, especially if they are posting negative comments about your business.

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

You may also be doing your business a great disservice if you don’t spread the positive things your clients say about your services and products. Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are powerful ways of helping you market your products and services online and should be used in your content marketing strategy.

In this article, we’ll show you ways to improve your conversions using awesome user testimonials.

Testimonials And Consumer Reviews

Legendary American businessman and showman Phineas Taylor P.T. Barnum once 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. Genuine testimonials and reviews quoted directly from existing users are far more persuasive for drawing new clients, customers or users than anything you say about your own products or services.

There is clearly an untapped source of opportunities for generating new business that most small businesses simply do not utilize, or utilize correctly … reviews and testimonials from their happy clients!

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

Studies conducted by many leading marketing research firms all lead to the same conclusion: adding testimonials and reviews to your sales information pages helps reduce doubts potential customers may have about a particular product or service, helps users select products and increases sales.

Below are just some of the findings available to support this:

According to research 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, consumer reviews can produce an average 18% uplift in sales and 50 or more user reviews per product can mean a 4.6% increase in conversion rates.
Website visitors who interact with both 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 Consumer Testimonials And Reviews – Online Reputation Management

Adding great reviews and testimonials to your site from very satisfied customers is important for growing your business online and creating a solid online reputation.

Reviews and testimonials, however, can work both ways and impact your business both positively and negatively.

You see, people may not be saying bad things about your business, products or services directly to you, but they could post negative comments on Facebook or a discussion thread about an unpleasant experience they’ve just had using your products 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 vitally important 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 to worry about it) may be causing damage to your business without you even being aware of it.

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

Managing Your Online Reputation With Power Online Reviews

Tips On Improving Your Conversions With Testimonials

Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are persuasive when it comes to helping you market your products and services online and should be included as part of your content marketing strategy. When you quote responses from clients in your content, you:

Show other users exactly what problems and pains your products and services can solve for them and how easily this can be done.
Help visitors identify and address their objections.
Help prospects connect with their motivations and facilitate moving them closer to a decision to purchase.

Here are some practical tips on how to create testimonials:

Don’t over edit: You should try using the actual words used by your customers as much as you can. Leaving grammatical errors and misspelt words in the content helps preserve the authenticity of your testimonials.
Use photos of real people: Marketing studies show that using images of people’s faces will draw the most attention of visitors on a web page. Adding client photos next to their testimonials and reviews will help increase visitor engagement with your site’s content.
Use the power of storytelling: Stories are far more powerful and captivating 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 support 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 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 will have on your visitor’s mind if you were to display a testimonial about what a “bargain” price your solution retails for before posting your product pricing information, or testimonials about problems you’ve helped clients solve before discussing the benefits of your products, or testimonials where customers are genuinely thrilled about your customer service when offering guarantees or providing content designed to help your readers overcome their objections.
Quantify the information: Which of the following statements is more powerful… “Since using your XYZ services, we we were able to grow our revenue by an additional $33,886 during the previous fiscal year,” or “XYZ software has 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 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 throughout your site: Although this can be somewhat difficult when 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 type of business you run, you could try to obtain more client 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 aspire to become can be an extremely 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 content across different platforms. If you get fantastic feedback on your Facebook page praising your commitment to customer satisfaction, send them a message asking for permission to reprint the content on your site.
Only use real testimonials. Most people can see through sites that employ copywriters to write content. Outsourcing content is fine, but prospective clients need to believe that the testimonials displayed on your site are real. Don’t compromise your credibility or reputation with false testimonials.

How To Get Testimonials From Your Customers

Just Ask

If you have just completed performing a service, or a customer says they are really happy with your product or service, ask them for a testimonial.

Follow these useful tips for requesting testimonials from customers:

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 after completing your service.
Add a text box for testimonials in client surveys.
Take out your phone next time you meet with clients or hand over a completed project and if they are delighted with the results, ask them if they wouldn’t mind recording a quick video testimonial/feedback interview. During your video, explain to viewers what you have done for your client and make sure to capture their positive reactions and feedback.
Make it easy for them. Whenever clients send 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 written – never put words into their mouth), and use these to create a testimonial, then contact your client and ask them for permission to quote them on your site. Explain that you have done this to save them time and invite them to modify what you have written however they see fit before replying with their approval.

Offer To Post A Link Back To The Source

Offer to post a link back to their website in exchange for their testimonial. This is often enough of an incentive for clients to provide a testimonial. It also makes the 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 one of your autoresponder broadcasts. This should be timed to reach subscribers just after your clients have had a chance to experience 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 them to provide honest feedback, a testimonial, or a review.

Use LinkedIn

The LinkedIn “Recommendations” feature allows you to obtain testimonials from other members that become part of your account. With LinkedIn, the process for requesting and providing recommendations is user-friendly and the person who provides the recommendation gets a link to their profile. If you get a recommendation on LinkedIn, ask for permission to reprint it on your site (you can offer to publish a link back to their profile in exchange).

Create A Testimonials Section

Create a “Testimonials” page and add a “read more testimonials …” link to your main testimonials section wherever you have added new testimonials on your content sections.

Tip: You can measure how effective user testimonials are by how long visitors remain on the section of your pages or posts where you have added your testimonial content. A great tool for measuring visitor behaviour on your site are “heatmaps”.

We have written an article about a heatmap technology you can add to your site to understand visitor behavior here:

Measuring Visitor Behaviour On Your WordPress Site Using Analytics Software – Heat Map Tracker Review

WordPress Testimonial Plugins

If your website or blog is powered by WordPress, you can use a plugin to add and display testimonials. Some plugins also allow you to add a form to your pages inviting users to submit reviews and testimonials.

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

Check out the testimonial plugins below:

Easy Testimonials

Easy Testimonials is a free WP plugin that lets you add client testimonials to the sidebar as a widget, or embed them into a Page or Post using a shortcode. The plugin also lets you insert a list of all testimonials or output a random testimonial, and include images with testimonials, which is great for adding a photo of the testimonial author, a company logo, etc.

The plugin also comes with a “pro” version that has additional features and plugin support.

To download this plugin, go here:

Easy Testimonials – WordPress Testimonials Plugin

Testimonials Widget

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

Testimonials Widget has plenty of additional features available via a premium version, including built-in functions SEO functionality and plugin support.

To download and use the plugin, visit this site:

Testimonials Widget

Testimonials WordPress Plugin

This premium WP plugin provides 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 sliders, slideshows, grid layout, list layout, etc. by adding 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 colours, font types and more.

Visit this site to download and use the plugin:

Testimonials WordPress Plugin

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

How To Add Testimonials In WordPress

In Summary …

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 feedback, reviews, and testimonials from your clients or customers, and start publishing these on your web site.

Additional Info

The articles below are a great source of information about creating effective testimonials and were helpful in providing research and information for sections of this article:

We also recommend subscribing to our Free Content Marketing Email Training Series. You will receive regular training emails with easy-to-digest information and practical tips that will show exactly how to drive more traffic to your website, save money creating high-quality content for 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 100% FREE!

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