Build Your Reputation With User Testimonials And Reviews
Are you stuck doing what you’ve always done to attract new customers, and getting the exact same disappointing results? Most business owners don’t need to be told that trying to generate new business can be extremely hard and confusing. Just trying to remain in business 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 economy, ignoring what your customers may be saying online about your business could be a costly mistake!
Ignoring what consumers may be saying online about your business could be a costly mistake!
By the same token, you could be doing your business a disservice if you don’t promote the positive things your clients say about your solutions, user support, etc. 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 added throughout your content.
In this article, we’ll show you how to achieve better results online with profit-boosting user testimonials.
Customer Reviews And Testimonials
P.T. Barnum, the great American showman, is often quoted as having stated that “Nothing draws a crowd quite like a crowd.”
P.T. Barnum obviously understood the power of “social proof”. Social proof-driven content is a powerful and effective way of promoting your business. Testimonials from existing users are far more persuasive when it comes to drawing new customers, clients or users than anything you have to say about your own products or services.
There is a source of untapped opportunities for generating new business that most small businesses just aren’t utilizing, or utilizing correctly … testimonials and reviews from your happy customers!
Consumer reviews and testimonials are effective for building credibility for your business.
Research conducted by many marketing firms all seem to point to the same conclusion: adding testimonials and user reviews to your sales information helps reduce doubts potential customers may have about buying a product, helps users select products and helps increase conversions of visitors into sales.
Here are just some statistics 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 consumer reviews.”
- According to Reevoo.com, customer reviews produce an average 18% uplift in sales and 50 or more reviews per product can result in 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).
- 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).
(The figures above were sourced from eConsultancy.com)
Adding Client Reviews – Managing Online Reputation
Clearly, you should be adding great reviews from happy customers to your site.
Customer testimonials and consumer reviews, however, are like double-edged swords; they can impact your business both in a negative and positive manner.
You see, people may not be saying bad things about your business, products or services directly to your face, but they could post damaging comments 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 vitally important to your success.
Misconceptions about online reputation management, such as being too complicated or too time-consuming (or the belief that you just don’t need it) may be harming 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 negative reviews about your services through effective user review management:
Tips For Creating Effective Testimonials
Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are persuasive ways of helping you market and promote your products and services online and should be an integral part of your content marketing. When you quote your own user responses in your content, you:
- Show potential customers exactly with similar problems and pains how your products and services can help them.
- Help your visitors identify and address their objections.
- Help prospects connect with their motivations and facilitate moving them further along the sales process.
Here are some practical tips on improving your sales with captivating testimonials:
- Avoid over-editing: Try to use the actual words used by your customers as much as possible. Leave grammatical or spelling errors in the content. This helps keep your testimonials ‘real’.
- Use photos of real people: Research shows that using images of people’s faces will draw the attention of visitors on a web page. Adding client photos next to their testimonials and reviews will help your visitors and potential prospects take notice of your site’s content.
- Use the power of storytelling: Stories are far more effective and memorable than providing mere facts and statistics. Being able to present a customer’s horror story and how your solution came to the rescue will make a far more lasting impression on those reading your content than presenting generic statements about excellent service and giving “two thumbs up” product recommendations that all of us have heard a “million times” before.
- Use it in context: Add customer 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. 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 retails for before posting product pricing information, or testimonials about problems you’ve helped your clients solve before talking about the benefits of your services, or testimonials where clients are genuinely thrilled about your customer service when offering a risk-free guarantee or addressing objections.
- Quantify your information: Which of the following statements do you think your prospects would find more powerful… “Since installing your XYZ software, our net profits have grown by an additional $15,569 during the last financial quarter,” or “XYZ product definitely helped us grow our sales?” Whenever possible, ask clients to specify quantifiable results when submitting testimonials, 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 in a recent financial quarter, what kind of things are they able to do or experience now that they couldn’t do before, etc.
- Use different customer testimonials on your site: Although this can be somewhat difficult when you are just starting out and have very few clients, it’s best to avoid using the same testimonial repeatedly throughout your site. Depending on the type of business you run, you could try to obtain more user 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 can be a really powerful motivator and influencer. People want to see and buy from “better versions” of themselves, so make sure to include testimonials that speak directly to your ideal customers.
- Reprint content across different platforms. If you get a great comment on your Facebook page praising your commitment to customer satisfaction, contact them privately asking for their permission to reprint the comment or post on your site.
- Only use genuine client testimonials. Your prospects need to see that the testimonials displayed on your site are genuine. Don’t destroy your credibility with ”made up” testimonials.
How To Get Client Testimonials
Just Ask
Getting a testimonial from a satisfied client can be as simple as just asking for it.
Follow these useful tips for soliciting testimonials:
- Contact your customers after 30 days with an email reminder for a testimonial if you did not obtain one after completing your service.
- Include a text box for testimonials in your client surveys.
- Take out your phone next time you visit clients or hand over a completed project and if they are delighted with your services, ask them if they would be happy to record a very brief video testimonial/feedback interview. During your video, describe to your viewers what you have done for your client and capture their positive reactions and responses.
- Make it easy and write it for them. When 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 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 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 to their site in exchange for their testimonial. This is a great incentive for 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 A Testimonial Request To Your Auto Responder/Newsletter Messages
If you have a subscriber list, include a request for a testimonial in a periodic newsletter broadcast. This should be timed to reach subscribers just after your clients have had a chance to assess the impact of using your products. Use words like “I need your help” in your email subject and make the point of your email or message specifically about asking customers for feedback, a testimonial, or a review.
Use LinkedIn
The LinkedIn “Recommendations” feature helps you solicit testimonials from other members for your profile. The process for requesting and providing recommendations is user-friendly and the person providing the recommendation receives a link to their profile. If you get a positive recommendation on LinkedIn, ask for permission to reprint it on your website (once again, you can offer to publish a link back to their website or profile in exchange).
Create A Client Testimonials Page On Your Site
Create a new section for testimonials and add a “more customer testimonials …” link to this section throughout your site.
Useful 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 the testimonial content. A great tool for measuring 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 observe visitor behavior here:
Testimonial Plugins For WordPress
If your website or blog is powered by WordPress, you can use a plugin to display testimonials. Some plugins also let you add forms to your pages where users can submit reviews 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), all you have to do is send users to your “Testimonials” page.
Check out the testimonial plugins below:
Easy Testimonials
Easy Testimonials is a free plugin that lets you add testimonials to the sidebar as a widget, or embed testimonials into posts and pages using a shortcode. The Easy Testimonials plugin also lets you add a list of all your 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 company logo, etc.
Easy Testimonials also comes with a “pro” version with additional features and technical support.
To download this plugin, visit this site:
Testimonials Widget
Testimonials Widget is a free plugin that lets you randomly slide or list selected portfolios, quotes, reviews, or text with images or videos on your 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 plugin comes with additional features via a premium version, including built-in options SEO functionality and technical support.
Visit this site to learn more about the plugin:
Testimonials WordPress Plugin
This is a premium WP plugin that provides plenty of great features right out of the box, including:
- Responsive design that resizes for correct display on any device or browser.
- Display your testimonials in a widget or as sliders, slideshows, grid layout, list layout, etc. via a shortcode
- Styling options (display image on 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 for more information about the plugin:
To learn how to add testimonials in WordPress, see the tutorial below:
In Conclusion …
Client testimonials and customer reviews are powerful 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 customers or clients, and start publishing these on your website.
Additional Info
For additional information on creating effective testimonials see 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 regular training emails with actionable information and practical tips that will teach you how to drive more traffic to your site, save money creating useful content that will add value to 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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