Building Your Reputation With User Testimonials And Reviews

Are you stuck in a cycle of doing what you’ve always done to attract and retain new customers, only to get the exact same results? As most small business owners know, that generating new customers can be extremely hard, confusing and frustrating. 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 online and social media-driven economy, ignoring what clients may be saying online about your business could be a costly mistake!

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 great disservice if you don’t publish the positive things your customers are saying about your solutions, user training, support, etc. Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are powerful ways of helping you market your products and services online and should be included as part of your content marketing.

In this article, you’ll discover tips for creating better results online with compelling customer testimonials.

Testimonials And Customer Reviews

P.T. Barnum, the great American showman and businessman, once 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. Quoting genuine testimonials and reviews from satisfied customers is satisfied clients are far more persuasive when it comes to drawing new customers than anything you can say about your own products or services.

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

Customer testimonials and reviews are terrific for building credibility for your services and products.

Studies conducted by marketing companies all point to the same conclusion: adding reviews and customer testimonials to your sales information eliminates doubts potential customers may have about purchasing your product, helps with product selection and increases sales conversions.

Below are just some findings 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, consumer reviews play a significant role in creating an average 18% uplift in sales and 50 or more consumer reviews per product can mean a 4.6% increase in conversion rates.
• 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).
• 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).

(Source: eConsultancy.com)

Adding User Testimonials And Reviews – Online Reputation Management

Clearly, you should be adding positive reviews from existing clients to your website.

Customer testimonials and reviews, 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 business, products or services directly to your face, but they could post disparaging remarks 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 costing you business.

This is where online reputation management becomes 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 to worry about it) could be seriously causing damage to 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 customer reviews:

• Manage Your Online Reputation Easily With Power Online Reviews

Tips On Improving Your Conversions With Engaging Testimonials

User reviews, testimonials, and case studies are powerful ways of helping you promote and market your products and services online and should be included in your content. When you quote your own client responses in your content, you:

• Show others exactly what pains and problems your products and services can help to solve for them and how easily it can do this.
• Help your visitors identify their objections and address these.
• Help potential customers connect with their motivations and facilitate the sales process.

Here are some tips on improving your sales with knockout client testimonials:

• Avoid over-editing: Try using your customer’s actual words as much as you can. Leaving grammatical errors and misspellings in the content helps preserve the authenticity of your testimonials.
• Use photos: Images of people’s faces draw the most attention to your content. Adding client photos next to their testimonials and reviews will help increase visitor engagement with your site’s content.
• Tell a story: Stories are so much more powerful and captivating than just providing statistical facts. The ability to present a customer’s horror story and how your solution saved the day will make a more lasting impression on those reading your content than using generic statements about excellent customer service and giving “two thumbs up” product 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 makes the most sense to place them, and where you believe these can most effectively help to 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 can be purchased for before posting pricing information, or testimonials about problems you’ve helped clients solve before presenting the benefits of your services, or testimonials where customers are genuinely ecstatic about your support when offering guarantees or providing content designed to help readers overcome their objections.
• Quantify your information: Which of the following statements do you think is more powerful: “As a direct result of implementing XYZ solution, we were able to increase our revenue by $30,425 in the previous financial quarter,” 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 of work you have helped them save, 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.
• Vary the customer testimonials throughout your site: Although this can be somewhat difficult if you are just starting out or don’t have many clients, try to avoid displaying the same testimonial repeatedly throughout your site. Depending on the nature of your business, you could try to obtain more client 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 choose to use it.
• Appeal to your target audience: 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 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 targeted to your best audience demographic.
• Reprint testimonials across different platforms. If you get fantastic feedback on your Facebook wall praising your customer service, contact them privately asking for their permission to reprint the content on your site.
• Don’t use fake testimonials. Your potential clients need to believe that the testimonials published on your site are real. Don’t compromise your credibility with false testimonials.

How To Get Customer Testimonials

Just Ask

Getting a testimonial from a happy customer can be as simple as just asking for it.

Here are some tips for requesting testimonials:

• Contact customers after 60 days with an email request for a testimonial if you have not obtained one immediately after completing a service.
• Add a field for testimonials in all your client satisfaction surveys.
• Take out your phone when you next meet with clients or hand over a completed job and if they are delighted with your services, ask them if they wouldn’t mind recording a very quick video testimonial/feedback interview. While recording your video, explain to your viewers what you have done for the client and try to capture their positive reactions and feedback.
• Make it easy and write the testimonial for them. If 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 already prepared something to help them save time and let them know they are completely free to change 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 site in exchange for their testimonial. This is often enough of an incentive to get clients providing 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 subscriber list, include a request for a testimonial in one of your autoresponder messages. Preferably, this should be timed to reach subscribers just after your customers have had a chance to use your products or services. 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 users to provide honest feedback, a testimonial, or a review of your services.

Use LinkedIn

The LinkedIn “Recommendations” feature lets you request testimonials for your profile. The process for requesting and providing recommendations is quite user-friendly and the person providing the recommendation receives a link to their profile. If you get a positive recommendation on LinkedIn, ask their permission to reprint it on your website (you can offer to add a link back to their profile in exchange).

Create A Customer Testimonials Page

Create a “Testimonials” page and add a “read more client testimonials …” link to this page throughout your site.

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

We have written an article about adding heatmaps to your site to monitor visitor behavior here:

• Monitoring Visitor Behavior On Your WordPress Site Using Analytics Software – Heat Map Tracker Review

WordPress Testimonial Plugins

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

Once your testimonial plugin is installed and set up (remember to provide simple instructions for adding testimonials via the submission form – if available), you then refer users to your “Testimonials” section.

Here are some testimonial plugins you can check out:

Easy Testimonials

Easy Testimonials is a free WordPress plugin that lets you add customer testimonials to your sidebar as a widget, or embed them into your pages and posts using a shortcode. The Easy Testimonials plugin also lets you publish a list of all your testimonials or output a random testimonial, and include images with testimonials, which you can use to add a photo of the testimonial author, their logo, etc.

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

To learn more about using the plugin, visit this site:

• Easy Testimonials – WordPress Plugin

Testimonials Widget

Testimonials Widget is a free WP plugin that lets you add random or selected portfolios, reviews, quotes, or text with images or videos on your website. You can insert testimonials content 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 makes loads more features available via a premium version, including built-in functions SEO functionality and developer support.

To download this plugin, visit this site:

• Testimonials Widget

Testimonials WordPress Plugin

This premium WP plugin provides a range 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 slideshows, sliders, grid layout, list layout, etc. by adding a shortcode
• Styling options (display image on top, bottom, or side of the testimonial, display testimonial in a speech bubble, customized font and background colours, font types and more.

For more information about the plugin, visit this site:

• Testimonials WordPress Plugin

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

• How To Add Testimonials In WordPress

In Summary …

User reviews and client testimonials are great 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 website or blog.

Additional Info

For additional information about creating engaging clients testimonials read 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 website, save money creating useful content for your visitors and grow your business online using content. It’s not only a great course with loads of useful information, it’s also completely FREE!

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