Build Your Reputation With Testimonials And User Reviews
Are you stuck in a cycle of doing what you’ve always done to attract and retain customers, only to get the exact same results? As most business owners know, that trying to generate new customers can be very difficult. Just trying to keep your business afloat takes up a lot of time, money and energy, and sometimes this can feel like it’s just not worth the effort.
In today’s digital, mobile and social-driven economy, ignoring what clients may be saying online about your business could be a costly mistake!
Don’t ignore what consumers may be saying online about your business!
By the same token, you may also be doing your business a disservice if you don’t promote the positive things your customers are saying about your products and services. Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are persuasive ways of helping you market your products and services online and should be added to your content marketing.
In this article, you’ll learn how to convert more visitors into qualified prospects using highly effective client testimonials.
Consumer Reviews And Testimonials
The great, legendary showman and successful promoter P.T. Barnum once said that “Nothing draws a crowd quite like a crowd.”
P.T. Barnum understood the power of “social proof”. Social proof-based content is a powerful way of getting your business promoted effectively. Reviews 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 clearly an untapped source of business growth potential that most businesses simply do not utilize, or utilize correctly … client reviews!
Customer testimonials and user reviews are great for building credibility for your business.
Studies conducted by many leading marketing companies all seem to point to the same conclusion: testimonials and user reviews help reduce doubts potential customers may have about products or solutions that you are trying to sell, help users select products and help increase conversions of visitors into sales.
Here are just some of the statistics available to support this:
- According to a study by eVoc Insights, an organization 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 result in an average 18% uplift in sales and 50 or more reviews per product can translate into a 4.6% increase in conversion rates.
- Site visitors who interact with both customer 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 Testimonials And Reviews – Online Reputation Management
Adding reviews and testimonials to your website from existing clients is important for helping you grow your business online and creating a solid online reputation.
Reviews and testimonials, however, can work both ways and impact your business both negative and positive ways.
You see, people may not be saying bad things about your business, products or services directly to your face, but they could be posting negative comments on Facebook, or a discussion thread or forum about an unpleasant experience they’ve just had with your services and this could be costing you business.
This is where online reputation management becomes important to your business success.
Misconceptions about managing your reputation online, such as the process being too complicated or too time-consuming (or the belief that you just don’t need to worry about it) may be causing damage to your business without you even realizing this.
See this article to learn more about a simple tool for WordPress users that can help you avoid the escalation of negative reviews about your products through effective user review management:
How To Create Client Testimonials – Useful Tips
Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are powerful when it comes to helping you market your products and services online and should be used in your content marketing strategy. When you quote your own customer responses in your content, you:
- Show others exactly what pains and problems your products and services can solve for them and how easily it can do this.
- Help prospects identify and address their objections.
- Help prospects connect with their motivations and facilitate moving them closer to a decision to purchase.
Below are some tips on improving your sales with testimonials:
- Avoid over-editing: You should try to use your customer’s actual words as much as you can. Leaving grammatical errors and misspelled words in the content helps to keep it ‘real’.
- Use real photos: 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 your visitors and potential prospects take notice of your site’s content.
- Use the power of storytelling: Stories are so much more powerful and memorable than simply providing statistical facts. The ability to present a customer’s horror story and how your solution saved the day will make a far longer-lasting impression on those reading your content than using generic 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: Add testimonials to your web content where it best makes 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 present a testimonial about what a “bargain” price your solution sells for before posting your service pricing information, or testimonials about problems you’ve helped clients solve before discussing the benefits of your services, or testimonials where customers are genuinely thrilled about your customer service when offering a money-back guarantee or addressing objections.
- Quantify your information: Which of the following statements do you think is more powerful: “Since using your services, we were able to increase our profits by an additional $92,558 in the previous fiscal year,” or “XYZ solution definitely helped us grow our sales?” Whenever possible, publish testimonials containing quantifiable results, like how much your solution helped to increase their market share or reduce their costs by in specific percentages or amounts, how many hours 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.
- Use different client testimonials throughout your site: Although this can be somewhat difficult if you are just starting out or don’t have many 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 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 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 targeted to your best audience demographic.
- Reprint content across different platforms. If you get fantastic feedback on your Facebook page praising your commitment to customer satisfaction, ask them permission to reprint the content on your site.
- Only use real testimonials. Most people can tell if you are employing copy writers to produce your content. Outsourcing content is fine, but prospective clients need to see that the testimonials published on your site are real. Don’t compromise your integrity with a ”made up” testimonial.
How To Get Testimonials From Clients
Just Ask
Getting a testimonial from a happy client can be as simple as just asking for it.
Follow these useful guidelines for soliciting testimonials from your clients:
- Contact clients after a specific period of time, e.g. 90 days with an email reminder for a testimonial if you did not obtain one after performing a service.
- Include a field for testimonials in all client surveys.
- Pull out your phone next time you meet with a client or hand over a finished project and if they are delighted with the results, ask them if they wouldn’t mind recording a very quick video testimonial/feedback interview. While recording your video, describe to viewers what you have done for the client and make sure to capture their positive reactions and feedback.
- Make it easy and write it for them. When 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 given you – don’t put words into their mouth), and use these to create 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 save them time and invite them to change what you have written however they like before replying with their approval.
Offer To Post A Link Back To Their Site Wherever You Quote Their Testimonial
Offer to publish a link back to their site in exchange for their testimonial. This is a great 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.
Include A Testimonial Request In Your Auto Responder/Newsletter Messages
If you have a subscriber list, include requests for a testimonial in a periodic auto responder message. Preferably, this should be timed to reach subscribers just after your customers have had a chance to assess the results of using your 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 customers for honest feedback, a testimonial, or a product review.
Use LinkedIn
The LinkedIn “Recommendations” feature lets you obtain testimonials from other members 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 receives a link to their profile. If you get a recommendation on LinkedIn, ask their permission to reprint it on your website (and offer to add a link back to their profile in exchange).
Create A Testimonials Section
Create a new page for testimonials and add a “read more client testimonials …” link pointing to this page whenever you have added small blocks of testimonials on your site.
Useful Tip: You can measure the effectiveness of your customer testimonials by how long visitors remain on the section of your pages or posts where you have added the testimonial content. ”Heatmapping” technology is a great way to measuring what visitors are doing on your pages.
We have written an article about a heatmap analytics software you can add to your sites to predict visitor behaviour here:
Testimonial Plugins For WordPress
If your site 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 inviting users to submit reviews and 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 customers to your “Testimonials” page.
Below are a few useful plugins you can check out:
Easy Testimonials
Easy Testimonials is an easy-to-use free plugin that lets you add customer testimonials to the sidebar as a widget, or embed testimonials into posts and pages using a shortcode. The plugin also lets you insert a list of all testimonials or output a random testimonial, and include an image with each testimonial, which is great for adding a photo of the testimonial author, their logo, etc.
The Easy Testimonials plugin also provides a “pro” version with additional features and technical support.
Go here to download and use the 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 site. You can insert user 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 makes loads of additional features available via a premium version, including built-in functions for better search engine results and technical support.
To download the plugin, visit this site:
Testimonials WordPress Plugin
This is a premium plugin that provides 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, list layout, grid layout, etc. using a shortcode
- Styling options (display image at the top, bottom, or side of testimonials, display testimonials in a speech bubble, customize font and background colours, font types and more.
Go here to download the plugin:
To learn how to add testimonials in WordPress, see the tutorial below:
In Conclusion …
Customer reviews and testimonials are powerful sources of content that 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, and start publishing these on your website.
Resources
The articles below provide useful information on creating engaging testimonials and were used when researching 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 that will teach exactly how to drive more traffic to your web site, save money creating high-quality content for your 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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