Build Your Reputation With User Testimonials And Reviews
Are you stuck in a cycle of doing what you’ve always done to attract new customers, only to get the exact same results? As most small business owners know, that trying to generate new customers can be confusing, frustrating and difficult. Just trying to remain in business takes 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, you just can’t ignore the impact of what potential customers are doing online, especially if they are posting comments about your business.
Don’t ignore what consumers may be saying online about your business!
You may also be doing your business a great disservice if you are not spreading the positive things your customers are saying about your products, services, customer training, 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 included as part of your content.
In this article, you’ll discover tips for turning more visitors into qualified leads with powerful customer testimonials.
Customer Reviews
Legendary showman and successful promoter P.T. Barnum once stated 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 and effective way of promoting your business. Testimonials from your existing users are far more persuasive for drawing new customers than anything you can 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 your previous clients!
Customer testimonials and reviews are a great way to build credibility for your business.
Marketing studies conducted by leading research companies all lead to the same inevitable conclusion: user reviews and testimonials help reduce doubts potential customers may have about buying your product, help users select products and increases the number of product sales.
Here are just some of the findings 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, 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 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 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
Adding positive reviews to your website from clients is essential for creating a solid online business reputation.
Customer testimonials and customer reviews, however, are like double-edged swords; they can impact your business both in a negative as well as positive way.
People may not be saying bad things about your products directly to you, but they could post unhelpful feedback on a forum about an unpleasant experience they’ve just had with your services 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 a vitally important aspect of your 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 harming your business without you even being aware of it.
See this article to learn more about a WordPress plugin that can help you avoid the escalation of negative reviews about your products through effective customer review management:
Improving Your Sales With Awesome Testimonials – Useful Tips
User reviews, testimonials, and case studies are powerful ways of helping you market your products and services online and should be included in your content marketing. When you quote responses from users in your content, you:
- Show potential customers exactly what pains and problems your products and services can solve for them and how easily it can do this.
- Help visitors identify their objections and address these.
- Help prospects connect with their aspirations and motivations and facilitate moving them closer to a buying decision.
Here are some tips on how to create compelling client testimonials:
- Avoid over-editing: You should try to use the actual words used by your customers as much as you can. Leave grammatical or spelling errors in the content. This helps keep your testimonials ‘real’.
- Use photos of real people: Images of people’s faces draw 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 content.
- Use the power of storytelling: Stories are much more effective 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 longer-lasting impression on those reading your content than using generalized statements about how “excellent” the customer support was and giving “two thumbs up” product recommendations that everyone has heard a “million times” before.
- Use it in context: Add testimonials in your site copy where it makes the most sense to place them, and where they can most effectively help sell your point. Think about the impact you will have on your visitor’s perception by adding a testimonial about what a “bargain” price your solution retails for before posting pricing information, or testimonials about problems you’ve helped your clients solve before presenting the benefits of your services, or testimonials where clients are genuinely thrilled about your support when offering guarantees or addressing objections.
- Quantify your information: Which of the following statements is more powerful: “XYZ solution was directly responsible for growing our profits by $89,122 during the previous fiscal year,” or “XYZ solution helped us grow our business?” Whenever possible, publish testimonials containing quantifiable data, like how much your solution helped to increase their market share 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, what kind of things are they able to do or experience now that they couldn’t do before, etc.
- Avoid using the same customer testimonial throughout your site: Although this can be a little difficult if you are just starting out or don’t have many clients, try to avoid displaying the same testimonial repeatedly throughout your website. Depending on the type of business you run, you could try to obtain more testimonials by offering limited review copies of your product, or a special launch discount for clients in exchange for an honest review and permission to publish it if you decide 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 ideal customer is, providing testimonials from people who your prospects aspire to become is 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 ideal customers.
- Reprint content across different platforms. If you get a great comment on your Facebook wall praising your business, ask them permission to reprint the comment or post on your blog.
- Only use genuine testimonials. Your potential customers need to believe that the testimonials you provide on your site are real. Don’t destroy your credibility with a false testimonial.
How To Get Customer Testimonials
Ask For Testimonials
When you complete performing a service, or a customer says they are really happy with your product or service, ask them for a testimonial.
Follow these tips for requesting testimonials from your clients:
- Make a point of contacting clients after a specific period of time, e.g. 30 days with an email reminder for a testimonial if you have not obtained one after completing a service.
- Include a field for testimonials in all your client surveys.
- Pull out your phone next time you meet with a client or hand over a completed job and if they are delighted with the results, ask them if they would be happy to record a very brief video testimonial/feedback interview. While recording the video, describe to viewers what you have done for the client and record their positive reactions and feedback.
- Make it easy and write it for them. Whenever a client sends 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 written – don’t 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 save them time and invite them to edit what you have written however they like before replying with their approval.
Offer To Post A Link Back To The Source Wherever You Publish Their Testimonial
Offer to add a link to their website in exchange for their testimonial. This is often enough of an incentive to get clients to provide you with a testimonial. It also makes the implicit statement to visitors that your testimonials are real and can be verified.
Add Testimonial Requests To Your Auto Responder/Newsletter Messages
If you have a list of subscribers, include a request for a testimonial in one of your newsletter broadcasts. Preferably, this should be timed to reach subscribers just after your customers have had a chance to experience your products or services. Use words like “I need a quick favor” in your email subject and make the point of your email or message specifically about asking subscribers to provide feedback, a testimonial, or a product review.
Use LinkedIn
The LinkedIn “Recommendations” feature lets you request testimonials for your account. 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 recommendation on LinkedIn, ask their permission to reprint it on your website (you can offer to publish a link back to their website or profile in exchange).
Create A Testimonials Section
Create a new page for testimonials and add a “more customer testimonials …” link to this page throughout your content sections.
Practical Tip: You can measure how effective client testimonials are 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 monitoring what visitors are doing on your pages.
We have written an article about a heatmap analytics software you can add to your site to monitor visitor behaviour here:
Using WordPress Testimonial Plugins
If your site or blog is built using 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 (make sure to provide simple instructions for adding testimonials via the submission form – if available), you then send clients to your “Testimonials” page.
Below are a few useful plugins you can check out:
Easy Testimonials
Easy Testimonials is a free plugin that lets you add customer testimonials to your sidebar as a widget, or embed testimonials into a Page or Post using a shortcode. The plugin also lets you add 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, a logo, etc.
Easy Testimonials also provides a “pro” version with additional features and developer support.
Visit this site to download and use the plugin:
Testimonials Widget
Testimonials Widget is a free WP plugin that lets you randomly slide or list selected portfolios, quotes, reviews, or text with videos or images on your posts and pages. You can insert testimonials via 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 more features available via a premium version, including built-in functions SEO functionality and plugin support.
Go here to download and use the plugin:
Testimonials WordPress Plugin
This is a premium WP plugin that offers many great features right out of the box, including:
- Responsive design that resizes to display correctly on any device or browser.
- Options to display your testimonials in a widget or as sliders, slideshows, list layout, grid 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.
Go here to download and use 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 add credibility, build authority, improve online reputation, and grow your sales funnel. Always ask for testimonials, reviews, and feedback from existing customers or clients, and start publishing these on your website or blog.
Additional Info
The articles below are a great source of information on creating engaging 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
We also recommend subscribing to our Free Content Marketing Email Training Series. You will receive regular training emails with easy-to-digest information that will teach exactly 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 100% FREE!
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