Building Your Reputation With User Testimonials And Reviews
Are you stuck doing what you’ve always done to attract customers, only to get the exact same disappointing results? As most small business owners know, that trying to generate new business can be confusing, frustrating and quite hard. Just trying to stay in business 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, it’s a mistake to ignore the impact of online consumer behavior, especially if they are posting negative comments about your business.
Don’t ignore what users may be saying online about your business!
You may also be doing your business a disservice if you don’t spread the positive things your clients say about your products, solutions, customer support, training, etc. Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are effective when it comes to marketing your products and services online and should be an integral part of your content.
In this article, you’ll learn ways to achieve better results online with knockout client testimonials.
Client Reviews And Testimonials
Phineas Taylor (Aka “P.T.”) Barnum, legendary showman and successful promoter, is often quoted as having said 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 way of getting your business promoted effectively. Quoting testimonials from satisfied users is satisfied customers are far more persuasive for attracting new clients than anything you have to say about your own products or services.
There is a source of untapped business growth potential that most businesses just aren’t utilizing, or utilizing correctly … testimonials and reviews from their clients!
Testimonials and reviews are a great way to build credibility for your business.
Research conducted by many leading marketing research companies all lead to the same inevitable conclusion: adding customer testimonials and reviews to your sales information pages decreases doubts potential customers may have about specific products or services, helps with product selection and increases the number of sales.
Here are just some findings that support this:
- According to a study by eVoc Insights, a company known for researching and measuring user experience, “In general, 63% of users indicate they are more likely to purchase from a web site if it has ratings and reviews.”
- According to Reevoo.com, user reviews can result in an average 18% uplift in sales and 50 or more customer reviews per product can result in a 4.6% increase in conversion rates.
- Web 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 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).
(Source: eConsultancy.com)
Adding Customer Reviews – Online Reputation Management
You should be adding great reviews from satisfied customers to your website.
Customer testimonials and customer reviews, however, are like double-edged swords; they can impact your business both positive and negative ways.
People may not be saying bad things about your services directly to you, but they could be posting negative comments on a discussion group about a bad encounter they’ve just had with one of your representatives and this could be costing you business.
This is where online reputation management becomes a vital aspect of your success.
Misconceptions about managing your reputation online, such as being too complicated or too time-consuming (or the belief that you just don’t need it) could 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 problem reviews about your products through effective user review management:
Improving Your Sales With Knockout Client Testimonials – Useful Tips
User reviews, testimonials, and case studies are persuasive ways of marketing your products and services online and should be included as part of your content. When you quote responses from customers in your content, you:
- Show prospects exactly with similar problems and pains what your products and services can do for them.
- Help visitors identify their objections and address these.
- Help potential customers connect with their aspirations and motivations and facilitate the sales process.
Below are some tips on creating standout customer testimonials:
- Don’t over edit: Try using your customer’s actual words as much as possible. Leave little grammatical or spelling errors in the content. This helps to keep things ‘real’.
- Use photos: Images of people’s faces draw the most 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.
- Tell a powerful story: Stories are much more powerful and captivating than providing mere 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 how “excellent” the support has been and giving “two thumbs up” product recommendations that everyone has heard a “million times” before.
- Use 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 you believe these can most effectively help sell your point. For example, think about the impact you will have on your visitor’s mind by adding a testimonial about what a “bargain” price your solution retails for before posting your pricing information, or testimonials about problems you’ve helped your clients solve before discussing the benefits of your services, or testimonials where customers are truly thrilled about your support when offering a money-back guarantee or providing content that helps readers overcome their objections.
- Quantify the information: Which of the following statements is more powerful: “XYZ solution was directly responsible for increasing our profits by $53,223 in the last financial quarter,” or “XYZ software has helped us grow our sales?” If 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 period, 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 repeatedly throughout your site: Although this can be a little difficult if you are just starting out and don’t have many clients, try to avoid displaying the same testimonial 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 discount for clients in exchange for an honest review and permission to publish it if you decide 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 ideal customer is, providing testimonials from people who your prospects aspire to become 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 ideal customers.
- Reprint across different platforms. If someone posts fantastic feedback on your Facebook page praising your customer service, send them a message asking for permission to reprint the content on your blog.
- Never use fake testimonials. Many people can tell if you are employing professional writers to produce your content. Outsourcing content is fine, but prospective customers need to see that the testimonials displayed on your site are genuine. Don’t compromise your integrity or reputation with ”made up” testimonials.
How To Get Testimonials
Always Ask For Testimonials
Getting a testimonial from a happy customer can be as simple as just asking for it.
Follow these useful tips for soliciting testimonials from your clients:
- Contact your customers after 14 days with an email reminder for a testimonial if you did not obtain one immediately after completing your service.
- Add a text box for entering testimonials in client satisfaction surveys.
- Take out your phone when you next 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 brief video testimonial/feedback interview. While recording your video, describe to viewers what you have done for your client and try to capture your client’s 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 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 your client and ask them for permission to quote them on your site. Explain that you have done this to save them time and let them know they are completely free to edit what you have written however they see fit before replying with their approval.
Offer To Post A Link To The Source
Offer to add a link back to their site in exchange for their testimonial. This is often enough of an incentive to get clients providing 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 one of your autoresponder broadcasts. This should be done after your customers have had a chance to use 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 for honest feedback, a testimonial, or a review.
Use LinkedIn
The LinkedIn “Recommendations” feature helps you solicit 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 (once again, you can offer to add a link back to their website or profile in exchange).
Create A Customer Testimonials Page
Create a new page for customer testimonials and place a “read more customer testimonials …” link pointing to this section throughout your site.
Useful Tip: You can measure how effective customer testimonials are by how long visitors stay on the section of your pages or posts where you have added your testimonial content. ”Heatmapping” technology is a great way to monitoring what visitors are doing on your pages.
We have written an article about adding heatmap analytics to your website to measure visitor behavior here:
Testimonial Plugins For WordPress
If your website or blog is powered by WordPress, you can use a plugin to add, edit and display testimonials. Some plugins also let you add forms to your pages inviting users to submit feedback and 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), all you have to do is send clients to your “Testimonials” page.
Check out the plugins below:
Easy Testimonials
Easy Testimonials is a free WP plugin that lets you add testimonials to your sidebar as a widget, or embed them into a Page or Post using a shortcode. The Easy Testimonials plugin also lets you publish a list of all testimonials or output a random testimonial, and include images with testimonials, which can be used to add a photo of the testimonial author, a business logo, etc.
The Easy Testimonials plugin also provides users with a “pro” version that has additional features and technical support.
Visit this site to download and use this plugin:
Testimonials Widget
Testimonials Widget is a free plugin that lets you add random or selected portfolios, reviews, quotes, or text with videos or images on your blog. You can insert customer 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 loads of additional features available via a premium version, including built-in functions for better search engine results and technical support.
To download and use the plugin, go here:
Testimonials WordPress Plugin
This is a premium WordPress plugin that offers plenty of great features right out of the box, including:
- Responsive design that resizes to display correctly on any device or browser.
- Display your testimonials in a widget or as sliders, slideshows, list layout, grid layout, etc. using a shortcode
- Styling options (display image on top, bottom, or side of the testimonial, display testimonials in a speech bubble, customized font and background colors, font types and more.
To download this plugin, visit this site:
To learn how to add testimonials in WordPress, see the tutorial below:
In Summary …
Client testimonials and customer reviews 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 your customers or clients, and publish positive content about your business on your site.
Additional Info
For additional sources of information and resources about creating engaging 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 easy-to-digest information and practical tips that will teach you how to drive more traffic to your web site, save money creating high-quality content that will add value to your site visitors and grow your business online using content marketing strategies. It’s not only a great course with loads of useful information, it’s also 100% FREE!
***
***
"I was absolutely amazed at the scope and breadth of these tutorials! The most in-depth training I have ever received on any subject!" - Myke O'Neill, DailyGreenPost.com