Build Your Reputation With Testimonials And User Reviews
Are you stuck doing what you’ve always done to attract new customers, and getting the exact same results? Most small business owners don’t need to be told that trying to generate new business can be quite hard. 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 and social-driven economy, ignoring what clients may be saying online about your business could be a costly mistake!
Ignoring what your clients may be saying online about your business could be a costly mistake!
By the same token, you may also be doing your business a great disservice if you don’t promote the positive things your customers are saying about your products or services. Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are persuasive when it comes to helping you market and promote your products and services online and should be an integral part of your content.
In this article, you’ll discover how to turn more visitors into prospects with compelling client testimonials.
User Reviews And Testimonials
Phineas Taylor (Aka “P.T.”) Barnum, legendary showman, 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. Genuine testimonials from your satisfied users are far more persuasive for attracting new clients than anything you can say about your own products or services.
There is an untapped source of business growth potential that most small businesses just aren’t utilizing, or utilizing correctly … client reviews!
Testimonials and reviews are fantastic for building credibility for your services and products.
Marketing studies conducted by leading research companies all point to the same inevitable conclusion: adding reviews and customer testimonials to your sales pages decreases doubts potential customers may have about purchasing a certain product, helps with product selection and increases the number of product sales.
Here are just some statistics that support this:
- According to research 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 site if it has ratings and user reviews.”
- According to Reevoo.com, consumer reviews play a significant role in creating an average 18% uplift in sales and 50 or more customer reviews per product can translate into a 4.6% increase in conversion rates.
- Site visitors who interact with both 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).
(Above figures sourced from eConsultancy.com)
Adding Client Testimonials And Reviews – Managing Online Reputation
Clearly, you should be adding great testimonials and reviews from happy clients to your website.
Reviews and testimonials, however, can work both ways and impact your business both in a negative or positive manner.
People may not be saying bad things about your services directly to you, but they could have posted negative comments on Facebook, or a discussion thread or forum about a bad experience they’ve just had with your business 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 vitally important to your online business success.
Misconceptions about managing your reputation online, such as being too complicated or too time-consuming (or the belief that you really don’t need to worry about it) may be hurting your business without you even being aware of this.
See this article to learn more about a simple yet effective plugin for WordPress users that allows you to legally and ethically manage your customer reviews:
How To Create Testimonials – Useful Tips
User reviews, testimonials, and case studies are effective when it comes to marketing your products and services online and should be included in your content. When you quote your own client responses in your content, you:
- Show other users exactly what problems and pains your products and services can help solve for them and how easily it can do this.
- Help visitors identify their objections and address these.
- Help prospects connect with their motivations and aspirations and facilitate moving them further along the sales process.
Here are some tips on how to create testimonials:
- Avoid over-editing: You should try to use your customer’s actual words as much as possible. Leave little grammatical or spelling errors in the content. This helps keep your testimonials ‘real’.
- Use real photos: Marketing tests show that using images of people’s faces will draw the most attention of visitors on a web page. Adding photos of your clients next to their testimonials and reviews will help increase visitor engagement with your content.
- Tell a powerful story: Stories are far more effective and memorable than simply providing facts and statistics. 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 customer support has been and giving “two thumbs up” service recommendations that everyone has heard a “million times” before.
- Keep it in context: It’s good to add testimonials to 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 will have on your visitor’s perception if you were to insert a testimonial about what a “bargain” price your solution retails for before posting your product pricing information, or testimonials about problems you’ve helped your clients solve before discussing the benefits of your products, or testimonials where clients are truly ecstatic about your support before offering guarantees or addressing objections.
- Quantify the information: Which of the following statements do you think is more powerful: “XYZ solution was directly responsible for growing our revenue by $59,709 in the previous fiscal year,” or “XYZ software helped us grow our business?” If possible, publish testimonials containing quantifiable data, like how much your solution helped to increase their profits or reduce their costs 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 in a recent business quarter, what kind of things are they able to do or experience now that they couldn’t do before, etc.
- Avoid using the same testimonial throughout your site: Although this can be somewhat difficult if you are just starting out and have very few clients, it’s best to avoid using the same testimonial repeatedly throughout your web pages. Depending on your business, you could try to obtain more testimonials by offering limited review copies of your product, or a special 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 target audience is, providing testimonials from people who your prospects can relate to can be 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 testimonials across different platforms. If you get fantastic feedback on your Facebook wall praising your solution, contact them privately asking for their permission to reprint the comment or post on your blog.
- Only use real client testimonials. Prospective customers need to believe that the testimonials published on your site are real. Don’t compromise your credibility or reputation with false testimonials.
How To Get Testimonials
Just Ask
Getting a testimonial from a happy customer can be as simple as just asking for it.
Follow these useful tips for soliciting testimonials:
- Make a point of contacting customers after a specific period of time, e.g. 30 days with an email request for a testimonial if you have not obtained one after completing your service.
- Include a field for testimonials in all 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 quick video testimonial/feedback interview. While recording your video, describe to your viewers what you have done for the client and try to record their positive reactions and feedback.
- Make it easy for them. When 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 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 use it. Explain that you have done this to help them save time and let them know they are completely free to change what you have written however they see fit before replying with their approval.
Offer To Post A Link To The Source Wherever You Quote Their Testimonial
Offer to publish a link to their site in exchange for their testimonial. This is often enough of an incentive for clients to provide you with a testimonial. It also makes an implicit statement to visitors that your testimonials are real 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 one of your autoresponder broadcasts. This should be timed to reach subscribers just after your customers have had a chance to measure the impact of using your product, service or solution. Use words like “I need a quick favor” in your email subject and make the point of your email or message specifically about asking clients to provide feedback, a testimonial, or a review.
Use LinkedIn
The LinkedIn “Recommendations” feature allows you to request testimonials from other members that become part of your account. With LinkedIn, the process for requesting and providing recommendations is quite 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 site (tip: offer to publish a link back to their website in exchange).
Create A Customer Testimonials Section
Create a “Testimonials” page and place a “read more testimonials …” link pointing to your main testimonials section wherever you have added single testimonials on your site.
Tip: You can measure the effectiveness of your testimonials by how long visitors stay on the section of your pages or posts where you have added the testimonial content. ”Heatmapping” technology is a great way to monitoring visitor behavior on your site.
We have written an article about adding heatmap analytics to your website to understand visitor behavior here:
WordPress Testimonial Plugins
If your site or blog is powered by WordPress, you can use a plugin to add, edit and display testimonials. Some plugins also allow you to add a form to your pages inviting users to 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), you can then refer customers to your “Testimonials” page.
Check out the testimonial plugins below:
Easy Testimonials
Easy Testimonials is a free plugin that lets you add customer testimonials to the sidebar as a widget, or embed them into posts and pages using a shortcode. Easy Testimonials 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 to add a photo of the testimonial author, a company logo, etc.
Easy Testimonials also comes with a “pro” version with additional features and plugin support.
Visit this site to download this plugin:
Testimonials Widget
Testimonials Widget is a free plugin that lets you randomly slide or list selected portfolios, reviews, quotes, or text with images or videos on your posts and pages. 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 offers a range of additional features via a premium version, including built-in options SEO functionality and technical support.
Go here to download this 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 for correct display on any device or browser.
- Display options for 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, customize font and background colours, font types and more.
To download the plugin, go here:
To learn how to add testimonials in WordPress, see the tutorial below:
In Summary …
Testimonials and user 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 existing clients or customers, and publish positive content about your business on your website or blog.
Additional Info
The articles below are a great source of information about creating effective customer 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 a comprehensive series of training emails with actionable information that will teach exactly how to drive more traffic to your 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 completely FREE!
***
***
"This is an awesome training series. I have a pretty good understanding of WordPress already, but this is helping me to move somewhere from intermediate to advanced user!" - Kim Lednum