Building Your Reputation With User Testimonials And Reviews

Are you stuck in a cycle of doing what you’ve always done to attract customers, only to get the exact same results? As most small business owners know, that finding new ways of generating new customers can be confusing, frustrating and extremely difficult. Just trying to keep your business afloat 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 and social-driven economy, it’s foolish to ignore the significance of what your potential customers are doing online, especially if they are talking about your business.

Ignoring what consumers 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 aren’t publishing the positive things your clients say about your services, solutions, customer support, etc. User reviews, testimonials, and case studies are effective ways of helping you market and promote your products and services online and should be included as part of your content.

In this article, you will learn tips for turning more visitors into qualified prospects using meaningful client testimonials.

Testimonials And Client Reviews

Legendary American showman and successful promoter Phineas Taylor P.T. Barnum 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 genuine reviews and testimonials from your existing clients is existing users are far more persuasive when it comes to attracting new customers, clients or users than anything you say about your own products or services.

There is clearly an untapped source of opportunities for generating new business that most businesses just aren’t utilizing, or utilizing correctly … testimonials and reviews from their satisfied clients!

Reviews and testimonials are a powerful way to build credibility for your business.

Research conducted by marketing firms all seem to point to the same conclusion: adding customer testimonials and reviews to your site eliminates doubts potential customers may have about purchasing products, helps users select products and increases sales conversions.

Here are just some statistics that support this:

• According to research 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 site if it has ratings and consumer reviews.”
• According to Reevoo.com, consumer reviews can result in an average 18% uplift in sales and 50 or more user 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 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 Reviews And Testimonials – Managing Online Reputation

You should be adding positive reviews from satisfied customers to your website.

Testimonials and consumer reviews, however, can work both ways and affect your business both positively or negatively.

You see, people may not be saying bad things about your services directly to your face, but they could have posted negative words on a forum about an unpleasant encounter they’ve just had with you or 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 a vitally important aspect of your online business success.

Misconceptions about online reputation management, 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 realizing it.

See this article to learn more about a simple WordPress plugin that can help you avoid the escalation of negative reviews about your services through effective user review management:

• Learn How To Easily Manage Your Online Reputation In WordPress With Power Online Reviews

Tips On Improving Your Sales Conversions With Client Testimonials

Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are effective when it comes to helping you market your products and services online and should be added to your content. When you include responses from clients in your content, you:

• Show other users 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 prospects connect with their motivations and aspirations and facilitate the sales process.

Here are some tips on creating standout user testimonials:

• Don’t over edit: You should try to use your customer’s actual words as much as possible. Leaving little grammatical errors and misspellings in the content helps keep your testimonials sounding authentic.
• Use real photos: It’s a proven fact that using images of people’s faces draws the most attention of visitors on a web page. Adding photos of your clients next to their testimonials and reviews can help increase visitor engagement with your content.
• Tell a story: Stories are much more effective and memorable than just providing facts and statistics. The ability to present a customer’s horror story and how your solution came to the rescue will make a more lasting impression on those reading your content than presenting generic statements about excellent customer support and giving “two thumbs up” product recommendations that everyone has heard a “million times” before.
• Keep it in context: It’s good to add testimonials to your site copy where it best makes sense to place them, and where you believe these can most effectively help you 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 sells for before posting service pricing information, or testimonials about problems you’ve helped clients solve before discussing the benefits of your services, or testimonials where clients are genuinely ecstatic about your customer service when offering guarantees or addressing objections.
• Quantify the information: Which of the following statements do you think your prospects would consider to be more powerful: “XYZ solution was directly responsible for growing our sales by $15,267 during the last fiscal year,” or “XYZ solution has helped us grow our sales?” Whenever possible, publish testimonials containing quantifiable data, 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 they have saved, 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.
• Vary the testimonials on 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 web pages. 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 discount for existing clients in exchange for an honest review and permission to publish it if you choose 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 a powerful motivator and influencer. People want to see and buy from “better versions” of themselves, so make sure to include testimonials that appeal directly to your ideal customers.
• Reprint content across different platforms. If someone publishes fantastic feedback on your Facebook page praising your solution, contact them privately asking for permission to reprint the content on your blog.
• Only use real testimonials. Your potential customers need to see that the testimonials provided on your site are real. Don’t compromise your integrity or reputation with a ”made up” testimonial.

How To Get Customer Testimonials

Always Ask For Testimonials

If you have just completed a service for someone, or a customer says they are really happy with your product or service, ask them for a testimonial.

Here are some useful guidelines for soliciting testimonials from clients:

• Make a point of contacting customers after a specific period of time, e.g. 30 days with an email reminder for a testimonial if you have not obtained one immediately after performing a service.
• Include a field for testimonials in client surveys.
• Pull out your phone when you next meet with clients 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 short video testimonial/feedback interview. While recording your video, describe to viewers what you have done for your client and try to record the client’s positive reactions and responses.
• Make it easy 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 best sections (only use what they have given you – never put words into their mouth), and shape these into a testimonial, then contact your client and ask them for permission to use it. Explain that you have done this to help them save time and invite them to change what you have written however they see fit before replying with their approval.

Offer To Post A Link Back To Their Site

Offer to add a link to their site in exchange for their testimonial. This is often enough of an incentive for clients to provide 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 newsletter messages. This should be timed to reach subscribers just after your customers have had a chance to assess the effect of using your products. Use words like “I need your help” in your email subject and make the point of your email or message specifically about asking clients for feedback, a testimonial, or a product review.

Use LinkedIn

The LinkedIn “Recommendations” feature is a great way to obtain testimonials from other members that become part of your profile. 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 for permission to reprint it on your website (you can offer to add a link back to their website or profile in exchange).

Create A Customer Testimonials Page

Create a new section for testimonials and place a “read more client testimonials …” link pointing to this section throughout your site.

Useful Tip: You can measure how effective testimonials are by how long visitors remain on the section of your pages or posts where you have added your testimonial content. ”Heatmapping” technology is a great way to observing what visitors are doing on your pages.

We have written an article about a heatmap software you can add to your sites to track visitor behavior here:

• Predicting User Behavior On Your WordPress Site With HeatMap Tools – Heat Map Tracker Review

Using Testimonial Plugins For WordPress

If your website or blog is powered by WordPress, you can use a plugin to display testimonials. Some plugins also allow you to add a form to your pages inviting users to submit testimonials.

Once your testimonial plugin is installed and set up (with instructions for using the testimonials submission form – if available), you can then refer customers to your “Testimonials” page.

Below are some great plugins you can check out:

Easy Testimonials

Easy Testimonials is a free WP plugin that lets you add testimonials to the sidebar as a widget, or embed them into a Page or Post using a shortcode. Easy Testimonials also lets you insert a list of all your testimonials or output a random testimonial, and include images with testimonials, which you can use for adding a photo of the testimonial author, a logo, etc.

The Easy Testimonials plugin also provides a “pro” version that offers additional features and plugin support.

Visit this site to download this plugin:

• Easy Testimonials

Testimonials Widget

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

Visit this site to learn more about using this plugin:

• Testimonials Widget

Testimonials WordPress Plugin

This premium plugin provides a range of great features right out of the box, including:

• Responsive design that resizes to display correctly on any device or browser.
• Display options for your testimonials in a widget or as sliders, slideshows, grid layout, list layout, etc. via a shortcode
• Styling options (display image on top, bottom, or side of testimonials, display testimonials in a speech bubble, customized font and background colours, font types and more.

Go here for more information about using this plugin:

• Testimonials Plugin

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

• How To Add Testimonials In WordPress

In Summary …

Testimonials and customer reviews are great 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 clients, and start publishing these on your web site.

Additional Info

The articles below provide useful information on creating effective clients testimonials and were 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 actionable information and practical tips that will show you how to drive more traffic to your site, save money creating useful content for your 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!

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