Build Your Reputation With Testimonials And User Reviews
Are you stuck in a cycle of doing what you’ve always done to attract customers, only to get the exact same disappointing results? Most business owners don’t need to be told that trying to generate new business can be confusing, frustrating and quite hard. Just trying to remain 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 media-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!
You could be doing your business a great disservice if you don’t publish the positive things your clients are saying about your services or products. Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are persuasive when it comes to marketing your products and services online and should be used in your content.
In this article, we’ll show you how to achieve better results online with profit-boosting customer testimonials.
Customer Reviews And Testimonials
P.T. Barnum, legendary American showman and businessman, is often quoted as having stated that “Nothing draws a crowd quite like a crowd.”
P.T. Barnum obviously understood the power of “social proof”. Social proof-driven content is a powerful and effective way of getting your business promoted. Quoting testimonials and reviews from satisfied customers is satisfied clients are far more persuasive for attracting new customers, clients or users than anything you can say about your own products or services.
There is clearly a source of untapped opportunities for generating new business that most small businesses simply do not utilize, or utilize correctly … reviews from your existing clients!
Reviews and testimonials are a terrific way to build credibility for your business.
Tests conducted by many leading companies all seem to lead to the same inevitable conclusion: adding customer testimonials and reviews to your site decreases doubts potential customers may have about products and services, helps users select products and increases sales.
Here are just some of the findings available to support this:
- According to research findings 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 site if it has ratings and reviews.”
- According to Reevoo.com, consumer reviews can produce an average 18% uplift in sales and 50 or more consumer reviews per product can mean a 4.6% increase in conversion rates.
- Web 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).
(Source: eConsultancy.com)
Adding Consumer Testimonials And Reviews – Online Reputation Management
You should be adding reviews from delighted customers to your site.
Testimonials and 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 business directly to you, but they could post disparaging remarks on a forum about an unpleasant encounter they’ve just had with one of your representatives and this could be costing you business.
This is where online reputation management becomes vitally important to your online success.
Misconceptions about online reputation management, such as being too complicated or too time-consuming (or the belief that you really don’t need it) could be hurting your business without you even realizing it.
See this article to learn more about a simple WordPress plugin that lets you legally and ethically manage customer reviews:
Tips For Creating Meaningful User Testimonials
Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are powerful ways of helping you market and promote your products and services online and should be included as part of your content. When you quote responses from users in your content, you:
- Show potential customers exactly with similar problems and pains what your products and services can do for them.
- Help your visitors identify their objections and address these.
- Help potential customers connect with their motivations and this facilitates moving them further along the sales process.
Below are some practical tips on how to create client testimonials:
- Avoid over-editing: Try to use the actual words used by your customers as much as possible. Leave little grammatical or spelling errors in the content. This helps to keep things ‘real’.
- Use real photos: It’s a proven fact that using images of people’s faces will draw the attention of visitors browsing a web page. Adding photos of your clients next to their testimonials and reviews can help your visitors and potential prospects take notice of your site’s content.
- Tell a story: Stories are much more effective and captivating than simply providing statistical facts. The ability to present a customer’s horror story and how your solution came to the rescue will make a far longer-lasting impression on those reading your content than presenting generalized statements about how “excellent” your service has been and giving “two thumbs up” service recommendations that everyone has heard a “million times” before.
- Keep it in context: Add testimonials to your site copy where it best makes sense to place them, and where they can most effectively help you sell your point. Think about the impact you can create on your visitor’s mind by adding a testimonial about what a “bargain” price your solution can be purchased for before posting service pricing information, or testimonials about problems you’ve helped clients solve before presenting the benefits of your products, or testimonials where customers are truly ecstatic about your customer service when offering guarantees or providing content designed to help readers overcome their objections.
- Quantify the information: Which of the following statements is more powerful… “Since using XYZ software, we increased our sales by $70,683 during the previous financial quarter,” or “XYZ solution has helped us grow our sales?” Whenever possible, ask clients to specify quantifiable results when submitting testimonials, like how much your solution helped to increase their profits 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, 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 somewhat difficult if you are just starting out or don’t have many clients, try to avoid using the same testimonial 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 launch discount for clients in exchange for an honest review and permission to publish it if you choose 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 target audience is, providing testimonials from people who your prospects can relate to is a 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 page praising your solution, contact them privately asking for permission to reprint the comment or post on your blog.
- Only use genuine client testimonials. Most people can tell if you are employing copy writers to write your content. Outsourcing content is fine, but your potential clients need to see that the testimonials published on your site are genuine. 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.
Here are some tips for requesting testimonials from your clients:
- Contact your clients after a specific period of time, e.g. 60 days with an email request for a testimonial if you have not obtained one immediately after completing a service.
- Include a text box for entering testimonials in your client surveys.
- Pull out your phone when you next visit clients or hand over a finished 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. When recording your video, explain to viewers what you have done for your client and record the client’s positive reactions and feedback.
- Make it easy for them. Whenever 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 juiciest sections (only use what they have written – 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 modify what you have written however they see fit before replying with their approval.
Offer To Post A Link To The Source Wherever You Publish Their Testimonial
Offer to post a link to their website 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 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 a scheduled auto responder broadcast. Preferably, this should be timed to reach subscribers just after your customers have had a chance to use your products. 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 clients to provide feedback, a testimonial, or a product review.
Use LinkedIn
The LinkedIn “Recommendations” feature lets you obtain testimonials for your account. With LinkedIn, the process for requesting and providing recommendations is quite simple and user-friendly and the person who provides the recommendation receives a link to their profile. If you get a positive recommendation on LinkedIn, ask their permission to reprint it on your site (once again, you can offer to publish a link back to their profile in exchange).
Create A Testimonials Page
Create a new page for customer testimonials and add a “read more customer testimonials …” link pointing to your main testimonials page wherever you add new testimonials on your site.
Practical Tip: You can measure how useful testimonials are by how long visitors remain on the section of your pages or posts where you have added the testimonial content. A great tool for observing visitor behaviour on your pages are “heatmaps”.
We have written an article about a heatmap technology you can add to your sites to analyze visitor behavior here:
WordPress Plugins
If your website or blog is built using WordPress, you can use a plugin to add, edit and display testimonials. Some plugins also let you add forms to your pages where users can submit testimonials.
Once your 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.
Check out the WordPress testimonial plugins below:
Easy Testimonials
Easy Testimonials is an easy-to-use free plugin that lets you add testimonials to the sidebar as a widget, or embed them into your pages and posts using a shortcode. The plugin also lets you add a list of all testimonials or output a random testimonial, and include images with testimonials, which you can use to add a photo of the testimonial author, their company logo, etc.
The Easy Testimonials plugin also comes with a “pro” version with additional features and plugin support.
Go here to download the plugin:
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 using a shortcode, theme functions, or widgets with category and tag selections and specify different display options such as random or specific ordering.
The Testimonials Widget plugin has loads more features available via a premium version, including built-in functions for improved search engine results and developer support.
Visit this site to download and use the plugin:
Testimonials WordPress Plugin
This is a premium WordPress 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 slideshows, sliders, 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 colours, font types and more.
To download and use this plugin, go here:
To learn how to add testimonials in WordPress, see the tutorial below:
In Conclusion …
User reviews and testimonials are powerful sources of content that can help your business add credibility, build authority, improve online reputation, and grow your sales funnel. Always ask for feedback, reviews, and testimonials from existing customers, and publish positive content about your business on your site.
Additional Info
The articles below provide useful information on creating effective customer 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 easy-to-digest information that will teach exactly how to drive more traffic to your website or blog, save money creating useful content for your site 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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