Build Your Reputation With Testimonials And User Reviews
Are you stuck in a cycle of doing what you’ve always done to attract new customers, and getting the exact same disappointing results? As most business owners know, that finding effective ways of generating new business can be very 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 web-based economy, ignoring what consumers may be saying online about your business could be a costly mistake!
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 customers say about your products or services. Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are powerful ways of helping you market and promote your products and services online and should be an integral part of your content.
In this article, you will learn ways to improve your sales using sales boosting client testimonials.
Consumer Reviews
P.T. Barnum, the great, legendary businessman and showman, once stated that “Nothing draws a crowd quite like a crowd.”
P.T. Barnum understood the power of “social proof”. Social proof-driven content is a powerful and effective way of promoting your business. Reviews from your existing clients are far more persuasive when it comes to attracting new customers than anything you can say about your own products or services.
There is clearly an untapped source of business growth potential that most businesses just aren’t utilizing, or utilizing correctly … testimonials and reviews from existing clients!
Consumer reviews and customer testimonials are a fantastic way to build credibility for your products or services.
Studies conducted by many leading marketing firms all lead to the same conclusion: testimonials and user reviews decrease doubts potential customers may have about buying products that you are trying to sell, help users select products and help increase the number of product sales.
Here are just some of the findings available to support this:
- According to a study 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 web site if it has ratings and user reviews.”
- According to Reevoo.com, reviews produce an average 18% uplift in sales and 50 or more reviews per product can result in a 4.6% increase in conversion rates.
- 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).
(Above figures sourced from eConsultancy.com)
Adding Consumer Reviews – Online Reputation Management
Clearly, you should be adding reviews and testimonials from really happy customers to your site.
User reviews and testimonials, however, can work both ways and affect your business both positive and negative ways.
People may not be saying bad things about your services directly to your face, but they could post updates on Facebook or a discussion group about a bad experience they’ve just had using your products and this could be costing you business.
This is where online reputation management becomes important to your business 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) may be hurting your business without you even realizing this.
See this article to learn more about a simple plugin for WordPress users that lets you legally and ethically manage user feedback:
Tips On How To Create Awesome User Testimonials
Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are effective ways of helping you market 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 pains and problems your products and services can help to solve for them and how easily this can be done.
- Help site visitors identify their objections and address these.
- Help prospects connect with their motivations and facilitate moving them closer to a decision to purchase.
Below are some practical tips on improving your sales conversions with client testimonials:
- Avoid over-editing: You should try using the actual words used by your customers as much as possible. Leave little grammatical or spelling errors in the content. This helps keep your testimonials ‘real’.
- Use photos: It’s a proven fact that using images of people’s faces will draw the attention of visitors on a web page. Adding client photos next to their testimonials and reviews can help your visitors and potential prospects take notice of your content.
- Tell a powerful story: Stories are so much more effective and captivating than providing mere facts and statistics. 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 presenting generic statements about how “excellent” your customer support has been and giving “two thumbs up” product recommendations that all of us have heard a “million times” before.
- Use it in context: It’s good to add testimonials in your web content where it makes the most sense to place them, and where you believe these can most effectively help to 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 product or service pricing information, or testimonials about problems you’ve helped clients solve before talking about the benefits of your services, or testimonials where customers are genuinely thrilled about your customer service before offering a risk-free guarantee or providing content that helps your readers overcome their objections.
- Quantify the information: Which of the following statements do you think your prospects would find more powerful: “XYZ solution was directly responsible for helping us grow our sales by $54,512 in the previous financial quarter,” or “XYZ solution definitely helped us grow our sales?” Whenever possible, publish testimonials containing quantifiable data, 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 you have helped them save, 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 testimonial throughout your site: Although this can be a little difficult if you are just starting out and have very few clients, try to avoid displaying the same testimonial everywhere on your site’s 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 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 best customer 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 targeted to your best audience demographic.
- Reprint across different platforms. If someone publishes a great comment on your Facebook wall praising your business, contact them privately asking for their permission to reprint the content on your blog.
- Never use fake client testimonials. Most people can see through sites that employ copywriters to produce content. Outsourcing content is fine, but your potential customers need to see that the testimonials displayed on your site are genuine. Don’t compromise your credibility with a ”made up” testimonial.
How To Get Testimonials
Always Ask For Testimonials
Getting a testimonial from a satisfied customer can be as simple as just asking for it.
Here are some useful guidelines 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 request for a testimonial if you have not obtained one immediately after performing a service.
- Include a text box for entering testimonials in all client surveys.
- Pull out your phone next time you meet with a client or hand over a completed project and if they are delighted with your services, ask them if they would be happy to record a brief video testimonial/feedback interview. While recording your video, describe to your viewers what you have done for the client and record your client’s 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 juiciest sections (only use what they have given you – never 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 help them save time and let them know they are completely free to modify what you have written however they like before replying with their approval.
Offer To Publish 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 the 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 requests for a testimonial in one of your newsletter broadcasts. Preferably, this should be done after your clients have had a chance to measure the impact of using your services. Use words like “I need your help” in your email subject and make the point of your email or message specifically about asking them to provide feedback, a testimonial, or a review.
Use LinkedIn
The LinkedIn “Recommendations” feature allows you to solicit testimonials that become part of your profile. The process for requesting and providing recommendations is 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 publish a link back to their profile in exchange).
Create A Client Testimonials Page
Create a new section for testimonials and place a “more client testimonials …” link to your main testimonials section throughout your content sections.
Useful Tip: You can measure the effectiveness of your customer testimonials by how long visitors remain on the section of your pages or posts where you have added your testimonial content. A great tool for understanding visitor behavior on your pages are “heatmaps”.
We have written an article about adding heatmaps to your sites to understand visitor behaviour here:
Using Testimonial Plugins For WordPress
If you use WordPress, you can use a plugin to add and display testimonials. Some plugins also allow you to add a form 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), all you have to do is send customers to your “Testimonials” page.
Check out the plugins below:
Easy Testimonials
Easy Testimonials is a free WP plugin that lets you add client 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 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.
Easy Testimonials also provides users with a “pro” version that offers 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 randomly slide or list selected portfolios, reviews, quotes, or text with images or videos on your site. You can insert testimonials using a shortcode, theme functions, or widgets with category and tag selections and have multiple display options such as random or specific ordering.
Testimonials Widget offers additional features via a premium version, including built-in functions for improved search engine results and plugin support.
Visit this site to learn more about using the plugin:
Testimonials WordPress Plugin
This is a premium WordPress plugin that offers a range 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 slideshows, sliders, grid layout, list layout, etc. using a shortcode
- Styling options (display image on top, bottom, or side of testimonials, display testimonials in a speech bubble, customize font and background colors, font types and more.
Go here to download this plugin:
To learn how to add testimonials in WordPress, see the tutorial below:
In Conclusion …
User reviews and client testimonials 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 testimonials, reviews, and feedback from existing clients, and start publishing these on your website or blog.
Additional Info
The articles below provide useful information on creating effective testimonials and were used when researching 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
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