How To Build Your Reputation With Testimonials And User Reviews
Are you stuck in a cycle of doing what you’ve always done to attract and retain new customers, only to get the exact same results? Most business owners don’t need to be told that generating new customers can be hard. Just trying to keep your business afloat requires a lot of your time, money and energy, and sometimes this can feel like it’s just not worth the effort.
In today’s web-based economy, you simply can’t afford to ignore the effect of online consumer behavior, especially if they are talking about your business.
Don’t ignore what consumers may be saying online about your business!
You could be doing your business a great disservice if you aren’t publishing the positive things your clients are saying about your products, services, user support, etc. User reviews, testimonials, and case studies are effective 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 convert more visitors into qualified leads using effective client testimonials.
User Reviews And Testimonials
Legendary American showman P.T. Barnum is often quoted as having said that “Nothing draws a crowd quite like a crowd.”
P.T. Barnum obviously understood the power of “social proof”. Social proof-based content is a powerful way of getting your business promoted effectively. Testimonials and reviews quoted directly from existing clients are far more persuasive for attracting new customers than anything you say about your own products or services.
There is clearly a source of untapped opportunities for generating new business that most businesses just aren’t utilizing, or utilizing correctly … testimonials and reviews from their customers!
Testimonials and customer reviews are a fantastic way to build credibility for your products and services.
Research conducted by leading marketing research companies all lead to the same conclusion: testimonials and user reviews eliminate doubts potential customers may have about purchasing your product, help users select products and help increase sales.
Below are just some statistics that support this:
- According to research 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 user reviews.”
- According to Reevoo.com, customer reviews play a significant role in creating an average 18% uplift in sales and 50 or more user reviews per product can result in a 4.6% increase in conversion rates.
- Website visitors who interact with both consumer 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).
- 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 User Reviews And Testimonials – Online Reputation Management
Adding positive testimonials and reviews to your site from delighted customers is important for growing your business online and creating a solid online reputation.
Customer testimonials and reviews, however, are like double-edged swords; they can affect your business both positive and negative ways.
You see, people may not be saying bad things about your products directly to you, but they could post disparaging remarks on Facebook or a forum group about a bad experience they’ve just had with your services and this could be costing you business.
This is where online reputation management becomes vitally important to your online 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 to worry about it) could be seriously causing damage to your business without you even realizing this.
See this article to learn more about a simple WordPress plugin that allows you to legally and ethically manage user reviews:
Tips On How To Create Testimonials
Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are persuasive when it comes to helping you market your products and services online and should be included in your content. When you include your own client responses in your content, you:
- Show potential customers exactly with similar problems and pains how your products and services can help them.
- Help prospects identify and address their objections.
- Help potential customers connect with their aspirations and motivations and facilitate the sales process.
Here are some practical tips on creating customer testimonials:
- Don’t over edit: Try to use your customer’s actual words as much as you can. Leaving little grammatical errors and misspelled words in the content helps to keep it ‘real’.
- Use photos: Images of people’s faces draw attention to your content. Adding client photos 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 providing mere facts and statistics. Being able 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 excellent customer support and giving “two thumbs up” product recommendations that all of us have heard a “million times” before.
- Keep it in context: Add testimonials to your web content where it best makes sense to place them, and where they 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 product 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 support before offering guarantees or addressing objections.
- Quantify your information: Which of the following statements do you think is more powerful: “As a direct result of using your services, we have noticed a profit increase of $84,811 in the last fiscal year,” or “XYZ product helped us grow our sales?” If possible, publish testimonials containing quantifiable data, like how much your solution helped to increase their sales or reduce their costs in specific percentages or amounts, how many hours you have helped them save, 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.
- Use different client testimonials on your site: Although this can be a little difficult when you are just starting out or don’t have many clients, try to avoid displaying the same testimonial throughout your website. Depending on your business, you could try to obtain more user testimonials by offering limited review copies of your product, or a special launch discount for existing 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 an extremely 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 best audience demographic.
- Reprint across different platforms. If someone publishes great 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. Your potential customers need to believe that the testimonials displayed on your site are real. Don’t compromise your integrity or reputation with a false testimonial.
How To Get Testimonials From Your Clients
Just Ask
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 tips for requesting testimonials:
- Contact your clients after 90 days with an email request for a testimonial if you did not obtain one immediately after completing your service.
- Add a text box for entering testimonials in all your client surveys.
- Pull out your phone when you next visit a client or hand over a completed job and if they are delighted with the results, ask them if they wouldn’t mind recording a brief video testimonial/feedback interview. When recording your video, describe to your viewers what you have done for your client and try to capture their positive reactions and feedback.
- Make it easy for them. Whenever 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 written – don’t put words into their mouth), and shape these into 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 Publish A Link Back To The Source Wherever You Quote Their Testimonial
Offer to add a link back to their site in exchange for their testimonial. This is often enough of an incentive to get clients to provide a testimonial. It also makes an implicit statement to visitors that your testimonials are not fake and can be verified.
Include Testimonial Requests In Your Auto Responder/Newsletter Messages
If you have a list of subscribers, include requests for a testimonial in a periodic auto responder message. Preferably, this should be done as soon as your customers have had a chance to assess the results of using your services. 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 review of your services.
Use LinkedIn
The LinkedIn “Recommendations” feature is a great way to solicit testimonials for your profile. The process for requesting and providing recommendations is 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 (you can offer to add a link back to their profile in exchange).
Create A Client Testimonials Page
Create a new page on your site for client testimonials and place a “more client testimonials …” link pointing to this page wherever you plan to add small blocks of testimonials on your site.
Tip: You can measure the effectiveness of 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 observing what visitors are doing on your site.
We have written an article about a heatmap analytics technology you can add to your sites to measure visitor behavior here:
Using Testimonial Plugins
If your site or blog is built using WordPress, you can use a plugin to display testimonials. Some plugins also let you 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 refer customers to your “Testimonials” section.
Check out the plugins below:
Easy Testimonials
Easy Testimonials is a free WordPress plugin that lets you add testimonials to the sidebar as a widget, or embed them into your pages and posts 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 for adding a photo of the testimonial author, a business logo, etc.
The plugin also provides a “pro” version that offers additional features and technical support.
To download and use this plugin, visit this site:
Testimonials Widget
Testimonials Widget is a free plugin that lets you add random or selected portfolios, reviews, quotes, or text with images or videos on your posts and pages. You can insert testimonials content via a shortcode, theme functions, or widgets with category and tag selections and have multiple 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 plugin support.
Visit this site to download this plugin:
Testimonials WordPress Plugin
This is a premium plugin that offers a range of great features right out of the box, including:
- Responsive design that resizes for displaying correctly on any device or browser.
- Display options for your testimonials in a widget or as slideshows, sliders, list layout, grid layout, etc. by adding a shortcode
- Styling options (display image at the top, bottom, or side of the testimonial, display testimonial in a speech bubble, customized font and background colors, font types and more.
To download this plugin, go here:
To learn how to add testimonials in WordPress, see the tutorial below:
In Summary …
Client testimonials and user reviews are great sources of content that can 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 customers or clients, and start publishing these on your website.
Additional Info
The articles below are a great source of 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 exactly how to drive more traffic to your website, save money creating useful content for your 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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