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 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 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 economy, it’s a mistake to ignore the impact of online consumer behavior, especially if they are posting negative comments about your business.
Don’t ignore what customers may be saying online about your business!
You could be doing your business a disservice if you are not spreading the positive things your customers say about your products, solutions, customer support, etc. 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 used in your content.
In this article, we’ll show you tips for converting more visitors into qualified prospects using captivating customer testimonials.
Consumer Reviews
P.T. Barnum, legendary showman and successful promoter, once 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 reviews and testimonials from your existing customers is satisfied customers are far more persuasive when it comes to drawing new clients, customers or users than anything you have to say about your own products or services.
There is a source of untapped opportunities for generating new business that most small businesses simply do not utilize, or utilize correctly … reviews and testimonials from their satisfied users!
User reviews and testimonials are effective for building credibility for your services and products.
Research conducted by leading marketing companies all seem to point to the same conclusion: testimonials and user reviews eliminate doubts potential customers may have about buying products or services, help with product selection and help increase conversions of visitors into sales.
Here are just some of the findings available to 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 web site if it has ratings and user reviews.”
- According to Reevoo.com, consumer reviews are responsible for producing an average 18% uplift in sales and 50 or more reviews per product can translate into 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).
- 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 Customer Reviews And Testimonials – Managing Online Reputation
Clearly, you should be adding testimonials and reviews from satisfied clients to your site.
Consumer reviews and testimonials, however, are like double-edged swords; they can impact your business both in a positive or negative way.
You see, people may not be saying bad things about your business, products or services directly to you, but they could have posted disparaging remarks on Facebook, or a discussion group or forum about an unpleasant encounter they’ve just had with one of your staff and this could be costing you business.
This is where online reputation management becomes vital to your online business success.
Misconceptions about online reputation management, such as the process being too complicated or too time-consuming (or the belief that you just don’t need it) may be seriously hurting your business without you even being aware of this.
See this article to learn more about a plugin for WordPress users that allows you to legally and ethically manage user reviews:
Tips On How To Create User Testimonials
Testimonials, user reviews, and case studies are powerful when it comes to helping you market and promote your products and services online and should be an integral part of your content. When you include your own client responses in your content, you:
- Show other users exactly with similar problems and pains what your products and services can do for them.
- Help site visitors identify and address their objections.
- Help potential customers connect with their motivations and facilitate moving them closer to a buying decision.
Here are some practical tips on creating powerful testimonials:
- Avoid over-editing: Try using the actual words used by your customers as much as possible. Leaving little grammatical errors and misspelled words in the content helps preserve your testimonials’ authenticity.
- Use real photos: Research shows that using images of people’s faces draws the most attention of visitors browsing 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 so much more powerful and captivating than providing mere statistical facts. Being able 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 using generic statements about how “excellent” your customer support has been and giving “two thumbs up” service recommendations that everyone has heard a “million times” before.
- Use it in context: Add testimonials in 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 can create on your visitor’s perception by adding a testimonial about what a “bargain” price your solution retails for before posting price information, or testimonials about problems you’ve helped clients solve before presenting the benefits of your products, or testimonials where clients are truly thrilled about your support before offering guarantees or addressing objections.
- Quantify your information: Which of the following statements do you think your prospects would consider to be more powerful: “As a direct result of implementing XYZ solution, we have seen our revenue increase by $53,453 during the last financial quarter,” or “XYZ software definitely helped us grow our sales?” If possible, ask clients to specify quantifiable results when submitting testimonials, like how much your solution helped to increase their sales or reduce their costs in specific percentages or amounts, how many hours they have saved, how many new leads or new clients they were able to generate in a recent period, 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 somewhat difficult if you are just starting out and don’t have many clients, it’s best to avoid using 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 launch discount for clients in exchange for an honest review and permission to publish it if you choose to use it.
- Appeal to your best customer: 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 aspire to become is a very 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 someone publishes great feedback on your Facebook wall praising your business, send them a message asking for permission to reprint the content on your site.
- Never use fake testimonials. Your prospects need to believe that the testimonials provided on your site are real. Don’t destroy your reputation with false testimonials.
How To Get Testimonials From Your Customers
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.
Follow these useful tips for soliciting testimonials from your clients:
- Make a point of contacting clients after a specific period of time, e.g. 90 days with an email reminder for a testimonial if you have not obtained one after completing your service.
- Add a text box for testimonials in all client surveys.
- Pull out your phone when you next visit clients or hand over a finished project and if they are delighted with the results, ask them if they wouldn’t mind recording a short video testimonial/feedback interview. If they agree, while recording the video, explain to viewers what you have done for the client and record your client’s positive reactions and responses.
- Make it easy for them. When 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 given you – never put words into their mouth), and shape these into a testimonial, then contact the client and ask them for permission to publish it. Explain that you have done this to save them time and let them know they are completely free to edit what you have written however they like before replying with their approval.
Offer To Publish A Link Back To Their Site Wherever You Quote Their Testimonial
Offer to add a link back to their website in exchange for their testimonial. This is a great incentive to get clients providing a testimonial. It also makes an implicit statement to visitors that your testimonials are not fake and can be verified.
Include A Testimonial Request In Your Auto Responder/Newsletter Messages
If you have a list of subscribers, include a request for a testimonial in a scheduled newsletter broadcast. Preferably, this should be done after your clients have had a chance to experience your 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 users for honest feedback, a testimonial, or a review of your services.
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 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 website (and offer to add a link back to their profile in exchange).
Create A Testimonials Page
Create a new page for testimonials and place a “more testimonials …” link to this page whenever you add new testimonials on your site.
Practical Tip: You can measure the effectiveness of 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 what visitors are doing on your pages are “heatmaps”.
We have written an article about a heatmap analytics software you can add to your site to understand visitor behavior here:
Using WordPress Plugins
If your website 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 inviting users to submit testimonials.
Once your testimonial plugin is installed and set up (with instructions for adding testimonials via the submission form – if available), all you have to do is refer clients to your “Testimonials” section.
Check out the testimonial plugins below:
Easy Testimonials
Easy Testimonials is a free WordPress plugin that lets you add customer testimonials to your sidebar as a widget, or embed them into posts and pages using a shortcode. The Easy Testimonials plugin also lets you publish a list of all testimonials or output a random testimonial, and include an image with each testimonial, which is great for adding a photo of the testimonial author, their business logo, etc.
The plugin also provides a “pro” version that offers additional features and plugin support.
Visit this site to download this plugin:
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 WordPress site. You can insert 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 has loads more features available via a premium version, including built-in functions SEO functionality and plugin support.
To download the plugin, go here:
Testimonials WordPress Plugin
This premium plugin offers plenty of great features right out of the box, including:
- Responsive design that resizes for displaying correctly on any device or browser.
- Display your testimonials in a widget or as slideshows, sliders, list layout, grid layout, etc. using a shortcode
- Styling options (display image at the top, bottom, or side of the testimonial, display testimonials in a speech bubble, customized font and background colours, font types and more.
Go here to learn more about this plugin:
To learn how to add testimonials in WordPress, see the tutorial below:
In Conclusion …
User reviews and client testimonials are powerful 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 your customers or clients, and start publishing these on your web site.
Resources
For additional information about creating engaging testimonials refer to these useful articles:
- 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 website, save money creating useful content that will add value to 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 100% FREE!
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