Getting Testimonials
Posted: Monday, February 13, 2012 at 9:38:23 AM EST by Joshua Browne
The best way to increase your sales team
Testimonials are a must have for your website, we all know this. But why, what is the methodology and reasons for having someone else saying that my product or service is great over me, the owner of the business.
Sorry to say but it’s for that very reason, you’re the owner of the business. To your website visitors you are happy to say whatever you want to get a sale and some extra coin.
Testimonials break down that wall.
They allow your visitors to be influenced by the best sales people your business will ever have, your current customers.
Whatever emotions are towards you, the business owner, are removed as soon as a customer stands up and brags about your business.
The social media scene has a great environment for businesses to receive social proof. Facebook for instance allows people to ‘like’ your business. Do you think that the more ‘likes’ you have the more business you could generate from Facebook?
Twitter is based around people and business following you. If I did a search, on Twitter, for a florist because I forgot Valentine’s Day was coming up, do you think I would go to the florist that had 50 followers or the one with 150 followers?
A third and final example is LinkedIn. If you were to search for a printer to form a strategic alliance with would you connect with the printer who has 25 connections or the one with over 100 connections?
All of these examples have obvious answers and that’s because of social proof.
The more testimonials you have the greater chance you have of securing future business.
Here are five quick tips to getting quality testimonials.
- Listen for a ‘ping’. Whenever you are meeting with a client and they say something positive about your business or product, that’s a ping. Get them to send that to you in an email. There’s your first testimonial.
- Doesn’t have to be long. People don’t want to read a thesis about why Bob bought a blue widget from you. Keep them short concise and they will be more effective.
- Video wins. Not everyone will do this but, if you find an audacious customer, stick them in front of a video camera for 30 seconds and get them to talk about your business. Visitors to your website will love the interactivity and Google will love that you put a video up.
- Don’t spend thousands. You don’t have to be Steven Spielberg to produce a testimonial video. Video capabilities on current smart phones do the job perfectly. It doesn’t matter if an ambulance goes past, sirens blaring, it show authenticity and realism.
- Give incentives. Travel Managers do gift vouchers, run a competition that if a customer emails you a testimonial they go in the draw to win a $200 travel voucher.
These tips are what we have found generate quality leads and referrals. If you have come across any other ways we would love to hear from you by either commenting below or contacting us here.
