It is no secret that online reviews, testimonials, endorsements on social media, shares and likes are the new age version of the old school word of mouth. Today, people are less likely to talk to neighbors or peers before making a purchase. They are more likely to check out the opinions of ten fellow shoppers or customers to decide what they should buy. In effect, testimonials have become the need of the hour. A website that doesn’t have any endorsements or a product that doesn’t have many testimonials is not going to gain much traction.
Google has changed the way companies would showcase their accomplishments. Today, a website is incomplete without testimonials but just having a few lines will not be of much help. Any company can come up with a dozen random testimonials speaking highly about a product or service. That will not help you to win the war. You need to have truthful or genuine, unique and amazing testimonials. You also need to use them well.
1) Generate the Testimonials
Don’t try to manufacture them. Today or tomorrow, manufactured testimonials will become obvious and that will stunt the prospects of your company. Always be truthful. Get your existing and former clients to submit a testimonial. Request them using emails or urging them at the time of purchases. You can also use testimonial gathering tools like Yelp, Angie’s List, Google Reviews, Consumer Reports, Yahoo Local Listings, Citysearch, Better Business Bureau, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Insider Pages among others. Testimonials don’t have to adhere to a certain format. Anything can be a testimonial. A comment on social media, a video endorsing the product or service, an image of a customer giving a thumbs-up or anything that you can think of.
2) Use Testimonials Wisely
Place them around call-to-action. Use them in emails and on social media pages, profiles on directories or business classifieds and also on advertisements. Use videos, images, textual testimonials, ratings and any kind of endorsement you can get. But always have unique and genuine testimonials.
3) Get Customers Involved
The secret of generating testimonials is to get a customer to issue a comment or statement when the customer is happy. When someone takes a product for granted or gets used to a service, he or she is unlikely to be interested in testimonials. Hence, look for testimonials when customers have just purchased a product, has enjoyed a service, got a problem resolved or has been the recipient of an amazing offer. Use these moments to generate diverse and truly effective testimonials.
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