Give Your Marketing More Impact with Quality Testimonials
Give Your Marketing More Impact with Quality Testimonials
The Power of Testimonials
Let's be honest in this day and age we often don't expect others to be, well, honest with us. We are suspicious about everything we are told and even more so about things we are offered. The phrases "Where's the catch?" and "There's no such thing as a free lunch" are bandied around with abandon.
There are that many convincing cowboys out there that we often have trouble distinguishing the great from the gruesome. We get around this by presuming that everyone is trying to take us for a ride until there is considerable proof otherwise. However, we make real offers and genuine guarantees to our customers and naturally we want them to take them at face value.
There's the catch. How do we show that we're genuine people who make genuine offers? There are a number of ways to do this, but the best and most prolific is testimonials.
Remember: people buy people first and foremost. Companies will obviously say that they're the best or offer the best price or the best experience. Of course, few people believe them as they read this about so many companies and they have had experiences with many claiming to be the "best" that have not turned out so great.
However, if a previous customer, who has nothing to gain personally says that "You're great!" then potential customers are far more likely to accept this statement as a fact. This is how you can increase your credibility and customer base.
So here are The 5 Golden Rules of Testimonials:
1. The better known and respected the individual or company the more weight the testimonial will carry. However, one should never under-estimate the power of testimonials from regular clients. Yes, celebrity endorsements carry a certain cache, but again people may think you've paid for it rather than it being genuine. Also, you need the testimonial to be from someone similar to your target market. If, for example, you are targeting families then you want a testimonial from a family person and not someone writing as an individual.
2. If you can, list the person's full name, job title and company as this works better than just initials. For a residential customer, full name (or Mr, Ms, Mrs etc.) and their home area works better. In both cases, photos can make the whole thing seem simultaneously more personal and more credible, although you have to be careful otherwise it'll end up looking like a Reader's Digest draw promotional piece.
3. The best way to get testimonials is simply to ask for them. (Please note, I'll be chasing some of you up for testimonials later this week). A good testimonial states the situation and how the product or service solved it. For example, "We were looking for more lunch time customers and by applying the ideas taught on the Making Marketing Make Money course we doubled our lunchtime trade".
4. You can never use too many. OK, you can have too many in one place, but there's no reason why you shouldn't have them spread across your literature range, e.g. web site, flyers, adverts, leaflets, menus etc.
5. Increase credibility with contactable clients. Some people inevitably believe that your testimonials are made up. This is probably because they make up their own testimonials. You can get round this credibility issue by giving people the phone numbers of a few of your clients who they can ring and check. Obviously you need to get your clients permission to do this first.
Like footballstickers from old, start collecting testimonials today.
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