Customer testimonials can have different uses to various parts of the organization.
You already know you want a great quote from a customer that addresses their experience with services or products. On the other hand, you also want your testimonials to be diverse and reflect the super sweet products or services you provide.
Who’s reading these testimonials, though? Potential customers. Yep – they are your target audience here.
So, have you considered how important it is to address what your customers are looking to learn about you? Whether it’s your excellent customer service, superior products or services, or a successful channel marketing partnership, testimonials are a powerful tool for every phase in the customer’s journey.
What Makes An Effective CUSTOMER Testimonial?
The more of these sorts of details you can pull out from your customer feedback, the better. And the more you can find that will engage people emotionally, the better.
For example, which sounds more compelling or engaging to you as a potential customer?
- “Your consulting sessions were great! I learned so much, thank you!”
- “Some amazing things have happened for my biz since I spoke to you – you were the spark for a lot of change!”
Which one connects to you more on an emotional level? Which one makes you want to know more about their story? Which one sounds like the kind of results you’d hope to experience?
When you get specific about what your customer will receive, what they might feel like after hiring your company, what their experience as a whole might feel like, that’s what makes for a more compelling or converting testimonial, one that actually speaks for your brand and helps you sell what you do.
The best way to get a good testimonial is to ask! Ask specific questions that will pull out those details that your website or social media visitors will connect with. Even one single quote can go a long way.
Questions like:
- What was your experience like working with us?
- How did you feel after you worked with my company for the first time?
- How did you feel in our first consultation?
- Did you have any problems or issues – if so, how were they resolved?
- What are the results you’ve had from {your service}?
- Would you recommend us to your friends?
- How have things changed since using our services?
- Anything else you’d like to share?
Customer Reviews Help You Earn Trust
Great testimonials are specific and emotional, and you can get great ones just by asking! By following up with your customers! (More on that a couple paragraphs on down… keep reading 🙂
And one last important tip – with their permission, include the customer’s name and location (or role), to help validate that these words are from real people, not just some quotes you made up. This adds to the trust issues that some have been eroded with some web users. Click here for more info on how users feel about testimonials.
You can also include images of the customer’s face, or of the products they bought, their business logo, etc. to add some visual interest and further the “proof” that these folks are real people with real opinions!
Where Are The Best Places To Share Customer Testimonials?
The first way to share your customer quotes is to create a testimonial page which shares many different ones and can be linked to from your main navigation, elsewhere in the homepage, in your footer, or whenever you mention it in a blog post or social media update.
You can also include a quote or two on your homepage, or create a graphic that scrolls through multiple quotes from different people. If you have them on a rotating graphic, make sure you’re displaying them long enough for people to actually read it! Elsewhere on your site, you may want to include service-specific feedback on the services pages themselves or share testimonials regularly to your newsletter list. Whitepapers and technical case studies also provide a great canvas for testimonials.
Last but not least: social media and business listing pages are excellent places for customer quotes and testimonials. Even better: ratings and reviews direct from the customer. Display-wise, on the post, format them differently if the testimonial is for a customer story versus a case study. Make the testimonial eye-catching, using imagery and make sure the focus is on the key headline of the quote. Be creative and pull out one of the main points in the quote to use as an attention-grabbing headline – just be careful not to rewrite the customer’s words 🙂
What’s Next?
There are so many ways to incorporate reviews, feedback, or other testimonials on your website and social media. Give your happy customers a voice and show your prospective customers what you’re made of!
When you’re ready to find new ways to position your old brand online, give us a call. We love to roll up our sleeves to help our clients broadcast their great work. Let your light shine!
