If you are a business owner, you may be asking yourself: why are customer testimonials important?
The truth is, testimonials for any business can be the starting point to generating plenty of business opportunities going forward. After all, people are much more likely to act off the back of ‘word-of-mouth’ recommendations then they are when it comes to online advertisement. Testimonials are one of the most important pieces of copy you can put on your website, landing page, sales letter, or any other kind of marketing communication.
Especially if you are a local business, recommendations are more than likely the sole focus of your business, so by having all of these in one place can prove to be a money-making strategy.
Sharing these across your social media can also help hugely, and the reasoning for this is that they give your audience that one final push to buy your product or service. According to surveys, “customer testimonials have the highest effectiveness rating for content marketing at 89%.”
But why are these forms of marketing proven to be so effective?
The main message a testimonial conveys to your prospect customers is: ‘if this person loved it, so will I!’ This way, a testimonial establishes your credibility in front of your potential customers. If you have a proven track record of completing services or selling a product, customers will see someone else try it, and if that person likes it, maybe then they will buy it too.
After all, no one likes to be the first in line when it comes to buying a completely new and unfamiliar product from a business they have never heard of. The same can be said for when you are looking to stay at a hotel or B&B, you are always going to check reviews beforehand. A testimonial makes the product a less risky purchase for your new buyers, because it reassures them that your product is ‘tested’, ‘works great’ and, therefore, is safe to buy.
As long as the testimonial is positive and elaborate, you will attract a more desired target audience. A boring and vague testimonial will attract low-value prospects. The amount of effort put in will result in the same amount of effort received. The most common forms of testimonial usually come in the form of:
- Quotes
- Longform testimonial calling
- Social media
- Video
Nothing will make your testimonials better than a person who has true appreciation for your products and services and is willing to offer genuine compliments. So if you have regular customers, ask them for a testimonial, 99% of people will not mind at all!
These can take anywhere between 30 seconds to 2 minutes, taking no time out of your working day whatsoever. Here are some quick-fire questions you can ask them just in case you get stuck:
- What did you find as a result of buying this product/service?
- Can you think of a reason why you wouldn’t choose our product/service?
- What specific feature did you like most about this product/service?
- Can you give me 3 benefits surrounding this service?
- Would you recommend this product/service to other potential customers? If so, why?
- Is there anything you’d like to add?
These questions can be your building blocks to creating a first-class testimonial, which in the long-term, will benefit your business hugely! You can easily create a few hundred words of copy off the back of these key questions, and if you can voice record or film it, even better!
Another alternative that you can take is gathering these testimonials through ringing through a database of your customers, you may just be lacking the availability or time. That is where we at Dynamic can help you! We can both manage and ring through your customer list, gathering first class testimonials for you to use at your disposal. Contact us today to enquire for free.