Testimonials play an important part in advertising – especially for small businesses.
Think about it…how else can we gain credibility than by creating a group of satisfied customers and shouting what they have to say?
Let’s look at some ways we can make testimonials an effective part of our marketing campaigns.
Collect Them
It would be nice if customers just wrote out wonderful testimonials on their own, walked into your business and slapped them on the counter……….it just doesn’t happen that way. So what you need to do is pay attention to your everyday conversations with customers. Set up a file of the positive comments you hear – both in person and on the phone.
Why not look for compliments? Send your customers an email that asks them what they think about your product or service
Get Specific.
You want to be a little picky about the testimonials you use. Choose testimonials that are specific… you want to pick testimonials that will motivate the readers to pick up the phone or get in the car!
Identify Customers Giving the Testimonial
How do you feel when you see your name across a newspaper advertisement or across a web page? Yeah, most of us puff up a little bit…you know, the ego thing. Your customers will be happy to let you use their name and comments as part of your advertising campaign and will be only too happy to show it off to friends and family.
Web pages are great for highlighting testimonials. It’s easy put them in attention getting coloured boxes, or accent with clip art. You might want to even spread them out in groups to add interest to your page.
Think about this…testimonials are like pure gold for marketers. Yeah, the time you spend digging them up definitely pays off. Marketing research has shown that testimonials can increase sales by as much as 250%! Yep…testimonials really are worth their weight in gold!
