5 Ways to Help Your Glowing Testimonials Truly Shine

If given the choice between blindly buying a product or service or reading the testimonials and reviews of countless fellow consumers, which would you choose? We think it’s pretty obvious that the answer would be to go with the advice from those with first-hand accounts and experience, right? For business owners, it’s important to embrace this consumer mentality while taking the time to fine-tune your approach to making the most out of every testimonial you have to share. Don’t worry though we did the legwork for you; here are 5 ways to help your testimonials shine:

1. GET TECHY

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While a written testimonial is great to have, words can still be overlooked or undervalued. Instead, truly grab the attention of potential new customers with eye-catching video testimonials that clearly express the sentiments of previous customers. By being able to put a face to the actual review- and listening to the person describe their pleasant experience- others will be more inclined to jump on board than from simply reading words on a website.

2. SHARE ON SOCIAL MEDIA

With your shiny new video ready to go, consider sharing those testimonials and the various other written ones across all social media platforms to truly attract the masses at once. Remember, reviews on your website are fantastic- once potential customers are actually on your website. However, in the meantime, you can reach more people at once by systematically posting and pinning customer reviews across your social channels.

3. USE YOUR BEST REVIEWS

Are we saying that you should delete or silence those that have had a bad experience? Absolutely not. In fact, we feel that poor reviews are a great opportunity to show what your company is truly made of by publicly working to understand and fix the genesis of the complaint (as long as there is validity to it.)

However, with that being said, of course you would want to share only the best of the best testimonials. After all, these endorsements sometimes hold the key to your next sale or major client contract.

4. TARGET & MATCH YOUR AUDIENCE

While any positive review will ultimately help your business, it’s important to target the audience you wish to serve with the testimonials that match it. On landing pages that target specific industries or needs, it would be wise to filter through your portfolio of customer raves and reviews to find the ones that match that specific client base. You want something that stands out to your potential customer that makes them say, ‘WOW! This company has done this before- and done it right!’

5. FINE-TUNE THE LOCATION

Testimonials on websites only go as far as the eye can see- literally. If you’re placing reviews on the bottom of website pages with very little traffic, chances are no one is seeing just how amazing your previous clients’ experiences were. Do your business a favor and fine-tune where you present the testimonials so that one of the first things new clients see on your page is just how great your product or services are.

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Keep the testimonials higher on the page and don’t be scared to test the waters with sidebar placements as well. Additionally, get into your customer’s psyche (in a good way) and help lead them to their final decisions. Testimonial placements near buttons such as “Contact” or “Buy Now” tend to have a higher conversion rate.

In the end it’s all about building up- and sharing- the reputation your business has come to have. Consumers want to know that what they’re paying good money for is worth the investment and that usually starts with hearing from other paying customers and clients. Remember, you took the time to provide an incredible product, service or customer experience, so let your hard work do part of the talking for you by way of glowing testimonials that will only bring in more success!

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It’s amazing how fast one negative review, or fabricated comment from a disgruntled troll, can put your reputation in a tailspin. Before you know it, you’re spending most of your day arguing with a person behind a screen, on hold with customer service robots trying to have the comment removed and banging your head against a wall because of the amount of times this review has been seen- or worse… liked! This isn’t where you shine as a business owner, and it definitely doesn’t sound like you’re doing yourself any favors by being emotionally invested. Leave the reputation management to professionals, like us at 2Ten Marketing, who specialize in building, maintaining and fixing your online reputation for the world to see.

Previously Published October 17, 2017