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Leveraging Testimonials to Attract Customers

by system
Mon, Aug 20th 2012 12:00 pm

Testimonials are an excellent way to promote your business and its products and services. Your testimonials can help you attract new customers, retain existing customers, and can even prove useful in your marketing campaigns. Why? 

They add credibility. 

According to a recent study by Deloitte, 82% of consumers have made purchases that were influenced by consumer reviews. While not exactly the same, client testimonials can often build the same sense of authenticity that is created by a customer review. 

They make you more believable.

It's one thing for you to say you're awesome, but quite a different thing for others to say it about you. If you say that your product or service is amazing, reinforce it by adding a corresponding testimonial - it will make your message more authentic. 

Your testimonials can help you retain customers, too.

Asking someone for their opinion and then using it publicly can help you leave a stronger and longer lasting impression with that customer. Additionally, by asking customers what they think of your business, product, or service, you're helping to reaffirm that positive opinion with them. The act of asking someone to recite a positive opinion could also increase the chances that they will tell others about your product or service, too. Just be sure to obtain written consent before using any testimonials in your marketing campaigns.

How do you get testimonials?

Just ask. Follow up with customers shortly after you've sold to them to ask them for feedback. This can be in the form of an online survey or phone call (or both, depending on your business model). You may also want to include a feedback form to your site. Make sure you point customers to this form in your communications and on your invoice or packing slip.

There are a lot of ways you can use customer testimonials once you have them: you can use testimonials in presentations, at trade shows, conferences, webinars, press releases, direct mail campaigns, print collateral, and video, when possible.

However, our current focus is adding testimonials to your website. To do this, you can create a new testimonials page and/or include a module that features your latest testimonials on the borders of each page. To get stated building your testimonial collection, log on to your Fission dashboard and select Showcase Manager > Testimonials.

 

After you've successfully added testimonials to your website, be sure to share them via your social media channels. Don't skip this part of the process, as it's an easy way to beef up your content marketing efforts, as well as tell your company story to your brand's fans and followers. You can also use this as an opportunity to publically thank your clients for their business.

To learn more about adding testimonials to your existing website, please contact an account manager today at 716.829.7373 or 360psg.com.