When was the last time you looked for something online and made a purchase without researching about the seller or checking for product reviews? Unless you were buying stuff from an extremely popular site like Amazon and you were ordering something like the iPhone, chances are pretty low for you to pay for something without researching anything about it. When you think about it, even Amazon and the Apple iPhone have got to the place they are due to their sustained marketing efforts over several years.
If you own a small online retail store, how do you compete against the likes of Amazon to sell your product. To put another way, if you sell headphones, how do you compete against the likes of Apple and Samsung that make headphones too? It is here that the power of testimonials come into play. According to a study conducted by Dimensional Research in association with Zendesk, 88% of respondents revealed to have been influenced by online customer reviews while making a purchase.
While it is important that you do not manipulate customer reviews on third party portals like Yelp or Amazon, you can still benefit from the power of reviews through customer testimonials. Testimonials are typically provided by real customers after they have tried your product or service. These references give new visitors an assurance that your business does what it claims to do and is thus trustworthy.
There is an entire industry that is based on fake testimonials and those that are paid-for. We will not be discussing them here. Instead, here are three easy ways for you to gather real testimonials from real customers that you can showcase to new prospects.
Free Giveaway : Newly launched businesses face the typical chicken-and-egg problem – they cannot get testimonials till they have happy customers; and it is difficult to get such customers till you have powerful testimonials and references. The trick in breaking this loop is by offering free giveaways to influencers and to your first customers. Everybody loves free giveaways and since there is no cash that exchanges hands, the reviews provided are mostly positive. For better impact, find influencers like bloggers and tweeters in your industry and offer the giveaway to them. This way, you can not only get a testimonial, but can also use their brand equity to reach out to more customers.
Facebook Reviews : If you have a well-engaged Facebook page, then you could pick a lot of new testimonials from here. Marian Berege, the owner of a wedding planning service in Perth tells me that the key to success in this strategy is to not aim for a testimonial but providing a well oiled platform for customers to interact with you. She says, 'A Facebook page for your business is like a landing page, helpdesk, review platform all rolled into one. By focusing on content sharing and engaging with your followers, you can get happy testimonials that you can put up on your website for other visitors later. Testimonials over Facebook is a by-product of a successful social media strategy and should not be the main goal.”
Plainly Ask : The third and most effective way to get high quality testimonials is by simply asking your long-time customers for one. As a business owner, it is important for you to be in constant touch with your customers, at least those who have been with you for a long term. These customers give you real, honest feedback on product and service that will help your business evolve. You can use this relationship to ask for testimonials. Most business owners will be happy to offer one if asked for.
Testimonials are extremely important for any kind of product or service. By deploying proper and honest strategies, not only can you help influence new prospects, but can also use this as a metric to understand your product better. What are your thoughts?