Charlotte Advertising Agency

Customer testimonials are one of the most powerful marketing tools available. A close cousin of the ‘referral’, testimonials provide a third party endorsement of a product or service and they are incredibly effective means of overcoming consumer skepticism. This is particularly true, if you have a small business that operate primarily in a local or regional market. After all, when a testimonial is from someone in a consumer’s own state or city or even neighborhood, it is generally perceived with an extra helping of credibility. The extra bonus of the customer testimonial is their power to solidify the relationship with the customer offering the endorsement. After all, once a person has “gone public” with their recommendation of a something, they are much less likely to abandon the brand.

When it comes to obtaining effective testimonials, small business owners typically have an advantage over large businesses  since owners are generally in contact with at least a portion of their best customers on a regular basis. Most consumers who have had positive brand experiences are more than happy to pen a few words of recommendation if asked by a familiar name or face.

So let’s talk about the nitty-gritty for a moment.

How should you collect testimonials?

1. POS. Ask for them at the point of sale if you have a retail establishment. Create a very short comment card to collect the information. Ask open-ended but specific questions such as “What part of your shopping experience did you enjoy the most?”  or  “What would you tell a friend about XYZ product?” Sincerely thank your customers who take the time to fill them out and ask permission to publish their responses. Assure them you will use only a first name and last initial and a city to protect their privacy. (Adding a location to a testimonial increases the believability factor).
2.  Online. There are literally hundreds of web sites that allow consumers to submit reviews of products, services and establishments such as Insiderpages.com, Yelp.com, Google Places and local.yahoo.com Make sure your company is listed on these and then encourage customers to use them via word of mouth, cash register receipts, web site links from your site or blog and even links on your HTML emails. The secondary benefit on online referrals is they elevate your online visibility and often link back to your web site. The result?  More traffic to your website. Voila!
3. Social Networks. Shame on you if you haven’t set up a Facebook Page for your business and then explored other social sites to assess their fit for your brand. These sites can be a rich environment for two-way conversation with your customers that often result in unprompted testimonials.

When should you collect testimonials?

• As often as possible. Testimonials collection shouldn’t be a ‘campaign’. It should be an ongoing effort in your place of business.

Where should you use them?

• Your print materials. Sprinkle them creatively in your text and images to reinforce your brand messages.
• Your web site. There are so many fun and creative ways to bring testimonials to life online. Video messages, animated text formats and even graphics. Of course, there is nothing wrong with the old-fashioned list format if the content says it all.
• Your direct mail or email. Spice up your newsletters by adding a new testimonial or two to the sidebar and margins. Give customers something new to think about by varying the type of testimonial.

Which ones are best?

• The best testimonials are the ones that are specific. The ones that refer to specific dollars saved or products purchased. Details make the statement more believable and often more useful to the reader.
• The key to a great collection of  testimonials is diversity. Make sure your testimonials address different aspects of your business when possible.

Hopefully by now you’ve started thinking about how testimonials can add impact to your marketing pieces. Now, get out there and start the conversations with your customers. It’s time well-spent.

One of the best parts about working at Mindstorm is the wide array of great clients we work with on a regular basis. Recently we completed and launched two new web sites for clients that have truly been a pleasure to work with, in two very diverse industries.

The first site, aimed at the local surfers and skaters, is for Charlotte and Myrtle Beach-based surf shop Wallerbears. It’s rich with cool imagery and gives visitors easy access to the shops via the social network of choice. It also provides product inventory information and helpful links for snow and surf reports. The owners of the shop really know their business and have a need to update product and store information quickly and efficiently. To best meet this need, we built the site using In Context Editing features from Adobe. This gives the client the ability to make changes to their site on their own schedule and without added cost.

The second site we recently launched was for a company named American Boxwood. As their name implies they are a national supplier of boxwood plants to landscapers and nurseries. In addition to redesigning their business-to-business web presence, we also completed a company rebranding including logo redesign. The impressive team from American Boxwoods opened our eyes with their depth of knowledge in this niche market. We certainly relish the opportunity to be a small part of their successful team.

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