A customer testimonial showcases the best of what your products and services have to offer – through the eyes of your happy customers. It’s an indispensable convincing tool, but getting the kind of customer testimonial that really helps your business requires a proactive approach. Planning the who, what, when and how behind your customer testimonial requests will earn you high-quality customer testimonials.
Online reputation management (ORM) involves using your online reviews and testimonials to maintain a positive brand image and sell more – you need it, but how do you get it? Well, a 2020 BrightLocal survey revealed 73 percent of consumers received a review request from a business and 72 percent of that group went on to leave a review. Acquiring testimonials and reviews starts with just asking – and planning how to get a testimonial from a client is 100 percent worth it.
Read on to find out what is a testimonial, customer testimonial examples, what is the goal of a testimonial, why ORM marketing matters and how a professional testimonial service helps you with how to get customer testimonials that deliver profitable results.
What Is a Testimonial and Why Does It Matter?
A customer testimonial is a written or spoken statement expressing support for a brand, product or service. Customer testimonials serve as social proof that reassures your potential customers about engaging with you and makes their purchase decisions easier.
What Is a Testimonial vs. a Review?
Let’s start by asking, what is the goal of a testimonial? It’s designed to 1) build trust among your target audience, 2) make them hesitate less, and 3) take your desired action or convert.
Often, a testimonial is intentionally crafted to benefit a business and is displayed across your digital channels.
Online reviews are found on review sites like Google and Yelp, usually with a star rating from 1 to 5 (highest). Since these are third-party platforms and anyone can leave a review, the feedback won’t always be positive and you can’t control what is said.
Testimonials and reviews are equally important. Testimonials are useful for ORM marketing and establishing credibility, while reviews provide the transparency and honest feedback that customers value. The content of your positive reviews are considered testimonials when you use it to promote your business. It’s a good idea to take a few sentences from a great Google review, edit them for brevity and clarity, then design a testimonial banner for your website.
Elements of a Good Customer Testimonial:
✔ Results
What are the benefits your product or service gave to your customer? With a very small window to catch and keep your target audience’s attention, it’s best to be straightforward about what’s in it for them.
✔ Relatable
Including pain points or problems the customer faced before discovering your company helps your target audience relate. Then the testimonial should cover how the pain points were addressed and how their problems were solved.
✔ Detailed
The testimonial should be more information-heavy and touch on specific client experiences your target audience can relate to instead of general feelings. A testimonial is almost like a case study but executed creatively as a quick story.
✔ Authentic
It should express real feelings and feedback from a genuine customer who has interacted with your brand. Going back to what is the goal of a testimonial, you’re trying to build credibility and trust. Your potential customers won’t appreciate a testimonial that feels too scripted or forced.
3 Excellent Customer Testimonial Examples
There are many different ways to showcase your positive feedback, but here are three customer testimonial examples you can learn from:
1. Website Banner
Site visitors are at least a little intrigued by your brand already, so they will likely take the time to read your testimonial. You can get away with having chunks of text, as long as every line adds value to your potential customer.
2. Social Media Post
Social media is all about bite-sized, easily consumed content. What’s more, people who see your social media posts aren’t necessarily your target audience who will read what you have to say. Stick with simple and short posts when posting testimonials on social media.
3. Video Testimonial
Having video testimonials is ideal because you can present substantial information in an easily digestible way. Video experts recommend keeping it snappy and around two minutes long at most. Wyzowl reported that 84 percent of consumers said watching a brand’s video convinced them to make a purchase or subscribe to a service. Hiring professional video production services is worth the investment.
These examples give you an idea of what you should end up with, but the challenge is how to ask a customer for a testimonial of excellent quality. Now with a clear end goal, let’s dive into exactly how to ask for a testimonial from a client.
How Ask For Customer Testimonials That Help Your Business
It should be obvious by now that how to ask a customer for a testimonial isn’t so simple. It’s a tall order – but if you ask the right people, with the right timing and in the right manner, you stand a good chance of gathering high-quality text and video testimonials.
What do you want them to say? How will you explain what you want them to say? What channel will you use to send the testimonial request and when will you send it? Answering these questions will give you a clear path on how get testimonials from your client.
#1 Start With a Customer Testimonial Template Request
Why are you contacting your customers? First, you need to be clear about what you’re asking them to do. You can find a customer testimonial template ready online, but it’s important to build different versions unique to your business and your team can use in multiple situations. For instance, the tone of your request would be different for a first-time versus a long-time customer.
Here’s a sample customer testimonial template you can build from:
Dear [CUSTOMER],
Thank you for being a loyal customer! We’re so glad our [PRODUCT or SERVICE] has been able to help you [ACCOMPLISHMENT or MILESTONE].
Featuring customer success stories like yours helps us out tremendously. Would you consider [WRITING or RECORDING] a testimonial for us? It will only take five minutes or less.
You can follow this link to submit a written or video testimonial:
[LANDING PAGE LINK]
Please reach out anytime for assistance.
Many thanks,
[YOUR NAME]
Important points:
• Personalize your request and address them by name.
• Mention how important testimonials are to your business.
• Emphasize that the task won’t take up too much time.
• Include detailed instructions on a landing page instead of the request body.
• Be available to help them out.
#2 Include Customer Testimonial Questions as a Guide
What do you want the content to be? Now that you’ve gotten your customers to click through to your landing page, they need a push to leave a testimonial. So you want to include customer testimonial questions to shorten their thinking time (making them more inclined to do it) and simultaneously influence what you want them to say.
Sample customer testimonial questions to include:
• What do you like the most about working with us?
• How did we help solve an issue you were having?
• What benefits did you get from our product or service?
• Why did you decide to stay a customer?
• Would you recommend us to others?
#3 Prioritize Requesting Video Testimonials
How can you convince them to leave you a video testimonial? There isn’t a more authentic type of testimonial than a video, but it requires more effort from your customer. While there are no guarantees, making the process as simple and easy as possible gives you a good shot.
Consider these options:
• Present incentives such as gifts and free exposure for their business.
• Make it possible to upload their video on a landing page with a few clicks.
• Invite them for an interview and record it with their permission.
#4 Send It To Happy Customers at Their Peak Happiness Point
Who are you sending it to? Of course, it makes sense to handpick who you’re asking a testimonial from. Prioritize your best success stories, long-time clients or well-known people. The timing of your request is also a critical factor – find their peak happiness point.
Tips:
• Mentioning a testimonial in person makes it hard for your customer to refuse your request.
• Give them enough time to enjoy the product or benefit from the services you provide.
• Choose customers who you have delighted to such an extent that their testimonial will showcase major milestones and unique accomplishments.
#5 Send Requests and Follow-Ups Regularly
What channels are you using? Send requests where you think your customers will most likely see it. Email and SMS requests work best, but remember to stay on top of how often you’re asking. You can automate your follow-ups using reputation management software to ensure you’re following up at decent intervals.
Why You Need a Professional Testimonial Service
These best practices on how to ask for a testimonial from a client, will help you achieve your goal of increasing the quantity and quality of your customer testimonials. Working with professional testimonial and review generation services allows you to collect written or recorded testimonials efficiently to become marketing tools that help you sell more.
Rize Reviews offers comprehensive testimonial and review generation services tailored to your specific needs. We cater to businesses of all sizes, from service-oriented companies needing powerful video testimonials to eCommerce businesses needing more online product reviews.
Our reputation management software automates email and SMS requests and helps you manage your customer database for personalized testimonial requests. We also customize landing pages and a review widget to make it convenient for your customers to leave text or video testimonials on and off your website.
Schedule a consultation with our reputation management experts to learn more about how our testimonial and review generation services propel your business.
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