Podcast: Play in new window
I want to talk to you about how do you ask customers for a testimonials.
- Using Testimonials for Social Proof [0:15]
- The Problem With Most Customer Testimonials [0:34]
- The 3 Types of Testimonials [0:46]
- The Step By Step How To Strategy To Ask For A Testimonial… [2:22]
Using Testimonials for Social Proof [0:15]
Testimonials are what we call social proof.
It is a way of showing to potential buyers that other people have used our services and that they like us and that they like buying from us so that it’s OK and that they will have a good experience if they buy from us as well.
Marketers have used this form of Social Proof for many years, and its been made extremely popular on late night TV infomercials as well with celebrities as well as every day people giving their experiences of using the product or service.
The Problem With Most Customer Testimonials [0:34]
The challenge is often so many entrepreneurs and small business owners try to use testimonials but they just absolutely suck, putting it bluntly.
It will be a customer saying…
“X, Y, Zed Widget is great, you should buy it.”
Maybe its just me, but that’s not what I consider a very powerful testimonial.
We need a testimonials that connects with other people and overcomes their potential objections of why they aren’t ready to buy right now.
The 3 Types of Testimonials [0:46]
- Written Testimonial
This can go on your web page. It can go on your flyers, it might go on your business card. - Audio Testimonial
This is where maybe you’ve had somebody on the phone, and you’ve recorded them giving you the testimonial. This can be used on your website. It could be sent as a CD to potential clients. - Video Testimonial
My favorite type of testimonial. The reason I like video testimonials is from your video you can display it as a video on a website, send it to them as a DVD, put it into your other promotional videos, but you can also extract the audio out of it and it becomes an audio testimonial, or you can get it transcribed and it becomes a written testimonial. So video gives you kind of the leverage to be all three.
The Step by Step “How To” Strategy to Ask for a Testimonial [2:22]
Now, what I want to do though is I want to share with you the strategy to getting great testimonials. Not just oh so and so was great, you should buy from them. We want powerful testimonials. Now I’m going to share with you a technique, now I learned this technique from a good friend of mine, Dale Beaumont, and I believe that he learned this strategy from another good friend of mine, Jesse Forest, who is a very good copywriter and it wouldn’t
surprise me if Jesse also learned it from somebody else. And now you’re going to learn it from me. We’re just kind of passing it on because this is really good quality technique to getting great testimonials.
So, the first thing we do is we don’t call it a testimonial to our clients. We ask them for feedback. Now the reason we do that is because if you ask someone for a testimonial, one, you’re implying that they actually had a great experience. Now, hopefully in your business you are giving a great experience and you’re delivering massive value so that’s OK, but better off not making that assumption. So, we’re going to ask them for feedback.
The other powerful thing about a feedback is they’re not just going to freak out and go, “Oh, I better think of something good.” When you ask them for a testimonial they think,”Oh, I’ve got to come up with something” because when we ask for feedback we actually ask them questions, and we ask them four specific questions. Now, the reason we ask them four questions is it’s to put some structure to the answers they give back which we will later turn into a testimonial.
- “Were you at all hesitant about buying from me or buying X, Y, Z Widget? If so, why? If not, why not?”
We want to find out from them were they hesitant about doing business with us because in a testimonial someone else is probably going to be thinking “Will I do business, will I not do business?” So, a testimonial says, “Hey look, I was really unsure about how great your seminar was going to be, or I wasn’t sure if your product would do what I wanted it to do.” If it starts out with that, someone is going to identify with it. - “What ultimately made you decide to buy X, Y, Zed Widget? Or to do business with X, Y, Zed Company?”
We’re looking to connect with other potential customers and show them that while they may have been hesitant the reason they bought is because of a benefit that they saw. - “What has been the biggest benefit or the results that you have achieved since attending that event or buying that product or doing business with us?”
We really want to focus on the result here, to show others considering our product or service that others are getting great results. - “Who would you recommend buy X, Y, Zed product? Come along to X, Y, Zed event? Do business with X,Y, Zed and why?”
You’re asking them to tell you who they would recommend it to and why they would recommend it to them.
So there are your four key questions. Now, I also like to also throw in a fifth question…
“Do you have any comments or would you like to provide a brief testimonial?”
…this allows them to provide some extra content that might just give you more juice and hot buttons for a testimonial.
Now here’s the key.
Once they’ve answered those questions, you take the answers to their questions and you turn it into a testimonial.
You write the testimonial for them or you edit the video into a testimonial, and you send it back to them and you say…
“Hey, thanks so much for your honest feedback, I really appreciate it. I love you what you wrote so much that I’ve actually put it together into a bit of a blurb that I would love to share with other people who are considering doing business with us. I hope that’s OK, Here’s a copy of it, just send me back an approval to say yes, it’s OK to use and P.S. by the way, if you could, send me a photo so people will know you’re actually a real person. That would be fantastic.”
And it’s as simple as that, guys. That’s how you ask and you get awesome, powerful testimonials. Hope that’s been helpful. I will see you soon.
Carl is the Author of Red Means Go! and founder of Business Builders Academy. He invests in and runs a number of businesses, and regularly teaches business skills through online training and live speaking events.
