Testimonials Are Great Credibility Building Tools

If You Know How To Use Them Correctly

If you are not fully employing testimonials from customers and clients as a marketing and sales tool in your company, you're missing out on one of the most powerful ways to generate sales there is available in business today.

If I have to guess it's a 50/50 chance you are even using testimonials in your marketing systems within your company.

And even if you are it's a safe bet you are woefully underutilizing the potential power they can have inside your marketing and selling systems.

Testimonials are like raw nuclear material.  Unprocessed uranium & plutonium ore is useless unless you know how to extract the right elements and then expose the finished product in the ideal environment to unleash it's full and virtually unending force.

Testimonials have the same potential power too if you know how to properly request them, collect them, document, package and effectively deliver them to your leads and prospects.

Let's look at 2 testimonials I've received and see the different ways I present them to make them more believable and powerful.

Beginner Level Testimonials

Below are what I would call the poorest excuse for a testimonial.  But you see them everyday in printed material and on websites.

In fact they are so incomplete when I look at them I think the company might have just made them up themselves.

By just using the initials of the person giving the testimonial when I read it I think the company is hiding something from me.  Why wouldn't they put the person's full name so I can see it comes from a real person?

Whenever possible use the person's full name who's giving the testimonial.  If you didn't ask for it up front, always go back and get permission from the customer to "publish" the testimonial and their name.

Intermediate Level Testimonials

Below are are the same testimonials but I've included the full name, city, state and company name and title of the person giving the testimonial.

I've also bolded certain parts of the copy to emphasize the quote and the person's level within the company.

Because my clients are Presidents and CEOs of businesses I want to make sure the reader sees these are people at their same level, saying positive things about me. 

If your customers are not "corporate", any other distinguishing personal factor about them can be inserted to add credibility.  Their age, weight, hobby, the product they bought, member since 1996.  Best if it's something a potential customer will identify with.

Now what else could I add to make these testimonials more powerful?

Advanced Level Testimonials

They say a picture is worth a thousand words.  Presented as part of your testimonials a persons picture makes the testimonial even more believable and compelling.

Why?  Because you can now read and SEE the actual person.  You gain an added level of trust because the comments being given seem more genuine when there's a face associated to them. 

. David Catalano talking about Jeff Bell...     "He’s really helped me quite a bit in my business.  He’s driven our response rates up and our costs per lead down.  He's been very good to work with..."   David Catalano, CEO Midwest Bankers Group, Inc. Indianapolis, IN www.MidwestBankers.com

. Charlie Haboush talking about Jeff Bell...     "I greatly appreciate the work that you’ve done... And I was thoroughly impressed with Jeff.  He has helped my company tremendously."   Charlie Haboush, President Specialty Capital Group, Inc. Indianapolis, IN www.SpecialtyCapitalGroup.com

In these I've also included each person's corporate website with links so anyone can click and check to see they are real, legitimate companies they own.

Now in the next level - what I call the Professional Level Testimonial - I've added what is the next best thing to talking to real people giving testimonials.

Professional Level Testimonials

Aside from an actual video of your customer, the next most believable, credible and powerful testimonial is an audio recording of their voice talking about you, your product or service.

Audio testimonials are very persuasive because you can hear the emotion in a person's voice - something that just can't be communicated in black & white.

Listen to the 2 testimonials from some of my clients below.  These were both unscripted.  I simply asked them to leave me their feedback on my Testimonial Hotline.

You can tell, just by listening, these are not paid actors.  They are not reading from a script.  Their words are real and very believable.  (Turn on your PC speakers and press the PLAY button to listen to each one.)

Listen to David Catalano talking about Jeff Bell... (Click  PLAY)     "He’s really helped me quite a bit in my business.  He’s driven our response rates up and our costs per lead down.  He's been very good to work with..."   David Catalano, CEO Midwest Bankers Group, Inc. Indianapolis, IN www.MidwestBankers.com

Listen to Charlie Haboush talking about Jeff Bell... (Click  PLAY)     "I greatly appreciate the work that you’ve done... And I was thoroughly impressed with Jeff.  He has helped my company tremendously."   Charlie Haboush, President Specialty Capital Group, Inc. Indianapolis, IN www.SpecialtyCapitalGroup.com

What did you think?  What was the impact of hearing each of these people talk about how they felt about me?  Compared to the written quotes, just hearing them talk casually and off the top of their head, the simple believability of what they said is 5x, 10x or 20 times higher than seeing the written words on the screen.

Put Yourself In The Shoes Of A Potential Buyer

Now imagine you are interested in buying a product or service.  Doing some research you run across 3 or 4 companies that seem to have what you are looking for.

One of the companies has a link that says "Click here to HEAR what our Customers are saying about our MiniWidget program".

You click and find a page with 6 or 10 or maybe dozens of Audio Testimonials from other people, talking about how they use and have benefited from the MiniWidget program.

You see their pictures, their full names, something descriptive about them.  And you can HEAR their voices describing their experiences.  You can't help but think, if there was ever a doubt in your mind in the first place, MiniWidget worked for all these people.  It will probably work for me!

Especially when you go to the other websites and see Beginner or Intermediate level testimonials (or no testimonials at all).  By comparison - which is what we all do consciously and subconsciously - powerful testimonials set yourself apart from your competitors.

Testimonials Can Be More Powerful Than Salespeople

Your testimonials act as persuasive sales people and can be more persuasive than your best salesperson.  Why? 

Because as a 3rd party endorsement, testimonials appear to be more objective than the average salesperson trying to "persuade" a person to their product.  They typically aren't paid actors or spokespeople like what you see and hear on radio and TV.

They have the power to help prospects over the edge of the "do I or don't I buy from them" question that your "undecided" prospects all have in their minds.

FYI: The service I use to capture audio testimonials is AudioGenerator.com.  You can click on the link to get a Free 21-Day Trial of the service and "hear" as well as see how adding audio to your testimonials, websites and emails increases their effectiveness as marketing tools.

For more information on how to use testimonials or to ask me a sales or marketing question, go to www.AskJeffBell.com

Jeff Bell - Sales and Marketing RESULTS - (317) 774-3787