The Power of Correctly Formatted Testimonials

No matter what you sell whether product or service, online or offline you can dramatically increase sales by displaying testimonials from previous customers that are happy with your product or service.

Even those of you that are using testimonials could increase sales by formatting them correctly. Firstly let’s take a look at how you can acquire those first few testimonials to get the ball rolling. Let’s assume that your website is brand new and you have not made any sales yet.

How to get testimonials

My first suggestion would be to contact a few people that your product or service would appeal to and offer them a free copy, trial, loan etc.. In exchange for a review of the product.

Simply send them the product and ask them to fill out a questionnaire, you can then use the completed questionnaire to create a testimonial.

The most basic testimonial you can use is a text only testimonial. However, even these can be extremely powerful when formatted correctly.

So what does a correctly formatted testimonial look like?

1) Every testimonial should contain the customers name and their city or county. This provides added credibility that the testimonial is genuine.

2) The testimonial should alleviate or address concerns that the visitor may be having about purchasing your product.

3) You should bold, underline or italicise the benefits or the main points of the testimonial. This make it easier for the reader to skim read the testimonials and you are drawing their attention to the parts that matter.

Asking The Right Questions

As we have covered already to acquire testimonials you’ll need to ask for them but how and what you ask can make all the difference.
Why not send all of your previous customers a simple questionnaire.

Here’s some questions you might want to ask them:-

Did you have any concerns before purchasing?
Was the product shipped on time?
Is the product what you expected?
How have you benefited from the product?
What do you particularly like about the product?
Etc…

Don’t forget to ask if you can use their feed back on the website.

By creating testimonials from questionnaires you will not only discover new concerns that customers may have had before purchasing you can now alleviate similar concerns new customers might be experiencing.

Each piece of sales copy on the web should answer all objections that a new purchaser might have and testimonials formatted in this way are a fantastic way to achieve that quickly and efficiently.

Boost The Power Of Testimonials With Images Audio & Video

Remember the most basic testimonial is a text only testimonial. By incorporating Images, Video & Audio you can dramatically increase their credibility. Although “faking” testimonials is illegal adding audio and especially video removes any concerns that the testimonial is not genuine.