Use Testimonials To Boost Your Sales

By: Harry Piper

Every business has an easy way to persuade customers of the value of their services - testimonials from past customers. With around 8-10 testimonials, which can be written, audio or even video, you are in a position to get started. Using testimonials is probably the easiest way to increase your sales. Keep reading to learn more.

Time and time again, testimonials have been proven to increase your sales conversion rates, so let's quickly explore why that is. There's an incredibly powerful book by Robert Cialdini called Influence: The Science of Persuasion. For a period of some 36 months, Robert applied for sales jobs with various organisations, received their training and then watched the psychological strategies employed to turn prospects into customers.

When finally had enough data to evaluate about the gentle art of persuasion, he realised that all of the different approaches could be condensed into six major ways to influence somebody to buy from you. It's a book that's worth studying in order not only to help you improve your own sales processes, but also so that you can see when other people are using them to sell to you. However, when it comes to testimonials, the particular influencing technique is called Social Proof; it largely speaks for itself - it's proof from other people that your product or service is safe and worth while buying.

So let's now explore what you need to gather for testimonials. You need to avoid the kind of testimonial that states, "Bill's bakery is the best in town, we love them." The problem with this testimonial is that there's nothing very tangible or solid to hang your hat on. Another problem with a broad statement like above is that if you were making up testimonials for yourself, this is the kind of bland thing you'd be likely to say.

Instead of this you need to get testimonials that explain why your customers like you, with specifics of numbers or other details that give add substance to the message and really add credibility. A stronger testimonial might say, "Bill makes gorgeous cakes that never fail to delight our customers. In the many years we have been trading, Bill has always delivered on time. Their prices remain very competitive and they are always willing to bring us extras if we have a rush job. From the perspective of a catering company, we could not expect more."

Take a moment to study the differences. Even a cursory glance at the second testimonial will show several factors that will really matter to a commercial bakery customer. Using a strong testimonial like this can really help you win new customers.. When you combine this with another 5-8 similar ones, you get the basis of a very powerful marketing and sales tool.

To get things running for you, you'll want to gather some strong testimonials from your existing customers. First thing to do is ask! You'll receive very few testimonials if you fail to ask for them. Some of your customers might be a bit tight for time and ask you to write it for them. I've personally found that when I do this, they will scrap what I write for them and completely rewrite it, far more powerfully than I do.

Think of testimonials as ornaments that should grace every single piece of marketing you ever do. Use a strong phrase from a testimonial as a headline or sub-heading in a sales letter, you can quote them in sales letters, have a few choice comments in your sales presentation materials, brochures and newsletters.

Now you've got the strategy, I recommend you take action and go do something with it!

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Here are some examples of testimonials by customers for business coaching. An interesting one from the Chris Cardell VIP membership forum. There are other examples too on a business coaching website.

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