You have a great Web site,brochures, sales flyers, POP displays, maybe even a weekly e-newsletter. Butare you overlooking the most important marketing piece – a customertestimonial?
Testimonials – third-partyendorsements of your products or service – add credibility and help alleviateany worries or concerns prospective customers may have.
Before you can usetestimonials in your brochures, Web site, and sales letters, you first need toget them. There are two different types of testimonials: unsolicited andsolicited.
Unsolicited testimonials arethose little nuggets that arrive in your email or regular mail that singpraises about your employees, service and/or products. You probably havealready collected quite a few. Now all you need to do is get the writer’spermission to use their letter as a testimonial. When you contact them, makesure to explain how you plan on using their testimonial, and make sure you getpermission to use their name and company (if applicable).
Solicited testimonials canarrive in a variety of ways, depending on how you actively pursue them: commentor warranty cards, follow-up surveys, Web site comment sections or directrequests.
It is hard to get awell-written testimonial. It takes a long time to get busy customers to writeit, and when they do, it often doesn’t speak to what you want to promote inyour business.
There are options: you caninterview customers about what they liked about your dealership, products orservice. It is best to hire someone – like a PR, marketing or freelance writer– to conduct these interviews, transcribe them, and edit them down to the mostsalient points. They can also get the customers to sign releases approving useof their testimonial.
There are three things everytestimonial should include:
1. Names. Get the greenlight to use your customer’s name (and company, if applicable).
2. Short, readablesentences. Testimonials should be three sentences or less and stick to onemajor point with a definable benefit.
3. Emotion. Toss out anyflat testimonials such as "XZY Tire did a great job." Replace it withtestimonials like this: "Wow! I never thought I could get our tires sofast! XZY Tire really earned our future business.”
With testimonials in hand,you can use them in direct mailers, on your Web site and e-newsletter, printads, radio or TV spots, or even create your own POP displays featuring thetestimonials.
– Source: Tire ReviewBusiness Toolbox
