Have you ever sent that awkward email asking your client for a testimonial for your business? Painful, right? Let's resolve that pain once and for all.
Photo Credit: Artem Beliaikin for Unsplash
I connected with an old friend recently, and after offering some kind feedback on my articles, he gave me some solid advice. “Don’t get caught up in the ‘likes’ game,” he said. And on so many levels, I agree with this statement. For bloggers, writers, business owners -- anyone who creates and shares content -- this advice applies.
But it’s hard, right?
Because when you’re pouring yourself into a blog post (or design graphic or white paper) that you are really proud of, you want to know if anyone is actually enjoying it. You want to know if you are providing anyone with valuable takeaways. And if no one across the vast sea of social media actually takes the millisecond to lift their pointer finger and tap the like button beneath your post, you literally have no idea of what kind of impact you may be having.
The construct of social media does not allow for a true temperature read of your content. It is a vortex, and it is what it is: a blessing and a curse.
One day you’re flying high on a post that generated 700 comments and 10,000 views, and the next day your content gets barely any attention at all. And so it continues. Content creation is an unpredictable game, but it’s a game, and like any great athlete, you must keep playing, each and every day, if you want to see results.
Because as the business mastermind, @Pia Silva, always says, "content marketing is a long-term strategy."
Content creation is an unpredictable game, but it’s a game, and like any great athlete, you must keep playing, each and every day, if you want to see results.
But you need those likes to keep winning in business.
The counter-argument I’m about to make here is that likes are actually a huge part of your success in business. And at this point, I’m no longer referring to the thumbs up icon below your LinkedIn posts or the heart on Instagram.
I’m referring to likes in the form of references and testimonials.
How does a business truly quantify their success outside of straight-up performance?
Well, we know that social media engagement is not a true testament. But written references are, and that’s what we’re going to discuss in this post.
Glowing references are solid gold in the world of startups.
Once a business has gotten off the ground -- secured their first customer… their second customer -- they are going to need those references to secure more customers. And while I do believe that the game of ‘likes’ is a trap on social media, the art of securing testimonials for your business is not. It may be somewhat painful, but it is a necessary element to the marketing strategy of any business.
Ask yourself: What are the steps you take when evaluating a new vendor or partner for your business?
For me, it goes something like this:
Visit website to see if it looks current. Check.
Scroll around looking for information and hopefully pick up a positive vibe within the first three seconds of the visit. Check.
Look for a client list. Check.
Search for testimonials. Hmm...
Ok, well, since there aren't any testimonials, maybe head over to BFF Google and see what the world is saying about this business.
Can you trust reviews on Google? Maybe...
But wouldn't it be better if that business had its own testimonials to share?
Yes. It would. And of course, you already knew this.
So how do you go about getting testimonials for your business?
No one wants to ask their customers to give them a testimonial. I mean, you want to ask, but you don’t really want to ask. So, maybe you send your clients a nice polite email before the end of an engagement to see if they might be willing to throw together a quick quote you can use on your website.
And sometimes this works. But sometimes it doesn't.
And I'm not saying it doesn't work because your clients don't like you. It could be that they are super busy and in reality, giving you a testimonial isn't a top priority. And so then you're in the awkward position of deciding whether you'd like to ask them again... And that feels weird. So maybe you don't... And then maybe you miss that opportunity.
Sad, isn't it?
Side note: Thank you to those individuals who possess the kindness and understanding within themselves to give testimonials to young businesses in exchange for a smile.
But back to it.
Mastering the art of testimonial harvesting.
I’ve written a lot about my gameday experience clients from Omaha, Nebraska, and I am going to give them even more love in this post because they are 1) excellent clients, 2) stellar business minds and 3) wildly loved by their customers. And so, as part of our content strategy engagement, we embarked on what I like to call a ‘testimonial harvesting mission.’
Here's how it works.
We set aside some time to dig deeply into our brains to determine just how we could engage with their customers in a non-intrusive way to pull out some great feedback. From there, we assembled a list of ten thoughtful prompts on a fresh Google doc. We asked specific questions that were simple to answer (this is key!) and in line with our brand values. We created a nice introductory note to go along with the survey.
Then, we pressed send.
If you simply ask them for a testimonial, they'll have to think.... and that takes time and energy. If you give them questions to answer, the time it takes to complete the exercise is cut in half.
A few responses trickled in over the first week, and a few more over the next month. We received mostly excellent feedback, and because we had taken the time to craft a series of questions for said customers to answer, we received fairly beefy responses. In some cases, paragraphs of feedback, which was awesome.
You see, giving your customers questions to answer is so much easier for them. And this is where your head should be... easy for them. If you simply ask them for a testimonial, they'll have to think.... and that takes time and energy. If you give them questions to answer, the time it takes to complete the exercise is cut in half.
Then, just because we could, we used the responses to the questionnaire to populate an original "Testimonial Content Series" for their blog.
Check.
But that's not the end of the story.
Sprinkle your likes all over your brand. Like sequins!
From the long-form testimonial blog posts we had obtained and subsequently published, we pulled out the content gems and began to sprinkle them across the website. We took the best quotes of the bunch and turned them into beautiful graphics... and started sharing them on social platforms.
Because nobody puts baby in a corner, right?
Since testimonial quotes are such a crucial part of your business, you may as well squeeze every last bit of juice out of them. Take those gems and spin them into your promotional plan -- build them into blog posts, graphics, animated videos... the list goes on.
Rinse and repeat... with every willing customer you have.
Maybe you even make one day of the week in social media posts "Testimonial Tuesday." ;)
One last word of advice: Don't overlook the thank you "tag."
If a customer is generous enough to shell out their own time to provide you with feedback that may very well carry your business into its next phase, do that customer a solid and tag him or her when you share their testimonial on LinkedIn (Instagram, Twitter, Facebook... wherever.) They deserve that extra love from you, and you'll want them to know how much you appreciate them. Because a little bit of gratitude goes a long way.
Are you ready to start your own testimonial harvesting mission?
Book a call to see how it works.
And if you want to start creating content that sells today, download this free guide to get you started.
Amie Sheridan helps #entrepreneurs find their #cadence through #content. Follow her on LinkedIn. Find out how to get a custom content strategy built for your business in just one week!
