Have you ever known something was important for your business but set it on the backburner because other things felt more immediate? Small business owners are only human and can’t do all the things all the time. One thing that typically gets put off? Collecting client testimonials. In this blog post, we explain why testimonials matter, where to use them, and how to add collecting them to your workflow with minimal work on your end.

The Power of Client Testimonials 

If you’re reading this blog post, someone has probably told you that client testimonials are important for your marketing. Integrating them into your workflow and marketing does take some work, so it’s worth keeping in mind why it’s worth it. Unique, on-brand copy is critical for driving leads, and testimonials support that goal. They help people see themselves inside your offer. Past clients can speak directly to how it feels to work with you.

Testimonials also show whether your results match up to your promises. My guess is that you’ve read a review before buying a product online. Reviews help us know whether to size up or down on a new jacket, or whether something is worth buying at full price. It’s not so different with your business. People want to know what it’s really like to work with you before they put down a retainer or even schedule a discovery call. 

One caveat that always applies to sharing anything client-specific: Make sure you have consent to do so. You can do this easily by including a checkbox for your clients to give consent for sharing or to opt out of doing so. We’ll touch on this more in the final section of this blog post.

Where Your Clients Can Market for You 

In a sense, client testimonials are like any piece of content: You should repurpose them as much as possible. Here are three places your clients’ kind words can work for you.

Instagram 

Thanks to Meta’s algorithms, not every follower sees every piece of content. In fact, some experts estimate that only 10% of your followers will see any given post. I say this not to discourage you but to encourage you to recycle content. Make your life easier by using your client testimonials in Stories, Reels, and posts. People won’t get sick of seeing them, and sharing them in different formats gives you a chance to do some storytelling from different angles. 

SEO blogging 

Speaking of storytelling, testimonials are a huge boon for SEO blogging. They help in two ways:

1. They focus your storytelling around your brand promises. Even if your blog posts cover different topics, they should always come back to that core brand messaging.
2. Clients’ kind words can increase your word count. You don’t want to go on and on for the sake of it, but higher word counts make your SEO blog posts more competitive.  

Let your clients fill out the story and highlight the emotion of the transformation your service provides.

Website Copy

When you were in school, you probably had to learn to write paragraphs that included an assertion and evidence to support it. Think of your client testimonials as the evidence supporting the claims on your website. With that in mind, take care to place testimonials on pages for which they’re relevant. If your services page claims to deliver a custom web design in just two weeks, include a testimonial that speaks to your speed and on-time delivery. General praise is nice but not as effective in driving your point home.

Our Strategy for Getting Stellar Client Testimonials

How to Collect Feedback

If you’re convinced that client testimonials will enrich your marketing, you might be wondering how to get them. Asking for client feedback can feel a little awkward if you’re not used to it. That’s why we recommend automating the process. For website copywriting clients, for example, a few days after we deliver the final product, we email a survey through our CRM. Clients complete a standardized questionnaire, and we keep moving through our ays without thinking too much about it.

Do you need a CRM? Dubsado makes it easy to automate workflows and streamline your processes. You can learn more about Dubsado here. (This is an affiliate link.) 

What to Ask to Get the Best Testimonials Possible

Not all client testimonials are created equally. The questions you ask can impact the response you get by guiding your clients towards responses on very specific aspects of their experience. Unfortunately, questions you copy and paste from Google won’t get you the best results. Instead, you should design questions specific to your service and client experience. Here are two things to consider when creating your questionnaire. 

1. What are your brand promises? On your website and other marketing channels, you share a core message about who you are and what you do. Take a documentary-style wedding photographer who focuses on candid moments on a wedding day. In your client testimonials questionnaire, explicitly ask how the candid photos make your clients feel. If you’re a business coach who helps clients create passive income, ask them how that changed their businesses and income potential.  
2. How do your potential clients want to feel when they work with you? People often think that they make decisions based on either logic or emotion. The truth is that we all use a combination of the two. Your questionnaire should include questions about feelings. Keep it simple because you never know what people will say. In our website copy feedback form, for example, we ask, “How do you feel about your website copy?” People almost always write full-on paragraphs in response. You might be surprised how emotional you can get when your clients share this type of feedback.

Notice that none of the examples here are “yes/no” questions. One thing we learned from teaching high school is that if you ask a “yes/no” question, people will just write “yes” or “no.” Ask open-ended questions to get those juicy client testimonials that make people curious about your services.

Putting It All Together

Once you have dreamy client testimonials, you may find that you want help leveraging them on your website and blog. Brandcendent provides trauma-informed SEO copywriting services. We create human-centered, on-brand marketing that connects with your dream clients. Reach out to us to learn how we can support you!