A little bit extra

[hostpath.com]

How do you get and keep customers? By providing "a little bit extra". Give customers a little bit more than they expect and you can win a customer for life.

In my article "A Lifetime of Loyalty" I wrote about how a very large company lost my business, probably for life, because they took away a small incentive they'd already given me. Instead of providing "a little bit extra" they didn't even manage to provide the basic service that was EXPECTED.

Tom Peters says that if you treat your customer with simple, common courtesy you can have the lion's share of any market. He's on the mark, for the most part, because so often companies fail to provide even this most basic level of respect for their customers.

Imagine what you can do by giving a little bit extra!

Giving a little bit extra opens the door to one of the most powerful sales tools you can acquire: testimonials. Testimonials are important -- no, more like vital -- in expanding your sales. Testimonials turn your current clients into "sales partners". They extoll the virtues of your company 24/7, right there on your site, right in front of your potential customers.

People TRUST testimonials. If you don't feature testimonials on your site, you're missing a valuable opportunity. Provide your customers a little bit extra and you can tap into the power of your "sales partners".

[Living Media]

Well, the "giving a bit extra" is easy enough - though, with the sheer number of hosting companies that don't give a bit extra, you begin to wonder...and then welcome their disgruntled customers with open arms.

I don't use testimonials on site, but I have several clients to whom I can send people - either to their sites, to look around and then contact them and ask about the service, or via email. Too many people are getting too jaded about testimonials - not only on web sites, but in general. Some studios fake viewer reviews on movies, some stores fake customer testimonials on their sites / on their literature. Having a few customers to whom you can send prospective clients, or having a good referral program (not affiliate sales, and not pay-per-click referrals, but actual "warm-leads-to-sales" referrals does actually make your customers a part of your sales force - and rewards them for doing what they'd do anyway, if you treat them well.

[hostpath.com]

Originally posted by Living Media:
Well, the "giving a bit extra" is easy enough - though, with the sheer number of hosting companies that don't give a bit extra, you begin to wonder...and then welcome their disgruntled customers with open arms.

And therein lies your opportunity.

Regarding testimonials, I firmly believe in their power to persuade. It's good you have customers to whom you can refer folks, but why wait to be asked? Yes, some folks have become desensitized to them, but I'd be willing to bet that posting some actual testimonials on your site would increase your conversion rate -- or at least be one factor contributing factor to raising the rate (which, as you know, should be something you focus on).

There are lots of small ways that, combined, can improve your conversion rate -- testimonials are one of those ways.

People worry too much about increasing traffic to their site instead of increasing the rate of conversion from the traffic they already get.

[hostpath.com]

Oh, and I forgot to mention:

Look how deftly and expertly Vito uses testimonials for his Flash demo products. He cites each compliment from his customer along with the customers FULL NAME and link to their site.

http://www.demodemo.com/testimonials.html

Very well done. Clearly Vito understands the power of this tool.

They only constructive criticisms I'd offer to Vito would be:

1) Testimonials are best when deployed as 2-3 lines in "sound bite" style. Some of his testimonials are several paragraphs. While they're fantastic, I'd probably pull out the best couple of lines from those long texts for best effect, and then provide a "more..." link to read the full testimonial.

2) Randomizing them on the page would be great, if it can be done with reasonable effort.

3) I'd put a random testimonial on the front page of the site, with a link that says: "See what our customers have to say..." to the full testimonial page.

Steve

[Living Media]

Problem being, I don't trust third-party testimonials worth beans. If I don't hear it straight from the person themself, I don't trust it. I don't feel good asking my customers to put faith in something that, as an overall concept, I view with extreme prejudice. It just doesn't sit well.

For those who trust them, stellar. I just don't trust them. I find it very hard to reconcile using a sales device that I view with such suspicion. I've been toying with ways to include testimonials yet provide a way to get in touch with the person who gave them; but until I can do this spam-free (ie, without exposing my clients to spam from other, less scrupulous hosts), I'm not using that particular tool.

I realise that this is a personal quirk. I also realise that it could impair the effectiveness of my sales efforts. However, every one of my clients who has come to me from a method other than WoM advertising from current clients has remarked on my straightforward conduct and the fact that they didn't feel pressured but truly helped. I see it as selling myself and my tech support team as much as selling the hosting services.

[hostpath.com]

Originally posted by Living Media:
I see it as selling myself and my tech support team as much as selling the hosting services.

OF COURSE!

No doubt, you are dead on. You shouldn't be selling Web hosting services at all! Any clown off the street can open a reseller account and sell Web hosting. The thing that is unique about YOUR hosting company is YOU. Make no mistake: if you are serious about business you're selling YOU. That's why testimonials are so powerful.

People want to BUY, they don't want to be SOLD AT. Customers don't want to be wrong, they want to know that they are making the RIGHT decision. Testimonials reinforce that.

Of course if you dislike them, then you've got a built-in bias and I wouldn't expect you to implement a sales concept that you dislike. You have to be comfortable with your own approach. You may be leaving money on the table every month, but if the concept bothers you that much then there's no sense in implementing it and fretting over it. Ultimately you have to be able to sleep at night, and that's certainly worth a few hundred dollars in lost sales per month.

I can only talk about study data, which (based on the last study I saw) says that over 70% of consumers have more confidence in a company that has verifiable testimonials.

Again, not looking to convert you (or anyone here), just sharing the benefit of my experience. Adding testimonials to the last site I built up and then sold had a real impact on the conversion rate.

Testimonials are nearly as powerful as the idea that your customers can buy without risk. That's why a MBG tops the list of vital sales tools and testmonials come right in just below it.

[Living Media]

Verifiable testimonials. That's the kicker. ;-> Well, that and "verifiable without bothering my clients overly much or exposing them to too much possible spam." I've been playing around with asking my clients to put their testimonials in the "Feedback" board in the support forums, and then linking to them from the site. That lets people see the client URLs, and send a PM if they choose.

[hostpath.com]

Or, if you post their testimonial on the site, you can do a form request for feedback. In other words, if the customer wants to talk with the client directly, they click a link that actually goes to a form you supply that sends the request to the person who gave the the testimonial -- rather than listing their e-mail address on your site.

[vito]

To an extent I agree with Lesli in that unless a testimonial is verifiable, it ain't worth a hill of beans. I have seen many sites where the testimonial is written by " John C., Columbus, Ohio". Anybody can make that up. That is why with my testimonial page I list the customer's full name and URL (with their permission, of course). Not their email address. Just their URL.

Steve, you're right on when you say that far too many people get obsessed with increasing site traffic versus increasing conversion rate. Imagine a site that gets 400 uniques a day and has a conversion rate of 1%. That's 4 new orders a day. So the site owner wants 8 orders a day. How much effort/expense would it take to increase traffic to 800 uniques a day? Unequivocally, it is far more effective and far less expensive to "tweak" the site and increase the conversion rate to 2%, effectively providing the 8 sales per day.

I watch my site traffic very carefully in real time. I must say that I have noticed an increase in my conversion rate since adding the Testimonials Page. I've even watched visitors as they navigate the site. It is not uncommon to see them hit the Testimonials Page, stay there for several minutes, then make a beeline for the Order Page. It really does work.

Thanks for the great suggestions, Steve. When I settle down from returning from the Vegas get-together, I will implement the changes. :beer:

Vito

[hostpath.com]

Originally posted by vito:
I must say that I have noticed an increase in my conversion rate since adding the Testimonials Page. I've even watched visitors as they navigate the site. It is not uncommon to see them hit the Testimonials Page, stay there for several minutes, then make a beeline for the Order Page. It really does work.

Very strongly agree. I witnessed the same thing, and after advising some others I've consulted with, so did they. It really is a very underestimated tool.

Originally posted by vito:
Thanks for the great suggestions, Steve. When I settle down from returning from the Vegas get-together, I will implement the changes.

You've done quite well so far. I think those few tweaks will make your excellent effort even stronger!

Steve