Client Testimonials: why you need them and 13 ideas for collecting them
Client testimonials and stories are the lifeblood of your design business.
They are what help people decide to work with you and they are proof that you are good at what you do and can get people results.
In this post I share the reasons why testimonials are so important plus 13 ideas for how to collect them.
Why testimonials are so important:
they are proof that people have actually worked with you before (people don’t like thinking they might be the only buyer!)
social proof that your service is good and people get results
they can be added to your website/sales page = more people will buy from you if they see others have had success working with you
they give you great content to share on social media
the online world is quite spammy and people want to know you and your business are a genuine thing
they can address objections/pain points that potential clients are having - e.g. if they are worried about value for money, time required etc. you can strategically use testimonials to address these pain points
13 ideas for collecting testimonials:
Screen grabs from your DMs or social media where people talk about their progress or their success working with you - these are great as potential future clients actually believe them (as opposed to testimonials that are just a quote written by you on your website, which nobody believes - see images below for what I mean). Make sure you de-identify any screen grabs that you share (or get permission to share them).
Facebook and Google reviews
Ask for a video testimonial (they can use a tool like Loom for this)
Set up Google alerts for your business name and share anything positive you find - you can do that here https://www.google.com/alerts
Regularly check mentions on social media by using the search function
Encourage clients to tag you on social media or share aspects of their build progress
Screen shot emails of thanks people send you (de-identified!)
Create a testimonials or ‘before and after’ page - e.g. here is a page for one of my courses
Offer rewards in return for reviews (not my recommended way of doing it as it feels spammy!)
Interview your clients in a Q&A style video - clip this down for social media or your website or share full video to YouTube. If you’ve got the budget then hire a professional videographer to film your completed projects and interview clients about the process of working with you.
Build a client completion survey (also great to help you improve your service over time)
Take lots of before/after videos and pictures and make sure to document (and share) the progress all your projects as you work on them (by the way mood boards of ‘upcoming projects’ if no project ever actually appears on your social media page or website aren’t believable so make sure you only share stuff that is actually true)
Use an online tool - e.g. https://testimonial.to/
Good vs Bad Testimonial Examples
Wherever possible try and share screen shots or get people to publicly review you on sites like Google/Facebook as these will be more trusted by your potential future clients.
Here’s two examples of a good and bad way of sharing testimonials - both shared by me over the years :)
The testimonial on the left was a genuine testimonial from one of my course students - but it could just have easily been made up - nobody knows whether it is or not (and people likely wouldn’t believe this testimonial).
The one of the right can’t have been made up (not easily anyway) so people are much more likely to trust this one.
Client testimonials and stories are the lifeblood of future sales for your business.
They also help to build the trust and credibility that you are an expert that can be trusted to work on their largest asset (their home).
So think about the different ways you can be encouraging clients to provide testimonials and reviews and build out some strategies you are going to implement.
Thanks for reading and catch you in my next post :)
Clare x
Dr Clare Le Roy
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