How do you make a decision on where to eat on Friday night?
Do you open the yellow pages and look for a restaurant, call them, and ask if they would recommend a restaurant for tonight? Of course not! They would recommend their own restaurant.
Instead, you call a friend.
You call a friend or you consult a review or you read a guidebook. Why is that? Because what people say about you is “at least” ten times more believable than what you say about yourself.
If an outside source with a real name recommends something to you, you tend to believe it because you inherently expect this person to tell you the truth. He or she doesn’t have a material interest in your decision to purchase. This person is simply telling you what he or she likes through his or her own experiences. And that’s powerful. OUTRAGEOUSLY powerful!!
Unfortunately, most people won’t believe you when you are selling something, because you are the one who is going to profit from the sale. And few people have the confidence in their own ability to make a good decision. And so, getting someone else to recommend you helps … a lot.
The easiest and most efficient way to get others to recommend you in your OUTRAGEOUS advertising is to use testimonials.
What is a testimonial?
Webster’s Dictionary defines testimonial as “a written or said recommendation or as an expression of esteem or appreciation.”
While this is true, some testimonials are better than others. These are what I call “good” testimonials.
A good testimonial does one of two things:
1) It relays a “specific” outcome
OR
2) It overcomes an objective
Both kinds of testimonials are important to include.
A good outcome is relayed by someone who has been a customer of yours, is believable, and is helpful. This is a place where I see a lot of entrepreneurs make a mistake.
For example, you’ll often see what people think are outcome testimonials where they say they saved hundreds of dollars or were happy with the product or service for whatever reason. While these words are helpful, they are too general and are not very powerful.
A “specific” outcome testimonial relays a specific outcome.
For example, instead of saying, “I saved hundreds of dollars,” a good outcome testimonial would say, “I saved $213.92.”
Or, instead of saying, “I was happy with your product or service,” a good outcome testimonial would say, “When I used your audio course to teach me how to speak Japanese, I was amazed that I could master the language in just nine short weeks.”
Hopefully you see the subtle but powerful difference between a generic outcome testimonial and a specific outcome testimonial. Obviously, the specific ones are much more believable, and that’s what you are attempting to achieve … people believing they are true.
And it’s the same when a customer of yours gives a testimonial that overcomes an objection.
These types of testimonials are just as powerful as outcome testimonials because when you bring up and overcome objections, it significantly helps your sales process.
Let me give you an example. Let’s say you are providing a weight loss product and you find out that many of your customers procrastinate before they engage your services.
A great example of a testimonial to overcome procrastination would sound something like this:
“I can’t believe I waited an entire year before I became a customer of the Take It Off Fast Centers. I could have been 20 pounds lighter 12 months ago and felt great about putting on my swimsuit while I was vacationing in the Bahamas last year.”
Can you see how these types of testimonials can get people to take action? It’s important that you figure out every reason why someone might not buy and have a customer testimonial to overcome each.
OUTRAGEOUS exercise Develop a list of all of the reasons why someone might not buy your products or services. Make the list as long as you can because the longer the list, the better the chance you’ll be able to overcome every objection that someone might have. A great place to get help with developing a very complete list is to ask your prospects/customers/clients/patients what their objections were before they bought. |
I’ve been in business a long time, and after many years of expecting (and hoping) that people would “automatically” give me great testimonials, I discovered that there is one best way to get them.
The best way to get testimonials is to … simply ask for them—and then make it easy for the customer to give them.
I know this might sound a bit obvious, but that’s how you get them. People don’t often volunteer praise that you can use publicly, but when you ask for it, praise is surprisingly easy to acquire as long as you’ve earned it.
But, as in much of life, a key to getting good testimonials is timing. So what you want to do is look at the entire experience that a customer has when he or she does business with you and figure out what is the “best” time to ask for testimonials.
For example, in my retail stores we discovered that the best time to ask for a testimonial is when the transaction is finished and the customer or client says, “Thank you.” That’s the sweet spot.
At that moment, you essentially have the customer’s full permission to turn to him or her—and you have to train yourself and your staff to do this—and ask, “Can you do me a favor?”
This is what we discovered. When someone thanks you for your service and product, he or she is actually thanking you for your expertise and therefore will always say “YES” when asked to do you a favor.
After he or she says yes, we always respond with, “I really appreciate your thanks, but would you take just a few seconds and write down for me why you enjoyed doing business with us so I can show it to others I can help just like you?”
And have a sheet of paper sitting there already prepared for the customer to write down his or her thoughts.
Another example is what we developed with a client of mine who sold new windows for homeowners. There we set up the testimonial at the beginning of the selling process.
In this case, we told clients that we were going to do a great job when we installed their new windows and all we asked in return was that after we installed them and proved we’d done a great job, the clients would put in writing the experience that they had dealing with the window replacement company.
Once again, it’s all timing, and you have to determine when is the best time when you are dealing with your customers/clients/patients to “ask” for testimonials.
OUTRAGEOUS exercise Write down every “step” that your customers/clients/patients experience when they do business with you and decide which step is the best time to ask them to give you a testimonial about their experience with you or your company. NOTE: You might find that you have to test a few steps before you find out which one is best. |
Of course you can help to prep them with their testimonials. Let’s go back to our weight loss example from above. If you have clients who told you they procrastinated before they purchased your weight loss service, you could say to them that you’d really appreciate them writing about how waiting a year turned out to be a big mistake.
Remember, when asking for testimonials, you always want them to address one of the two purposes …
1) Relays a “specific” outcome
2) Overcomes an objective
It’s a well-known fact that people are skeptical about testimonials. They often see them but don’t believe they’re real. For example, if they see a testimonial that’s signed with just initials, often they think it’s made up.
So what you want to do is make sure that as much information as possible is given about the person who is giving the testimonial. The more information you can include about the person giving the testimonial, the better.
At my menswear store, we ALWAYS included their full name, and we liked to include their occupation, how many years they’d been a customer, and their hometown in any testimonial we offered. We wanted others to know that they could believe our customers—because they are “real,” not made-up people.
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OUTRAGEOUS boost The information gathered to use for testimonials has the extra benefit of being added to your customer database, and people who give you testimonials often become your best repeat customers. |
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OUTRAGEOUS boost Blank space in your OUTRAGEOUS advertising doesn’t sell anything. If there is blank space, put a testimonial there and let that previously blank space now go to work for you to make your product or service more believable. |
Although there are lots of ways to effectively present testimonials, simply presenting them at all is effective because once again (it’s worth repeating) what other people say about you is ten times more effective than anything you can say yourself. So use them!
Use as many as you can use, and use them wherever you can use them. However, presenting them so that they stand out can be done in a number of ways. Some of my favorite ways to get them to stand out are:
• Use a different font for each testimonial.
• Highlight or capitalize some of the key words in the testimonial.
• Use a different color ink.
• Put a box around them.
• Show a photo of the person giving the testimonial.
• Place a headline above the testimonial that encourages someone to read it.
Again, I emphasize that you want to give the customer a chance to hear other people say things about you that are ten times as effective as anything you could say about yourself.
Finally, they can be long or they can be short. I’ve used four-page testimonials. I’ve used two sentences. It depends on the situation. Devoid of an opportunity to present a long testimonial letter (if you can), it is best to load up an ad with as many short testimonials as possible.
If you have testimonials, you can use them more than once.
You can use a testimonial, for instance, in a direct mail piece, a Web advertisement, a magazine ad, and, if you got the person to record it, for radio or television or a Webinar.
One of my favorite ways to use testimonials was done at my own menswear stores: whenever we put someone “on hold,” we had him or her listen to a six-minute continuous recording of our customers’ testimonials about how they liked shopping with us and some of the great services we provided.
As a matter of fact, you should always attempt to put testimonials in all of your OUTRAGEOUS advertising. I have never seen a case where a properly written and placed testimonial did any harm. They are a great benefit!
Here are some examples of the use of testimonials in OUTRAGEOUS advertising.
This section will focus on the use of testimonials, but there are other aspects of OUTRAGEOUS advertising to point out as well.
This example comes from England. That’s why the coin you see in the corner is an English tuppence.
Jon McCulloch is a freelance copywriter and certainly understands the power of testimonials, so he uses them to attract more clients for himself.
As you can see, he used the coin as a grabber to grab your attention, and then he goes on to talk in first person using some very good copy to reach the customer.
Page 1 of Jon McCulloch’s COIN MAILER. You can see this in full color when you claim your FREE CD of all of the exhibits in this book by using the form on page 312.
But then when you flip the page over, you see the back is loaded with twelve testimonials of “Success Stories From People Jon Is Making Rich.” Take a look.
Page 2 of Jon McCulloh’s COIN MAILER. You can see this in full color when you claim your FREE CD of all of the exhibits in this book by using the form on page 312.
Jon placed twelve one-paragraph or so testimonials from satisfied clients on the back of his OUTRAGEOUS letter because he knows that what people say about you is ten times as effective as anything you could say about yourself.
He further added credibility to each of the testimonials by giving their full names, business names, and Web sites.
Carefully read each of the testimonials and pay close attention to how he mixes outcome and objection-overcoming testimonials.
“Our appointment book has been three times as busy as last year.”
That’s a testimonial that Gary Shapiro of Bullhead City, Arizona, wrote to me about some help I gave him in his advertising. Gary actually wrote me a two-page letter that I use in my advertising, but I want to point out how he uses testimonials in his successful OUTRAGEOUS advertising.
Accu-Tax’s NEWSPAPER AD. You can see this in full color when you claim your FREE CD of all of the exhibits in this book by using the form on page 312.
Of course, your eyes immediately go to the heart in the middle of the advertisement. “WE LOVE SOLVING IRS PROBLEMS!” But as you see that and realize what this is about, you also notice, right outside the heart, the words of satisfied customers.
And if you look closely, you will see that only a first initial and last name is used. Although you do want to use full names whenever you can, sometimes, as in the area of tax returns, customers are more comfortable only putting part of their name where confidential information is talked about.
The rest of the advertisement includes all the essential elements: a headline, an offer, and a deadline—one time only. But the adding of the extra element of testimonials resulted in helping them to triple their appointments from the previous year … THAT’S THE POWER OF TESTIMONIALS.
Don’t take our word for it, take a look at what our clients say about us …
In this particular advertisement from my menswear store, we were sending out gift certificates for discounts off of our merchandise because of our anniversary. I put a headline on it and personalized it by writing it from me to you, and there was a deadline printed on the OUTRAGEOUS coupons. But there was more when you flipped it over.
FRONT AND BACK OF GAGE ANNIVERSARY AD. You can see this in full color when you claim your FREE CD of all of the exhibits in this book by using the form on page 312.
When the customer gets to the back of the letter, there is a clear section at the bottom of the page stating:
Don’t take our word for it… Take a look at what Gage clients say about us...
The important thing here is the use of the quotes and the font that is used. Each testimonial is in a different font, making it appear as if each was actually copied from the original letter. Again, just a little extra OUTRAGEOUS touch that increases the odds of the copy being read.
OUTRAGEOUS resource Your business should conduct an anniversary sale or event every year because an anniversary is a credible reason for conducting something special. In fact, I’ve seen many survey results that prove this. Of course milestone anniversaries, such as 5, 10, 20, 25, and 50 years, should be handled as even more special because people really love to participate in them. I teach this strategy in great detail in my Platinum Business Building Marketing System, available at bgsmarketing.com. |
In chapter 6, I described a campaign during which I sent out a nickel in the mail to promote a Buy-1-Get-1-for-5¢ sale.
There was one more element to that campaign—a premium (see chapter 8 for more on premiums) of a free wallet with any purchase during the sale. I enclosed a coupon.
FRONT AND BACK of Gage’s FREE wallet coupon. You can see this in full color when you claim your FREE CD of all of the exhibits in this book by using the form on page 312.
When I first looked at the proof of the coupon, I noticed that the back of it was blank. As I’ve mentioned before, blank space won’t sell anything and is a waste. So I filled it up with six great testimonials—a much better use of space.
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OUTRAGEOUS boost You’ll typically get a better response in your advertising when you include multiple inserts. For example, when you open up the Publisher’s Clearing House mailing that comes to your home, a whole bunch of stuff falls out of the envelope. This is designed to keep you involved in the mailing. A simple way to understand this is BUSY FINGERS INCREASE RESULTS! |
Scott Tucker is a former loan officer who now teaches other loan officers how to grow their businesses. This happens often when you get good at OUTRAGEOUS advertising. You exit your everyday job and start teaching others how to do what you’ve mastered. In fact, that’s exactly what happened to me. I became so good at marketing and advertising in my retail business that I began teaching it to others.
Scott is an expert at creating what are commonly called “tear sheet” mailings. This is an advertisement that at first appears to be a newspaper or magazine article that’s been ripped out and mailed to you. Typically it has a Post-it note attached to it with a handwritten note on it that says something like, “(Your First Name), Try This, It Works! J.”
Tear sheet mailings are very effective when you learn how to write them and design them so they appear to be an actual newspaper or magazine story.
But Scott Tucker went an extra mile by making the following tear sheet mailing a long-form testimonial. It works on the tear sheet level and the testimonial level.
FRONT AND BACK of Scott Tucker’s “Babe” tear sheet mailing. You can see this in full size when you claim your FREE CD of most of the exhibits in this book by using the form on page 312.
This is a great example of a long testimonial used to great advantage. And you’ll notice that this very long-form testimonial tear sheet actually BOTH offers outcome and overcomes objections.
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OUTRAGEOUS boost The attractive girls in bathing suits on both sides of the tear sheet appear to be part of the adjacent article in the newspaper, but they are not. They are like a border, and these girls actually increase response by as much as 30 percent. You noticed them and so does everybody else—both men and women. They do the same thing that grabbers do on a sales letter. NOTE: Don’t be offended. I’m onlyteaching what works. |
Sizzling Outrageous Summation
1) What someone says about you is “at least” ten times more believable than what you say about yourself.
2) The best testimonials either give a “specific” outcome or overcome an objection.
3) The best way to get testimonials is to ask for them at the right time.
4) Make it easy for people to give testimonials.
