Tell me what you think

Posted on Jan 22, 2020

How good are you at asking for testimonials or feedback?

Customer feedback and testimonials are great for your brand as they provide third party proof that you deliver what you say you will. Did you solve a problem, provide a solution, deliver something on time and within budget, do a good job or were great to work with?

However, as a nation, we’re really not very good at shouting about our successes. And I’m guilty of this too.

Testimonials are fantastic sources of information that can be directly used on your website (have you seen mine under My Clients?), and any customer quotes can be used as part of your social media content.

Ways to ask for Testimonials

You can ask your customers for testimonials in various ways:

• email request – send your customers an email directly asking for feedback
• use feedback tools – link to your favourite customer feedback tool such as Google reviews, TrustedPilot, LinkedIn recommendations, Facebook reviews, TripAdvisor etc. Because these are third party sites, feedback placed here are more likely to be viewed as real and honest feedback
• feedback cards – send your customers postcards asking for feedback
• face to face – a bit scary this one, but you could ask your customer for some feedback when you’re talking to them
• online surveys – you can set up an automated online survey (eg SurveyMonkey) that asks for feedback once your customer has made a purchase. This can be as simply as ticking a smiley face to asking a few questions and delving deeper into their responses
• videos – ask your clients to send you a video with their feedback, or video them when you next see them

But even less favourable customer feedback is still good as it provides an opportunity for you to make improvements and changes in your business. These too can be used in marketing as you can promote the changes you’ve made following customer feedback.

Do you have a favourite mechanism for requesting feedback? Do you offer an incentive to encourage customers to respond? Let me know!