Better Conversion Tip #11 – Test Different Testimonials
If you can swing it, adding a celebrity endorsement will always help to establish credibility. And the celebrity doesn’t have to be Tom Cruise or Madonna. In fact, the best “celebrities” are those who your target market knows within the subject of your niche. Selling a guide to home repairs? Then you’d want a “Bob Villa” or similar type. Selling a magician-themed product? Then having David Blaine endorse your product is a good idea.
(More about that topic in a previous post “Celebrities And Direct Marketing”.
And even if you can’t get Mr. Blaine to give you feedback, you can always use a 3rd party testimonial (just check on the legality of copying a quote in the manner you’re using it).
What are 3rd party testimonials?
Here’s some examples from some sample web site copy in a situation where there weren’t many customer testimonials available:
“Spyware, without question, is on an exponential rise over the last six months.”
– Alfred Huger, Senior Director of Engineering, Symantec Security Response (maker of Norton security software)
“Simply clicking on a banner ad can install spyware.”
– Dave Methvin, Chief Technology Officer, PC Pitstop
“A deployment method is to “trick users into consenting to a software download they think they absolutely need”
– Paul Bryan, Director, Security And Technology Unit, Microsoft
What’s happening here is that these are quotes from experts in their respective fields and used to support the case.
But…as I said, be sure to get their consent or permission from the copyright holder if there’s ever any question about copyrighted materials as your source. Note that I also pushed an emotional hot button…fear. It’s been proven that people will generally do more to avoid pain than to obtain pleasure. So why not use that tidbit of info to your advantage?
The point here is that you can turn these quotes into testimonials, provided they’re talking about the problem. You obviously can’t have them endorse your product if they’ve never seen it or provided you with a first-hand testimonial. But in certain cases you can have them address the problem, then you can move on to provide the solution.
When testing testimonials, be sure to test both with and without photos, audio, video, etc. when you can.