newsletter Archives - Peter Grandstaff

The Power of Authentic Testimonials

Testimonials add something very special to your website, when they’re authentic. It’s a third party who presumably has nothing to gain by saying good things about you. Readers are more inclined to believe a third party, but poorly executed testimonials just won’t do.

You can go on and on about how great you are and all the benefits people get when they do business with you, but it’s still just you talking. You’re biased, and people know it… “Of course they say it’s the best thing since sliced bread, they came up with it!”

When a third party talks about how great you are, it’s completely different. They don’t profit when you make a sale. Yet, they took the time to write a few words expressing their satisfaction. A visitor to your site can read some testimonials and feel reassured that real people have gotten real benefit from doing business with you.

Of course, since the testimonial is on your website you could have written it yourself or edited it heavily. In fact, a lot of people do write the testimonials themselves and ask clients to sign off on it as if they had written it. Don’t do that. Your testimonials will all sound the same and people will not be swayed by the words.

Your testimonials must be authentic, and there’s a few basic things you can do to make sure they come across as the words of real, three-dimensional human beings:

Get people to write their own testimonials. The main reason I hear why people write testimonials for their customers or clients is that they asked for testimonials and never got them. It’s not because people don’t want to write them or don’t have time. It’s because they don’t know what to say.
When you ask someone for a testimonial, give them some guidance. Ask them what benefits they received from buying your products or services. Ask them what they would tell a close friend who was considering buying your products or services. Whatever you do, don’t just say, “Can you send me a testimonial?”
Everyone has their own voice and that’s the single most important thing to capture in order to make your testimonials authentic. The varying tone and voice in your testimonials will make everything believable to the reader.
Give attributions for each testimonial. Real people have names, occupations, and live in specific places. Provide that info along with the testimonial!
Nothing says unauthentic like testimonials without names. Granted, some industries shouldn’t give out names for confidentiality reasons, but whenever possible provide a name.
If you serve a wide geographic region you can show that off by listing the location with each testimonial. This will reassure readers that you’re a match for them even if they live further away from your home base. Additionally, it adds another layer of authenticity.
Listing the occupation of your testimonial’s author is another way to show visitors they’re in the right place, that what you offer can help them. This is especially useful in the business to business market. It lets you demonstrate that you either serve a wide range of industries or have a specific niche that you focus on.
Got pictures? Use them! Reading words and names is one thing. Seeing someone’s face is another. If feasible, provide a picture along with each testimonial. Outside of video, nothing will make your testimonials more three dimensional than a picture.

Remember to capture and showcase the unique voice and identity that goes with each testimonial. Your visitors will recognize the authenticity and be reassured by the third party validation.

Of course, testimonials aren’t as powerful as reviews in third party websites or publications, or word of mouth. They are a powerful sales tool, though. I suggest having a section of your website devoted to showing them off, and using them any place where a visitors will be making a decision on whether to do business with you or not.

Engage Your Audience with Online Video

There are hundreds of places to share your video online. Click above to search for them.

Video is huge. It’s all over the web these days. There’s nothing new about that, but what I see is a lot of small businesses that still aren’t using it. It wasn’t that long ago when having video play right on your website was a difficult and expensive task. Today, there’s simply no excuse: video sites handle the technical side for you and affordable HD cameras can make you look like a pro.

In the average US home, a television is turned on for over 6 hours a day. No matter how familiar someone is with the web you can be sure they’re used to video. No matter how complicated your website is, video is simple. It takes a click to play it, and then your visitor can just sit back and consume your message.

There are a variety of ways you can put video to use effectively.

Welcome Videos — These are really good at getting the visitor’s attention and making sure they feel like they’re in the right place. Ideally the video will show a person talking, but it could also just be a slide-show with voice over.
Product Videos — If you’re doing eCommerce then product videos can really boost your conversions. Looking at pictures and reading about a product can only make it so real for us. When we see it in motion, with a real person using it and talking about it, a product becomes much more real.
Virtual Tour Videos — Show off your facilities and offerings with a video tour of your business. Be sure to highlight things that make your shop unique and get someone passionate to narrate the tour.
Sales Videos — Use video on a sales page to drive home the benefits and wash away the objections of your prospect.

You can pick up a pocket sized HD video camera for less than $150 plus the cost of a memory card. I got a Kodak Zi8 for my birthday this past week, and I think that’s the best option out there, right now, for web video.

If you’re camera shopping, make sure it has a microphone jack so you can upgrade your audio equipment as your budget allows.

You can edit your video in iMovie or Movie Maker then just upload it to YouTube, Vimeo, and tons of other sites. Then, just look for the “embed” link and send that code to your webmaster or paste it into your site. Don’t forget to post links to your video on your social media sites as well.

So, when you’re out doing your weekend shopping why not pick up a cheap camera and start playing around with video. Your website will become instantly more engaging for users and you’ll benefit from the increases in visit depth, time on site, and conversions.

This post first appeared in my small business e-mail newsletter.

How To and Why You Should Issue Press Releases

You should be issuing press releases regularly for two reasons.

To get increased media visibility and coverage, giving you better brand recognition, trust and authority.
For increased traffic and links for your website, giving you more sign-ups and revenue.

Now, media visibility is a very different ballgame from 15 years ago. Back then, press releases were just for the press. Hardly anyone outside the media and PR firms ever read them. Now that everything is online, press releases show up in people’s search results, in Google News and Yahoo News, and on industry websites.

So, I say it’s okay to depart from the traditional style of release. I’m in favor of adding more background info and color to releases. Now, that doesn’t mean you should think of it as sales copy. Oh no. Keep it objective, but interesting.

If your release can stand on its own as a well written article then it’s more likely to make a splash. An editor may decide to run it with only minor edits to fill some space. Consumers who find your release online will be more likely to read through, and then click through to your website. News websites and blogs may syndicate your release.

I’m not going to teach you the format for releases, but when you’re ready just google [how to write a press release] and you’ll find plenty of sites to tell you the proper formatting rules. Stick to the standard format.

Spend plenty of time on your headline. That’s what will make or break your release. Remember that reporters and editors will respond to headlines differently than general readers. You can tailor your headline for pick-up by established media, or for general readership. Ideally you’ll write a headline that appeals to all of your audiences.

Write it about anything new: new products, new services, new facilities, new charitable efforts, new management… you get the picture. Your release needs to be newsworthy. It does not have to be ground breaking or amazing, just fresh.

Once you have your release, and compelling headline, it’s time to actually distribute it. If possible, post it on your website first. That way search engines know you had the content first.

Then you can e-mail it to all relevant media outlets. (Visit their websites and look for the “Newsroom” link.) You can send your release in email format – no attachments! – to the main Editors’ address, but it’s even better to hit the specific departments and reporters that cover the subject of your release.

Finally, you’ll want some form of online distribution. This is what will get you into Google News and relevant websites. Reporters and editors also comb the feeds from online distribution, so it’s a double whammy combined with your e-mail to them.

There’s a great and free press release distribution website, PRLog. I suggest you start there, as the paid distribution options can get expensive quickly. PRLog will let you set up a company profile with full contact info and logo. Your release can include a photo and up to three links, depending on its length. One of my favorite features is you can schedule your release. So, set up your online release ahead of time.

You should try to send your release out on Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday. Mondays are too busy. People are just trying to finish the week on Fridays. Releases are often released first thing in the morning, but you might have fewer competitors during lunch time.

You might get a call from the media for more details and such, so be prepared. Have some good pictures at high resolution on hand to send upon request.

Now the fun part: you can sit back and watch. Search Google for your headline or random sentences from your release to see where it shows up! Your distribution service should also provide some data on how many viewers you had there.

Hopefully someone will come in holding a newspaper with your picture and story in it. That’s what happened to J & J’s Deli after the release I wrote went out. Here’s the article.

Get those releases out. Do it every few months. Don’t have time? Hire me. Call 919-636-0953 or e-mail me.

Videos for Your Lazy Memorial Day

It’s a lazy day around here with Memorial Day. We’re having a block party later on, and I’m guessing you’re probably not terribly focused on work either. So, this month I’m not going to write a long, original article. Instead I have some videos for you to check out if you have some time to kill and want some good business brain food.

First, a video of Seth Godin talking about standing out. Some of you might remember a previous newsletter on this topic. Well, I don’t think I ever included this video. It’s worth watching just to find out how Silk brand soy milk tripled its sales. Running time: 17 minutes Seth Godin on Sliced Bread & Soy Milk

This next one is a bit off topic. It’s an interview with Richard Stallman. Never heard of him? I’m not surprised. He’s sort of an underground hero. You see, when he was a student at Harvard and working in the MIT artificial intelligence lab, he started creating free software so that academics could freely modify it to suit their needs. What he started back then, in 1983, was called the GNU project. You’re probably familiar with it. Most people just call it Linux. The correct title is GNU/Linux, as it’s a combination of Stallman’s work and a kernel by Linus Torvalds. Anyhow, Stallman recently gave an interview to Mashable that I think should be required viewing. Running time 3 minutes Stallman on Software Freedom

Finally, for you copywriting geeks out there, here’s a video presentation by Drayton Bird, who, according to David Ogilvy, “knows more about direct marketing than anyone in the world.” In it he breaks down and analyses four advertisements — two by him, one by David Ogilvy and one by Claude Hopkins. If you’re a student of the persuasive power of language then you’ll love this one. The link is to a summary, just click through to watch the video. They won’t try to sell you anything. Running time 50 minutes Drayton Bird’s Ad Crunch

Sorry, I can’t embed this last one, and I don’t think it will be available forever. It seems kind of hypocritical to post this non-free video after Richard Stallman, but hey – I’m not perfect.

Conversion Tracking You Can Do Yourself, Cheap

This is a follow-up to Is your business converting as well as it could?.

To figure out your conversion rate you need two numbers. You need to know how many total times you had the opportunity to make a conversion – e.g. website visitors, phone calls, or walk-in customers. I’ll refer to this number as impressions for the sake of clarity. You also need to know the number of successful conversions.

Note: Be sure to measure these over the same time period!

Then there’s a little math. Don’t worry, I’m a professional. Whip out your calculator and key in:

Conversions [divided by] Impressions [equals]
That will give you your conversion rate. Bump the decimal place to the right two spaces and you’ll have it as a percentage.

Example: Your website got 328 visits and you made 16 sales. 16 divided by 328 equals 0.04878. Bump the decimal over and you have a 4.878% conversion rate.

Okay, that’s the math. What about getting those numbers? Obviously, if you have an ecommerce site it’s pretty easy to figure out the number of visitors and the number of sales. It’s a little trickier if customers visit your website, then call in an order or visit the store.

The answer here is training. Train your staff to ask callers how they found you. Train your clerks to ask while they ring someone up. You can keep a clipboard by the register and the phone where your staff can mark down the answers. Heck, you could even use a fancy spreadsheet.

Spend some time figuring out how to phrase your question. Be specific. You probably don’t want to ask your regulars “How did you hear about us?” You’ll do better with “How did you find us today?”

If you’re tracking phone conversions be sure to tally how many total calls there were in addition to the number of sales made on the phone and how people found your number.

Another option is to get an 800 number that forwards to your main line. Then put that number on your website instead of your regular number. Now you can track the number of calls that came from your website. Of course, that’s another monthly expense.

Now, on the web there are a lot of ways to track conversions. For instance, you can define goals and funnels in Google Analytics or use Google Conversion Tracking. There are great click-tracking systems you can install like Crazy Egg or ClickTale. That’s a separate article though.

This post first appeared in my e-mail newsletter.