Stronger, Clearer Testimonial Letters Sell Better

Misconceptions about testimonial quotes from clients and customers are
rampant, weakening Web sites and printed brochures that fail to use the
full power of these marketing tools. For instance, longer is not better,
and unsigned testimonials add little credibility, even for a professional
service where confidentiality is appropriate.

Here are two blurbs that I found posted on the Web, along with my analysis
and revision.

1. BEFORE:

Rudy, Exelrod & Zieff LLP has been very pleased with results of its website
developed through Lawinfo.com. Because our firm is easily locatable through
the major search engines, we are finding that numerous people are
contacting us who otherwise would not. Additionally, Lawinfo.com handles
modifications of our website easily and otherwise provides good service.
Sincerely,
Alan Exelrod, Rudy, Exelrod & Zieff LLP, www.reztlaw.com

PROBLEMS:

"Numerous people" is vague. I would ask this attorney how many that would
be - three a month, thirty a day or what? "Handles modifications of our
website easily" is unclear - does it mean that Lawinfo.com makes changes
soon after you e-mail them in, or that they have a procedure in place to
enable site owners to do it themselves? While this question is undoubtedly
answered elsewhere on the site, it can usefully be clarified within a
testimonial like this as well. Next, what is meant by "provides good
service"? I don't think the "Sincerely" is necessary. Finally, all
testimonials should have quotation marks around them to make it explicit
that these are the customer's exact words.

AFTER:

"Rudy, Exelrod & Zieff LLP has been very pleased with results of its
website developed through Lawinfo.com. Because our firm is easily locatable
through the major search engines, we now have more than thirty new clients
a month that we would not otherwise have. Additionally, Lawinfo.com posts
our e-mailed website modifications within a day, is always up and running
and resolves billing issues promptly."
- Alan Exelrod, Rudy, Exelrod & Zieff LLP, www.reztlaw.com

2. BEFORE:

"Kidspiration is fun! Students will think they are playing while they are
engaged in language development, concept building, and acquiring a variety
of learning skills such as classification and sight word knowledge." -
Renee Schorr, Early Childhood Teacher, Winship Elementary School, Brighton,
MA

PROBLEMS:

All nine quotes on this site use "will" or present tense, referring to
predictions or guesses about results. Not one testimonial talks about
real-life, classroom-tested results. Overall, this conveys a strong sense
that the product has neither been released nor tested in actual classrooms.
Poking around on the site, I learned that is absolutely untrue. The site
thus needs to go back to its testimonial writers for real observations or
get new quotes from those who have seen the product in action.

AFTER:

"Kidspiration is fun! Students in my classroom believe they are playing
while they are engaged in language development, concept building, and
acquiring a variety of learning skills such as classification and sight
word knowledge." - Renee Schorr, Early Childhood Teacher, Winship
Elementary School, Brighton, MA