Getting Customer Testimonials for Your E-commerce Store: 7 Strategies That Work

Title

Getting Customer Testimonials for Your E-commerce Store: 7 Strategies That Work

Date

Dec 16, 2024

Description

Unlock the power of customer testimonials for your eCommerce store! Discover 7 effective ways to gather social proof that boosts conversions and enhances your testimonial page.

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Current Column

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Writer

E-commerce is a 6 trillion dollar industry.

While that means e-commerce business models are validated and can be profitable, making an online store stand out is not as easy as it was.

Hint: there are 4.6 million Shopify stores alone.

So if there is such a level of competition, why are so many players in this industry winning?

Because there are options to shine and proven tactics to differentiate and reach success.

You can start by working on the basics:

Creating a very attractive online store

Focus on creating or reselling high-quality products only

Operate with great internal systems (marketing, fulfillment, inventory, etc)

That’s the start.

Yet, there is a secret superpower that will make a difference and take down all barriers by showing your e-commerce store is the option to go. A reliable and trustworthy one.

Do you want to know this superpower?

Do you want to use this ridiculously good shortcut that looks simple at first sight but works unbelievably well once applied?

Then this article is for you.

The secret is simple and short.

It’s actually just one word: testimonials.

Testimonials are the positive experiences your paying customers had as they interacted with your store, product, support team, or anything around your shopping & post-purchase experience.

Since this is user-generated content and not a product of internal marketing in the full sense of the word, testimonials can help you reach your buyer’s mind and give a clear message: this business is good because its customers say it is good.

Since your potential customers usually have things in common with your customers, the effect is precise and unerring: your potential customers give themselves a chance to consider your offer or even better, are immediately sold.

Showcasing real experiences is the ultimate marketing hack to build trust in your brand.

But how can you get the full benefits if you have zero or very little testimonials?

The information in this guide will help you implement or improve your testimonial marketing game as an e-commerce business owner or manager.

Getting Customer Testimonials for Your E-commerce Store: The Foundation

Like I said in the previous section, you should start by working on the basics.

Building upon a solid foundation will always be the best for any business.

So, making sure your customer experience is top-notch before you start going hard into testimonial marketing is probably the best.

I am not saying you should have a bullet-proof and perfectly managed business before you request and gather testimonials but make sure you:

Your store has good-quality products

The appropriate options for customer support are available

Your business operation is running on the best practices and policies possible

Your e-commerce business doesn't have to be perfect, but having the right foundation will make things a lot easier.

So, without further delay, these are some of the most effective strategies to collect testimonials for e-commerce stores.

1. Provide an Exceptional Customer Experience

Before diving into any other tactic, you must create a memorable customer experience for your potential and paying customers.

It amplifies their loyalty and makes them more likely to leave positive reviews for your online store.

These are a few of the things you can do to make their experience once worth sharing:

Modern customers prefer to use their smartphones to shop online. So, a mobile-first design for your online store is crucial to offer an accessible shopping experience.

Ensure your product catalog is easy to navigate and offers authentic item details

Add relevant filters and categories so your customers can easily find the item they want

Collect customer data to personalize their experience in your online store

Offer relevant recommendations and let your customers add or remove items from their carts easily

Offer a smooth and simple checkout process so your customers don’t abandon their carts

Ensure that you have resources in place to address customer issues promptly. Consider employing a 24x7 customer service team. You can also include chatbots on your website to resolve customer issues quickly.

Encourage customers to share their feedback on your website’s user experience.

Prepare survey forms with specific feature-related questions. First, you can use positive reviews as customer testimonials. Second, critical feedback will help you detect loopholes and improve your customer experience a lot more.

If you work on the items above (you can even create a checklist) your customers will feel valued and provide authentic testimonials that will help you have more sales and more returning customers.

In all ways, this is an investment in the long-term sustainability of your business.

2. Implement Automated Testimonial Request Campaigns

Even if some people consider this “the age of social media”, email remains one of the most reliable channels for maintaining an algorithm-free connection with customers.

Considering that, an email campaign is probably the first outbound effort you should make to collect testimonials for your e-commerce website.

Your customers gave you an email when they bought from you anyway. Why not use it?

Just be careful not to fall into ineffective practices, like manual outreach.

Manually emailing each customer asking for testimonials can be hectic. It is impractical for scaling an e-commerce business and since it can drain you fast it may end up in you quitting testimonial marketing altogether.

To avoid this issue, set up an automated email campaign to gather testimonials.

The team behind Testimonial focused on creating a solution that automates testimonial requests, helping you accomplish more.

Now, you can request, collect, and showcase your testimonials using a single tool: Testimonial.to. This tool seamlessly integrates into your existing email workflow:

Send your regular confirmation email to your customer.

BCC T.E.A's unique email address and include a special snippet with customer details.

T.E.A. automatically schedules a personalized testimonial request.

The request is sent based on your custom timing settings, ensuring optimal engagement.

Now you can focus entirely on delivering excellent products or services while T.E.A. handles the testimonial follow-ups.

Finding the Right Timing Is Crucial

Above, I spoke about timing settings.

You have found a way to automate your emails. The next thing to consider is how soon after the purchase you should send the email request.

There is not a perfect practice to figure out that day range, since that varies from one store to another.

The best you can do is start from where you are.

Identify shoppers who bought items from your stores recently

Segment the list and send the request counting different days after purchase

Evaluate which group had most replies and more testimonials given

Once you are satisfied with the testing you can do more of what worked best and use that time range in your request.

For example, set up Testimonial Email Assistant to targets recent buyers within 5 to 7 days of delivery.

Customize Your Emails

Personalized emails can engage customers better and get you more testimonials.

Some steps you can take in this matter are the following:

First, write a compelling template(s). You can steal from our email template examples.

Segment your email list based on customer demographics and understand their preferences to curate the templates accordingly.

Add a catchy headline to your email.

Make sure your customer know what is in for them (even if it’s just the feeling of contributing to a higher cause or helping a brand they love).

Ensure the call-to-action is clear and eliminate other possible distractors.

Ensure your customers have a way to unsubscribe from testimonial emails, even if it’s just the option of replying to the email so you can remove them from the list.

You Can Also Request Testimonials Indirectly on Your Email Sequences

The alternative option of requesting testimonials indirectly via email is also open.

For example, Bellroy sent this email 30 days after purchase to:

Establish a new contact with their customers

Get feedback

Encourage them to share their experience on social media and tag them (indirect testimonial request)

Invite them to purchase new products

Make sure they have someone to contact if they need customer support

Amazing, uh? All of that with just one email send.

Diversify the Type of Testimonial You Request

Offering them multiple options also increases your chances of getting customer testimonials.

Here are some types of testimonials you can request via email, that are good for e-commerce:

A short video testimonial describing their experience

2-3 paragraphs for your website’s testimonial page summarizing what they liked about your e-commerce brand

A tweet or Instagram shoutout

The goal is to make it simple for the customer to leave you review. For that, you can use Testimonial.to’s collection tools which were created to simplify the experience.

Then, embed your testimonials on your website for greater visibility.

Your social media channels can be a goldmine of customer testimonials. To maximize customer testimonial collection, actively leverage your social media presence.

Choose channels where your target customers are most active. To collect testimonials for e-commerce websites, platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok are the best options.

Want to simplify testimonial collection? Testimonial supports these and more integrations so you can easily import your testimonials and embed them on any platform. So, if your customer posts a TikTok, you can easily embed it on a platform of your choice.

You can also encourage buyers to leave a review on your social media channels directly.

You can ask them to upload a story with a picture of the purchased items and a line or two on their experience, mentioning your social media handle. Include easy social media widgets in your emails and online store to make the process more accessible.

For example, Try Illuminate uses user-generated content from its social media channels as testimonials on the website.

Some good practices could be to:

Create engaging social media posts highlighting positive e-commerce testimonial examples. Feature happy customers and post snippets of their positive reviews. Don’t forget to tag them. It piques interest and drives more customers to share their experiences with your business.

Host live Q&A sessions to connect with your audience and try to find testimonial collection opportunities. Direct interaction with your customers lets you gather positive feedback. You can also detect issues in your customer experience and address them.

Whenever you improve your e-commerce website’s UX, conduct social media polls to tap into authentic customer feedback. Reply to every positive and negative feedback. Use applicable feedback or comments as testimonials.

Add a CTA button to your testimonial page in your Instagram bio and urge customers to leave testimonials for your e-commerce website.

Use social listening to track customer conversations and mentions of your brand. Identify user-generated content and customer testimonials for the online store. Share them on your stories to increase visibility.

Aura Bora did this perfectly.

4. Introduce a Rewards Program

Sometimes, even with quality products and exceptional customer service you may need to give your users a push so they take the time to leave you an impactful testimonial.

If that is the case, you can sweeten the deal with relevant rewards.

An incentive program can encourage your customers to leave glowing reviews.

It is mutually beneficial and can bring in-depth customer insights instead of vague feedback.

When managed well, incentive programs can be high-ROI investments on your business.

You should consider using Testimonial’s built-in Rewards features.

They allow you to show some appreciation to your customers who submit their testimonials.

They can choose e-gift cards from dozens of popular vendors.

Note: make sure you communicate the terms and conditions of the incentive programs clearly to your customers. Making it transparent for everyone involved is definitely a non-negotiable for any rewards program.

For example, Best Buy offers customer feedback incentives for every authentic, published review. The details and terms and conditions related to these activities are stated clearly on their page.

5. Add a Dedicated Testimonials Page to Your Website

Another great way to collect and showcase customer testimonials in online stores is to add a dedicated landing page for it. This way, your customers can easily leave their testimonials when they visit your site.

All you have to do is add a new page on your website or use your Testimonial.to page (you can add a custom domain to it if needed).

I love how PipDecks did this.

They added:

A message from the founder

A button with a link to their “Review PipDecks” page (hosted by Testimonial)

An embed of their Wall of Love

Just as in the PipDecks example, embedding your Wall of Love acts as a reliable source of social proof for potential leads browsing your products and services.

So, ensure the page is not plain or boring.

Include different testimonial formats to make it visually appealing and more engaging.

You can add the following e-commerce testimonial examples to give your customers different perspectives:

Text-based and image-only testimonials

Video testimonials

Reviews from external websites

Social media shoutouts

Other media mentions (podcasts, YouTube, articles, etc.)

Hint: you don’t have to worry about manually adding existing social proof to your website. There are great tools that help you import your social proof.

For example, Testimonial lets you embed customer reviews directly from social media channels and third-party review sites in minutes.

6. Third-Party Review Sites Can Help, Too

Now that we are speaking about third-party review sites it is important to note that many potential customers find them relevant as they make their purchase decision.

So, depending on what you are selling, they can add an extra layer of authenticity.

The first step to start generating third-party reviews is creating an account on credible review sites.

Most customers trust Google reviews while opting for an e-commerce brand. You can also enlist your business on Amazon, Yelp, Better Business Bureau, Shopify Product Reviews, Trustpilot, etc.

According to a study, verified buyer reviews showcase more 5-star ratings than reviews by anonymous buyers.

So, contact your existing customers with links to your preferred third-party review sites.

Happy customers may go this extra mile. So, identify buyers who have already expressed their satisfaction. Ask them to create an account and describe their experience on the review site.

Collect these third-party customer testimonials for your online store and embed them on your testimonial page.

For example, PopBrush’s customers leave reviews on the brand’s Trustpilot review page.

Additionally, PopBrush collects video testimonials via Testimonial.to to share them on their website. Thanks to their amazing product and the simplicity of their testimonial collection process, they have a whopping 500+ video testimonials on their website.

7. Run Contests or Giveaways

Run contests and giveaways that require customers to submit reviews/testimonials.

These initiatives create memorable experiences and increase customer satisfaction and brand loyalty. Your clients are most likely to share their experiences due to the fun and the incentives.

Some ideas to make this a cool (and profitable) experience:

Keep relevant gifts and rewards as prizes in exchange for honest testimonials. These can be your store’s limited-edition products, a goodie bag with your website’s best-selling items, gift cards for your store, dinner, a spa date for two, etc.

Promote the giveaway extensively on your social media channels and your website. Post stories with pictures of the prize. Highlight the gift items. You can even create an exclusive hashtag for the contest.

Use your customer’s followers to expand the reach by ensuring they mention your brand name in their review (that’s their entry to the contest). Assign extra points for aesthetically pleasing pictures and video testimonials. Always make sure the contest/giveaway rules are explained clearly.

For example, Supergoop’s Rewards Program offers 30 points for leaving product reviews and additional points for other tasks like sharing your birthday, taking their product finder quiz, and more.

Conclusion

Getting and showcasing testimonials can make all the difference for your online store.

Since each customer is different, try to test various methods to reach each one.

Make it easy for them to leave reviews with widgets and clear CTA buttons.

Provide multiple testimonial formats as options.

Understanding how to collect e-commerce testimonials may seem tricky initially.

But with the right approach and the right testimonial tool, you can perfect the process in no time.

With Testimonial's no-code solution, you can import customer reviews from multiple channels directly to your website.

Embed text-based and video testimonials, highlight impactful parts of a review, and create a stunning Wall of Love that impresses your potential customers.

Best part? With Testimonial, you don’t need coding skills or hiring a developer.

If this sounds good, go check out Testimonial and sign up today!

Getting Customer Testimonials for Your E-commerce Store: 7 Strategies That Work

Getting Customer Testimonials for Your E-commerce Store: The Foundation

1. Provide an Exceptional Customer Experience