What’s the one thing that can kill a lead or a sale on your website before you even get a chance at that conversion? The critical factor that can undermine your entire marketing strategy and the beautiful website you just designed?
It’s a lack of trust.
When someone makes a decision to work with you, it’s not the quality of your service, your pricing, or even the visual appeal of your website.
It’s their belief in your ability to deliver the service and promises you’re making. If your prospect doesn’t feel confident that you will actually follow through with what you’re promising, they’ll head back to Google and find someone else to help them.
How can you quickly build trust with your website visitors?
You need to add some social proof to your website.
Let’s break down what that looks like and three simple steps you can take to add trust to yours.
Unlocking the Power of Social Proof
Nothing builds trust with your audience like someone else saying that you’re amazing at your work.
You can say many things about yourself and your services, but when someone else backs up what you’re saying?
That’s priceless.
Having a third party verify your expertise is called social proof. That social proof is essential when you run a service-based business online.
Anyone hiring you is honestly taking a bit of a gamble that you’re going to do what you claim. When you use social proof, it’s a powerfully persuasive tool that validates your brand and your services for potential customers.
If you want to instill confidence and trust in your prospects, you need some kind of social proof on your website.
What can that look like?
Types of Social Proof
Logos
Perhaps the easiest thing you can add to your website is adding logos of companies you’ve worked with.
As a service-based business, you likely have a longer relationship with your customers than most. Take advantage of that! Showcase your biggest and happiest clients by simply adding a logo bar of your clients to your homepage.
A logo bar is super simple to add to your website and yet it carries a lot of weight, especially if you’re working with bigger companies.
But even if your client list includes businesses you think “no one has heard of,” this can still help you.
Why?
Because your prospective clients know exactly who to reach out to for a reference about your work or they might even be able to go and see your work in the live world.
It shows that you work with real people and real businesses, and are going to be around for the long haul.
Media Logos
What about some people that you see online that have great logos from media outlets like Forbes, Entrepreneur, or other media outlets?
If you have press mentions, those can be so powerful!
Those press mentions show that you’re recognized as an expert in your field and you’ve gotten some coverage to back that up.
You don’t need huge outlets like Forbes either to start. If you want to get some media mentions, then you’ll want to check out my interview with Cahill Camden, CEO of Press Jockey.
Testimonials
What’s more powerful than a list of your clients?
Their words about what it’s like to work with you.
Adding testimonials to your site – that you cultivate and gather – can be a powerful way to let your customers speak for you.
Testimonials about your business and how you work, what problems you solve, but mostly what transformations you get can be your best sales tactic. 97% of B2B customers said testimonials and peer recommendations were the most reliable type of marketing content.
Testimonials not only build trust; they also lead directly to sales. Testimonials on a sales page can increase conversions by an average of 34%.
Why is this true?
Because we trust what someone else says about a product or service more than we’ll ever trust the person who created it.
Think about the last time you bought something from Amazon or another online platform. Did you read reviews before you hit Add to Cart? I’ll bet you looked at the rating at a minimum and read two or three reviews to go along with that.
My favorite walking shoes are from No Bull. I walk Mac at least 2 ½ miles every day, so the shoes I buy matter. I had a trainer friend who suggested No Bull to me years ago, long before they were the CrossFit sponsor. It was because of her review that I purchased them and was happy to spend over $100 for a pair of shoes.
Reviews and recommendations are powerful tools to get more sales in your business.
How to Ask for Testimonials
If you’ve never asked customers for testimonials or reviews, it doesn’t have to be overly complex.
Put together a short survey at the end of a project or at a certain milestone and ask for feedback.
Be specific about the kind of feedback you want, too. It’s hard for many of us to come up with a review on the spot, but when you guide someone with what will help you it also helps them to write something far more quickly.
That guidance can look like “Why did you choose to work with me” or “What kind of transformation have you seen?”
When you get more specific feedback, it makes it easier for you to get more powerful testimonials out of your customers.
Just make sure that you request permission to share that feedback before you do.
Adding Testimonials to Your Website
Now that you have some testimonials, where do you put them?
My favorite place to include testimonials is right on your homepage. Back up what you’re saying with someone else saying it for you!
You can also add a few testimonials to your About page and it can be really powerful to add a testimonial or two to your Services pages especially if that review is specific to that service.
Honestly, you can’t have too many testimonials on your website.
Case Studies
What’s more persuasive than a testimonial?
A full case study.
This works best if you’re helping clients achieve some kind of transformation and growth, but adding case studies to your site can be a critical sales tool.
Case studies or a portfolio of your work provide tangible evidence of the value and expertise you offer.
More in-depth than merely a logo and a short testimonial, case studies help you showcase real-world examples of how you successfully addressed specific challenges or fulfilled unique client needs.
When you can dive deep and show concrete results or even detail the process you followed, you’re adding another trust signal that validates your capabilities and expertise.
Case studies are powerful because they demonstrate your unique problem-solving abilities and industry knowledge, positioning you as an expert in your field.
This evidence-based approach can remove a lot of the final concerns someone has about working with you.
When you can pair a case study with a testimonial?
Powerful.
Adding Case Studies to Your Website
Thinking about including case studies or a portfolio on your website?
How you go about gathering data depends a lot on what you do, but make sure you get as many tangible numbers as you can.
You’ll also want to make a page dedicated to your case studies. If you have impressive case studies to show off, add this link to your main navigation upfront.
Let your work do the talking for you.
Just don’t forget to add a call to action at the bottom of each case study so those who are reading it can request to work with you straight away.
Elevating Your Website’s Trust Factor
Want your website to bring you leads and make sales?
You need to build that trust.
Trust is really the main factor that helps you to get more out of your website, connect with your customers, and convince them to buy from you.
If you want your website to bring you leads, adding social proof to it is just one of 10 easy ways you can get more leads from your website.
Want the rest?
Download my free guide to get more leads from your website.
