A website mistake I see a lot of web site owners make is with Testimonials.

By Frank Deardurff | June 9, 2008 |

This is actually a double whammy and here’swhy first off I don’t see people giving testimonials and if they do they don’t give their site url. Always give a site URL in your testimonial most marketers will not mind at all. I usually start of with something like “Hi, this is Frank Deardurff coFounder of AskDatabase.com and I’d like to tell you about:.” This is good for multiple reasons it gets you traffic back to your site. AND it helps build credibility.

Some web site owners will even LINK to your website through your testimonial. Of course in my opinon that is they OTHER mistake with testimonials. DON’T link to other peoples websites on your sales page. If you absolutely feel that you have to have the link open in a new window but I totally recommend that you don’t link it. You can display the URL to their site I always do IF they have given me that information. But by linking to their website you are giving that web site visitor a way out of your order process.

They could easily click that link, go to the site from the testimonial, and never return to your site. It is always best to not have any external links on any page in your sales process.

Another mistake I see a lot of web site owners make with testimonials is they don’t make them credible enough. Just a basic text testimonial could be written by anybody. It doesn’t matter if you’ve included their first and last name, city and business. It just doesn’t look credible.

Add a picture of them and if at all possible an audio. It is next to impossible to manufacture a testimonial that has an audio with it. And of course with video becoming more popular, video testimonials will definitely be very credible and I’m sure will improve conversion on any sales page.

So be sure you use your testimonials wisely in all aspects.

If you’ve found this web site mistakes tip useful, visit http://50biggestwebsitemistakes.com and register to be notified when this course is released.

I wish you all the best and much success,

Frank Deardurff III – That One Web Guy!

Posted in Marketing Tips, Online Tips, Web Resource, Web Site Mistake, Web Site Tip

About Frank Deardurff

My Passion is my Faith, Family, Love for Music, Art and Photography. I myself have delivered many of my own training courses as well as webinars and teleseminars for many other coaching groups. I’ve also published a book titled “50 Biggest Website Mistakes”. Having many decades of experience in various forms of graphics and IT experience and aspects of online business, my vision is to help others overcome their fears and frustration with taking their businesses online and reach the next level of success.

2 Comments

  1. Steve Brown on June 9, 2008 at 2:11 pm

    … and don’t forget checking that website in the testimonial.
    If the testimonial is all about how great your product/service is, but their website is dead-cheezy-or worse, you may want to just skip it.

    Steve

    Reply
  2. Frank on June 11, 2008 at 7:09 am

    Very good point Steve! You are SOOOO correct it could do more harm than good if the url in the testimonial is to a site that, is either “coming soon”; Doesn’t even exist; or as you said “Cheesy” and would do more harm than good.

    Thanks for the comment.

    Reply

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