What’s the Best Way to Solicit Testimonials from Customers without Coming Off as Spammy?

When it comes to soliciting customer testimonials, the last thing you want to do is tick off an otherwise satisfied customer by spamming their inbox, asking them too-frequently, or otherwise being just plain annoying!  But, you need testimonials from your customers in order to rank higher in search engines, build social proof, reduce customer acquisition costs, show prospective customers that your brand is trustworthy and valuable, and generate more traffic and sales for your business. 

So, what’s the best way to solicit testimonials from customers without sounding spammy or salesy, without being overly annoying, and most importantly, without causing people to turn away from your brand?

You might be surprised to know that there are actually some non-spammy, non-annoying, perfectly safe and powerful ways that you can solicit testimonials from your customers without driving them nuts in the process! So, before you start with the interstitial & ever-invasive pop-up ads that everyone hates or the annoying emails, texts, and constant push-notifications every two minutes that make people instantly regret following your brand, consider these unobtrusive, relevant, and incredibly powerful opportunities to solicit testimonials from customers without ruining the name that you’ve built for your brand.

Surveys, Interviews & Post-Purchase Requests

One of the easiest and least pushy or spammy ways to solicit testimonials from customers is to provide a survey, interview, or post-purchase request that simply asks the customer that has just purchased your product to consider leaving a review when they’re ready. Things like exit-interviews can work at the end of a projects for service oriented businesses whereas printing a QR code that links to your Google Business Page or another location to easily provide a review can be a great way for brick and mortar businesses to draw the testimonials from customers. 

All of these are non-invasive and, since they come immediately after a project or purchase has been completed, they are generally well-accepted by customers. Just keep in mind that you cannot be overly pushy. If you provide an exit survey, keep it short and focused. If you’ll provide a QR code to provide a review, make sure that it brings the customer directly to the review page such as Google, Facebook, or your website. Make it as easy as possible so that your customer doesn’t have to work at it!

Use Contests to Make Testimonials Fun

It doesn’t matter what your business does or what industry you’re in, people LOVE contests! Some will go through great lengths just to be a part of a contest and others not so much, but the point is, many find contests to be fun and exciting so it’s worth it to consider this one of the ways that you could be gathering your testimonials. 

With contests, just like any other solicitation for a testimonial, it’s important to keep it simple! You might ask your customers to leave you a review on Yelp, on social media, or on Google – it doesn’t matter where you decide to ask for the reviews, but in doing so you can then have them send you a screenshot proving that they posted the review qualifying them for the contest or you could get more technical and have them automatically redirected to your review page, where when they post, they are then automatically entered into your contest.

You can provide anything as the “prize” but if you really want to get reviews, you’ll need to make it worthy. Some offer gift cards, others offer tangible products, product discounts, or even cash. If you’ve got something your audience might want as a prize, you’ll get testimonials!

Host an Event & Capture Testimonials 

Many have found that the best way to solicit testimonials from customers without coming off as spammy is to do so during an event. If your business is one that hosts regular events, or that could host an event, capturing satisfied customers during the event is a great way to get the testimonials that you’re looking for! 

In fact, some brands have even created entire events that are solely based on capturing testimonials from their customers. For instance, a VIP event that invites only your top customers, the best of the best, will allow you to pool together a group of people that are all happy and talking about your product. Gathering testimonials from the group while they’re all together should be fun, easy and effective.

Incentives to Provide Testimonials

Finally, when searching for the best way to solicit testimonials from customers without coming off as spammy you might decide that offering incentives to your customers is the way to go. Similar to a “contest” but not exactly the same, offering incentives to your customers in exchange for their review is a great way to get people on board and shows that you value their time. 

Consider offering free gear, branded products, discounts, or other incentives to get your satisfied customers to provide a review for you. The sky is the limit, and there benefits that you’ll gain from having a testimonials without driving your audience away are priceless!