Are many testimonials fake?

Right! Testimonials are extremely important!

That's rather a sweeping generalising. Although I don't doubt that a great number of testimonials are genuine, I, personally, don't take the least notice of them.

I have spent thousands upon thousands of dollars (I'm a marketer's dream customer) but I have not read a single testimonial or listened/viewed the audio or video testimonials, respectively either, even when I've been checking out products on Jeff Walker's own site (sorry Jeff) although the latter two types of testimonials have more credibility. I do a quick scroll down, passed the last testimonial on any sales site.

I've reluctantly used only two on mine which, by the way, are genuine but then I'd say that, wouldn't I and I would not blame anyone for doubting my word because I'm still an unknown online marketer although I have over two decades of specialist experience in my discipline in the bricks and mortar businesses I've run and have a file full of comments from attendees (from junior executives to CEO's of leading companies) who were kind enough to give me glowing feedback after each seminar.

I have another two product sites where I offer no testamonials at all and invite people who expect to see any to leave my site if they are not prepared to use their own judgement.

Arrogant? Perhaps. But then I won't risk getting the FTC (new guidelines) on my tail to prove that any testimonials that I do provide on site is genuine should some competitor maliciously plant any suspicions.

I believe visitors to my site should take responsibility for their actions and should be able to judge for themselves whether or not the product or service I'm selling to them is going to be of benefit to them. What one person may choose to say about my product (in a testimonial) does not necessarily mean that another will have the same result. There are too many variables for those comments to be of any real value.

I appreciate that online marketing has inherent risks for prospective customers but when one offers a 30-day or even 60-day money back guarantee, particularly when using Clickbank or even a merchant account, there's no risk to the customer. They either get value for money or their money back.

I'm so glad to see one Warrior prove my point. It srengthens my resolve to go down that route rather than take up valuable time collating and uploading videos and audios and typing up endless text testimonials.

James

Colm, I completely agree with you.

What I'm getting at is you can launch a page without any testimonials and make sales... then when you make sales you get feedback.

And that feedback becomes your testimonials.

I love testimonials as much as anyone else... I'm just saying that you don't NEED them to get a page converting at a decent rate.

Does that make a little more sense?

-Dan

May the force be with you!!! love it.

Let me chime in here with some very recent experience.

We are currently in a launch cycle for a mid-high ticket system.

So what we did a few months ago was go and find a core group of "influencers" in our industry. These are what we could call a group of "power users" who have had some experience and would be able to pick up the system without too much trouble.

So we recruited them and we worked closely with them for our product. Basicly we gave them as much or little support as they required to find success.

Then what we have are a core group of happy and successful users who are pleased to give testimonials and spread the social proof. And the testimonials are real and that realness really shows. and spreads the news of the product like wildfire.

This goes deeply with the concept of 1000 true fans. Or to start -10 true fans will do the trick. Find 10 people and get them to be your true fan and believe in what you are doing. Keep going and looking until you have those ten.

After you have 10 people who really believe in your product, then you are ready to go to the next step.

I had the same issue. This is what I did.

1. I had friends and family give me the initial testimonials.

2. After I had a few customers, I offered them a free report if they gave me their testimonial.

3. I obtained permission to use in marketing collateral and also slightly reword the testimonials if necessary in both cases since most people don't won't write them well anyway. Another tactic to get testimonials without an offer is to just write the testimonials for them and ask them to edit or approve as is. (This saves both parties a lot of time if what you write is true and you usually get a better testimonial)

4. I used SurveyMonkey to record all of the above for reference and documentation purposes in case any of my affiliate networks or regulators came knocking.

I would recommend any buyers or friends to give an honest testimonial including pros and con of a product.
Because in my own point of view, 9 out of 10 or maybe 10 out of 10 is'nt perfect, bound to have cons. So, by including pros and con, it would seems more real, rather than all testimonial gives positive comment, people would doubted it.

Some use pictures of everyday looking people to make them look real. I see lots of projects posted at Elance for testimonials stating they must be realistic, etc. Maybe when the new FTC law kicks we'll see more honesty.

One way I've seen marketers get testimonials is to include email in the AR that gets sent to your customer list a two or three days after they order and asks if they downloaded everything ok and such. Fishing indirectly you know. Another way is to just directly ask for feedback. Whenever a customer sends you something that is good testimonial material ask if you may use their first and last name and city and state. This will also give you valuable information about your customers and what they want.

Before you have customers, you can as it was suggested above, offer your book for free, but again, don't ask for testimonials in exchange or you'll need to write a disclaimer (new FTC laws). Just ask for feedback. Best wishes to you!

I agree with Jag82, there is a lot of persuasive power in social proof. And genuine testimonials can build credibility.

Sadly, I'm not sure that people outside of the IM community can spot a phony testimonial as easily as we can. And even when a testimonial looks "suspect", some will be persuaded by it because they want to justify their interest in buying the product.

I don't agree at all. Real testimonials have a ring of truth around them. You can indeed make up a testimonial, but testimonials that come from clients are very specific and detailed. And if a testimonial is crafted in the right way, it will indeed go a long way to reducing and removing objections.

When you ask for a testimonial, you're usually saying: Hey (insert name) can you give me a testimonial? Which is a slightly crappy way to ask for a testimonial. Because you're giving the person a zero-chance to respond to the question the way you want them to respond. (Waitasec, isn't this wrong? Why would you want to control the response?) Here's why.

For one, it's bloody hard to give testimonials. Try giving someone a general testimonial. Now suppose I change the way I construct the question to: Was price a big objection when you considered using our service? Now I've not just got the client to think about a testimonial, but specifically about price. So the customer may say: "No, it wasn't a big objection." Well that sets up the next question. So what was the big objection; what would have caused the hesitation to using our service?

Now the customer will tell you what the hesitation was.
 But if the objection was indeed 'price', then the customer would go down the road of price.

So why is all of this 'going down the road' important?
 Well, it's important because a testimonial is not a rah-rah set of words. A testimonial is designed to reduce risk. And increase the like-factor-both simultaneously. So if it doesn't address a single focus (e.g. Price) then the testimonials you receive are all over the place. And when you consider that testimonials are precisely meant to kill objections, then you need to have testimonials killing every objection.

So if you have a product or service and the main objection to the product or service is the following:
1) Price
 2) Timing
 3) Distance
 4) Whatever...
 5) More whatever... Then the testimonials need to address each and every one of those objections. Rah-rah won't help at all. What will really help, is the construction of the questions.

As you've heard before; Input=Output. 
The quality of your questions + the direction of your questions is going to determine the quality + direction of your answers. And that's just one tiny-itty-bitty lesson in the secret world of testimonials.

I read a fair number of your answers, and several of you mentioned that you never read testimonials. Well that's interesting on several fronts, because I can tell you that most of us do read testimonials, whether we like it or not. We may read them as 'reviews' or 'case studies' or even this amazing video...that doesn't look at all like a testimonial...but in fact is an amazing testimonial for this person.

Kim Komando's Video of the Day Blog Archive Amazing soda shop

That's only one side of the story. The other side is that "You are NOT your customer". What you think you do, is not what your customer does. I'd seriously doubt that many (if any) of us would buy a book off Amazon, or even a measly 99 cent app from the Apple store without reading at least some of the reviews.

On our site we track heatmaps of where people stop and where they read stuff. I can tell you (heck I can show you) how people slow down like crazy at a testimonial. Guess what they're doing? They're reading it.

One of the things that needs to be quicky understood is that testimonials don't stand alone. They are linked directly to objections.

Here's a tiny report that shows you how your customer thinks. And why you've often got the wrong end of the stick when creating (yes, creating) testimonials.

http://www.5000bc.com/2009/pdf/000_2...Objections.pdf

I feel this way too when I see a testimonial. It makes me think that they could not possibly trick anyone, but I'm not really sure if that is true.

I would say that most testimonials are fake in that they are either made up, friends or relatives of the person, or they are quite simply bought. That is not to say that all are, and that is not to say that you shouldnt use some of these methods, "fake it til you make it" and replace the friend testimonials with real ones after you have a solid track record. Many people will give you good word of mouth advertising if you have a good enough product.

It's when I have a product on backlinking, and I stick in my sales letter:

"This is an awesome product! I learned so much, it's amazing. Caliban Darklock is an awesome writer with massive genitalia who is probably smarter than Einstein. - Sally Jackson"

Except there is no Sally Jackson. I made her up, and wrote the testimonial myself. Maybe I stick a stock photo on the page and pretend it's her picture.