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Let's say, you've just finished your new product (e.g. e-book or a sofware) and got your salespage done. Everything is ready for the lauch, but you don't yet have any testimonials about the product. What is your strategy for getting testimonials and putting them in your salespage? Do you:

  • Ask kindly from the first buyers if they could write a brief testimonial about your product?
  • Send free copies of your product to some "high profile" people (e.g. some well known bloggers) and ask them to consider giving a testimonial? And do this before lauching the actual product site.
  • Some other strategy?

And few additional questions: How much do you personally value product testimonials? Do you personally even consider buying a product from a "not so well known person/company", if they won't provide any testimonials on their salespage?

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3 Answers

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Testimonials are collected over years, if not decades.

Bob Bly has dozens of sales page websites, and many, if not all, of them have a "wall" of testimonials. They're all about him, not necessarily any particular product that he's selling at the moment. Check out his site, MyVeryFirstEBook.com. (Not an affiliate link.) Look down the left side. The testimonials go all the way down this very long sales page.

If I recall correctly, he asks people for testimonials after they've come back to him to say what a great job he did for them. Then he adds it to the pile.

One thing to remember is that new FTC regulations require proper disclosure of things received in exchange for testimonials. The A-List bloggers you give the freebie to will likely have to say that they received a free copy of your material to review. This affects what people think of that person's opinion of your work.

Bob Bly's testimonials came with no strings attached. Much more powerful IMO.

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"They're all about him, not necessarily any particular product that he's selling at the moment." This is a very good point. I like his approach. I think one approach is also to let people download a free "manifesto" (like those two that Chris Guillebeau is giving out for free at his homesite) and use the positive feedback as a testimonials(with the permission of the respected commentators of course). I believe, that if the A-list blogger you're giving your material for free is authentic and respected among your target audience, it doensn't really affect THAT much if it's a freebie or not. – Juha Liikala Dec 4 at 8:10
If the product is free to everyone, then it's not an issue. It's only an issue if it cost the A-List blogger nothing and it costs the normal consumer something. But the point is now the FTC is explicit about what bloggers have to disclose. (By the way, as you say you're from Finland, none of this may matter to you. But be sure to check!) – JW Dec 5 at 5:30
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I just read about offering your customers say a 5% rebate, or a coupon to your store for writing a testimonial after they have received a product.

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I find just simply asking your list is the best approach for producing unbiased testimonials. Testimonials will come naturally for good products. Offering incentives for testimonials will only produce untruthful testimonies. If your product hasn't produced any sales offering review copies is another good way to get testimonials or unbiased reviews.

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