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Duct Tape Marketing

How to Get Rockin’ Reviews

Reviews and testimonials have always been a nice way to offer third-
party proof that your company does what it says it does and that your
customers are happy campers and willing to talk about it. Reviews,
however, have become even more important now that local search
directories like Google Places and Yelp have made them a founda-
tional element for ranking high in local searches.

Getting reviews and testimonials on a routine basis takes a pro­
active and committed approach if you are going to generate them
both consistently and authentically. (Fake or over-the-top review gen-
eration campaigns can actually produce negative results.)

Here are five ways you can look at systematically creating reviews:

Do the Reference Track
I stumbled onto this idea quite by accident, but it’s very effective.

Every now and then, a prospect would ask me for several references.
I would provide a list of three to four happy customers, and that was
that. If a prospect reached out to these customers, most often they
would copy me on their response. The amazing thing is that because
they were basically telling someone else why they should hire me, it
turns out these were the best testimonials I ever received. Instead of
them writing them to or for me, they were writing them to and for
prospective customers. This approach was so effective that I started
requesting that future prospects contact some of my customers.

Repurpose Testimonials
When you get that unsolicited testimonial, no matter where it

comes from, make sure you are using it in several ways. If a happy
customer writes a review on Yelp, post that review on your Web site,
in your store, and in next month’s newsletter. If a customer sends you

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