Ask questions that produce specifics rather than adjectives. A testimonial naming the job, a number, and something that was difficult reads as real; praise alone reads as selected.

Why generic praise is discounted

A reader knows you chose which testimonials to display, which means praise on its own carries almost no information.

Great service and highly recommended could be written by anybody about anybody, including by you.

So a page of them is read as evidence that you have customers, which the reader already assumed, and nothing more.

What carries weight is anything a business would not have invented, which is specifics.

The anatomy of a believable one

The third is the one that does the most and is the one nobody asks for. A testimonial mentioning a concern that turned out to be unfounded, or a problem that was handled, is far more convincing than one with no friction in it at all.

The problem is the asking

Not the customers, who are willing and are being asked badly.

Would you mind writing us a testimonial produces a paragraph of adjectives, because that is what the request sounds like it wants.

The person is trying to be nice, has no idea what would be useful, and reaches for the phrases they have seen on other websites.

Which means the generic testimonial is something you asked for, without meaning to, by asking an open question.

Ask specific questions instead and you get specific answers, from the same customers, at no extra cost to them.

The questions to ask

Four, sent as a short message, answerable in a couple of sentences each.

What were you trying to sort out before you called us.

Was there anything you were unsure about beforehand.

What did we actually do.

Is there anything you would tell somebody else considering it.

Those produce material rather than praise, and the answers frequently contain a better testimonial than the customer could have written deliberately.

Say you will edit it into a short quote and send it back for approval, which removes the pressure of writing something polished.

A worked example

A business had six testimonials on its site, all variations of excellent work and very professional.

They sent the four questions to eight recent customers and heard back from five.

One answer described worrying that the job would take a week and being told at the start it would be two days, which it was.

Another mentioned having had a bad experience with a previous firm and what had been different.

Both were used, edited to a short paragraph and approved by the customer, and both mentioned things the business would never have thought to claim about itself.

Enquiries began referring to the two-day comment specifically, which no version of excellent work had ever produced.

Keep the flaw in

The instinct to edit it out is strong and is worth resisting.

A testimonial saying the work was slightly delayed and the communication was good throughout is more persuasive than one saying everything was perfect.

Readers assume perfection is selected and are calibrating for it, so a small acknowledged imperfection makes everything around it credible.

It also demonstrates something a claim cannot: that you publish what customers actually said rather than only what suits you.

Cut for length and for clarity, and leave the mild negative where it is.

Anything genuinely damaging is a different matter, and that is a conversation with the customer rather than an editing decision.

Attribution carries the weight

Since an unattributed quote is functionally anonymous.

A first name and an initial is the minimum, a first name and a neighbourhood is better, and a full name with a business is best where the customer agrees.

Add the month, which most people omit and which tells a reader this is current rather than from 2016.

Where a customer will not be named, that is fine and the specifics carry it, since the details are doing the work rather than the identity.

What does not work is a quote with no name at all beside one with a full name, since the contrast draws attention to the anonymous one.

Where they belong

Beside the relevant claim rather than collected on a page nobody visits.

A testimonial about a particular service belongs on that service page, next to the description of that work.

One mentioning speed belongs beside whatever you say about timescales, where it supports a specific statement.

A dedicated testimonials page gets very little traffic and is understood as a selection, which is exactly the framing that discounts them.

Two well-placed quotes on a service page do more than twelve on a page of their own.

Ask at the right moment

Since timing decides whether you get a reply at all.

The moment is a day or two after the work finished and the customer is pleased, not weeks later when the feeling has faded and the details have gone.

Send it while they can still remember what they were worried about beforehand, which is the answer you most want and the first one to fade.

Ask by whatever route you have been using with them already, since a message in an existing thread gets answered and a formal email does not.

And ask everybody rather than selecting, since choosing who to approach produces fewer replies and a narrower picture than asking all of them.

The counter-case

Some businesses genuinely cannot do this.

Where confidentiality applies, or where customers will not be named or described, generic quotes may be all that is available, and they are better than nothing.

Asking four questions is also more work for the customer than asking for a sentence, and a proportion will not reply at all.

And platform reviews, which cannot be selected or edited, carry more weight than anything on your own site regardless of how well written it is.

Ask the four questions, keep the specifics and the mild flaw, attribute as fully as the customer allows, and put them beside the relevant claim.

Getting a better one

  1. Stop asking for a testimonial.
  2. Ask the four questions instead.
  3. Offer to edit and send it back.
  4. Keep the number and the difficulty.
  5. Leave the mild negative in.
  6. Attribute and date it.
  7. Place it beside the claim it supports.

Step two is the whole change, since a generic testimonial is almost always something the business asked for by asking an open question.

How to display them is covered in putting reviews on your own site.

Frequently asked questions

Why is generic praise discounted?

Because the reader knows you chose which to display, so praise alone carries no information. Great service could be written by anybody about anybody, including you.

What makes one believable?

Specifics: what the job was, a number, something that was difficult or worried them, what was done about it, and a name and place.

Why do customers write generic ones?

Because you asked an open question. Would you mind writing a testimonial sounds like it wants adjectives, so people reach for phrases from other websites.

What should I ask instead?

What were you trying to sort out, was there anything you were unsure about, what did we actually do, and what would you tell somebody considering it.

Should I edit out a small negative?

No. Readers assume perfection is selected, so a mild acknowledged imperfection makes everything around it credible and shows you publish what people actually said.

Where should testimonials go?

Beside the claim they support, on the relevant service page. A dedicated testimonials page gets little traffic and is understood as a selection.

West Coast Media Solutions Inc. provides web design, web development, hosting, digital marketing, and business consulting to organisations across Canada, drawing on more than twenty-five years in the field.

Six testimonials all saying excellent work?

Send four specific questions to five recent customers. The answers contain better material than they could write deliberately.

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