Is That Your Testimony?

H ave you been faced with a merchant who says something to the effect of, “Of course you’re going to tell me how wonderful the service is, you work for them!” Or, “Sure, you tell me this is a terrific deal, but you just want the sale.”

The point is, sometimes we need a third party, someone without an interest in our profits, to vouch for us. You can’t blame a savvy merchant for being suspect or doubting your motives. If they want to hear some unbiased reviews, get testimonials from your current customers.

Asking for testimonials is easy. When a customer compliments you, ask them to put it in writing. When you make follow-up calls and your clients tell you everything is going well and the service is working great for them, ask them to fax you a letter stating so. Encourage them to include specifics, such as the increase in volume or anecdotes about happy customers.

Of course, you will want to let the letter writers know that you will be providing the testimonials to prospects and make certain it is OK for prospective customers to contact them. In fact, you should ask the letter writer what time of day is best to have someone contact him for a referral. You want to keep this customer happy.

Once you have the letters, always carry clean, crisp copies with you. You can even include pictures of the merchant location or the merchant himself. You may want to file them by type of business or type of services used, for easy reference.

One caveat—Be sure to keep up with your testimonial-writers. The last thing you want is to send a prospective customer to a merchant who has just experienced a billing error or has had difficulty with his POS equipment.

Not only do testimonials help you win new customers, they help you better serve current ones. As you keep tabs on your customers and verify that they are still happy with the service, you can inquire if they need to add services, set up Internet processing, or move up to a wireless terminal.

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