Don’t you love it when you provide great service, ask for client testimonials and you wait, and wait, and wait some more? But the testimonial either never comes or when it does, it is so generic you can’t use it. Worst part is that you let this happen. It’s not your client’s fault; it’s yours.
I don’t need to tell you how hard it is to get a new client out of the blue, and how easy it is when they come back to you to do another deal. The deal might be challenging, but having a client come back to you makes the sales process much simpler. While the best commercial real estate brokers, property managers and mortgage brokers leverage their good service to get repeat business, you must also leverage the good service you provide your clients to secure new clients by utilizing client testimonials.
THE COMMON, BUT FLAWED APPROACH
[Tweet “Testimonials are powerful marketing tools where clients tell the story of how good you are.”]
You are incorrectly thrilled when your client sends an email, writes a letter or even records a brief video describing the service they received from you. There are two problems with this approach:
First, as noted above, you ask for the testimonial, and then you wait, and wait and even wait longer. Regrettably, you put yourself in position to feel guilty of asking again, for a testimonial on the great service you provided!
Second, in those cases when a client does provide a testimonial, it doesn’t differentiate you in any way. Worse, it really doesn’t resonate with your prospects. The reality is having a testimonial that states “Mike is great, he’s the best” doesn’t really mean anything. It’s equivalent to when someone asks you “How’s the market” and you respond “Great!” What the heck does that mean?
THE BETTER APPROACH
[Tweet “You don’t want clients writing testimonials for you.”]
You don’t want clients writing testimonials for you. You want them to approve testimonials you write on their behalf.This way YOU are in control of the message. And the messages will need to vary on the range of services you provide.
For example, if you represent tenants, you should have testimonials based on relocation services, renewal services, contractions, expansions, new locations, operating audits, tenant improvement allocations, blend and extends, merging locations, portfolio management… and the list goes on.
The same is true for commercial sales, property management and mortgage brokerage. The point is when you have a prospect that has a specific need – you have a specific and applicable testimonial to share with that prospect.
Better testimonials would be “John secured a loan for us in less than 30 days and 25 basis points than we had anticipated” or “Bob secure more qualified offers that we imagined. He and his team were able to create a competitive bidding environment and ultimately sold our building at a record price.”
