How to get the best testimonials and reviews

Would you like more powerful reviews and testimonials from the people who use your products and services?

Often, there’s something missing from reviews and testimonials, and that’s emotion.

The reviews that are full of not just satisfaction but pure emotion, are the ones that really attract customers, and to get them we have to understand the ‘after party glow moment’.

The ‘after party glow moment’

To demonstrate the ‘after party glow moment’ I’m going to introduce you to Rent the Runway. Rent the Runway is a billion-dollar online service that provides designer gowns and dresses for special occasions like a weddings or rehearsal dinners.

Something incredible happens after their clients have worn the dresses and they have a genius way of soliciting reviews for the products they provide.

This is because Rent the Runway understand the second phase in the consumer momentum curve – the honeymoon phase.

The honeymoon phase starts the moment you receive a product or a service and ends after the first use of that product or service, or the moment the service ends, or the moment you hang up the phone for a conference call, or the moment you end that sales meeting.

If you want to solicit the highest quality customer testimonials and reviews, you have to understand exactly when these moments occur. When is the end of the honeymoon phase?

The power of emotion in customer reviews

You'll never be happier about the product or service that's been provided to you, than the moments before the honeymoon period ends.

I looked at a Nordstrom's review for a gown for a special occasion:

“Mother of the bride dress. This dress is gorgeous, it's so comfortable and it feels pretty light. Bought it for my daughter's wedding which is outdoors in the summertime, should be perfect. I will need to have it hemmed and I may have it taken in just a little, although it fits very well as it is. The color is true navy, stunning dress.”

Now, this is a nice review and it has five stars… there's certainly nothing wrong with it. But there's something missing... true emotion.

And this is where Rent the Runway truly excels. They know exactly when the event the dress has been rented for is going to occur, which means if they're going to ask for photos or reviews, they know exactly when to do it.

In other words they know exactly when the honeymoon phase is waning.

Leveraging the honeymoon phase

Rent the Runway asks for photos and reviews immediately following the party. Right when people are experiencing the after party glow moment.

People upload amazing photos and glowing, emotion-filled reviews. Here’s an example:

“I tried this dress on at the location in D.C. so I knew the four would a perfect fit, and I knew how much I loved it, but after spending a night in it, I have to rave about this dress! The whole night, I felt like I stood out in the best way, even hearing a ‘wow, lady in red’, which I'll take!”

This doesn’t sound like the Nordstrom review at all, does it?! There’s emotion, passion,  power and satisfaction in this review, and there’s many more like it.

The problem with Nordstrom's reviews is that they’re not captured at the right time. They don't understand when the honeymoon phase is ending – it's not when you buy the dress, it's when you wear it for the first time.

Nordstrom's reviews contain no pictures because the event hasn't happened yet, there's no emotion, no passion – they're not bad reviews, they're just not the best they could be.

And Rent the Runway's are just full of exclamation points and passion and power and fun. And that's what makes them all the more powerful.

When is your honeymoon phase?

If you want to capture the emotion behind the products and services you're delivering, you have to understand the honeymoon phase specifically. You need to know when the end of it is and when it's approaching.

For example, let's say you design a website, ask yourself, when is your client most excited about the new design you've provided? If you sell office phones, when is the moment your customer is thrilled to have a brand new phone system installed in their office? If you're an agency, think about the moment after you provide a quarterly review of the results you've provided (and it was a stellar quarter), how does your client feel at that exact moment?

These are the after party glow moments.

Think about the moments where your clients or customers are at their most enthusiastic about the products and services you provide, and that is the moment to ask for a testimonial or review. You can be assured that the kind of testimonials and reviews you get will be drastically different from the ones you used to get.

After all, different sells and so does emotion. Emotion leads to action… if you get those emotional customer testimonials and reviews you'll stand out from the competition.

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• How to ask for reviews or testimonials
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