Boost Conversions 15% in 15 Minutes
If you’re not doing this, you’re missing out on a huge opportunity.
Lori Ballen earns money from qualifying purchases from affiliate links in this article.
Social proof helps your prospects by showing how many other customers you’ve helped, how many experts in your industry recommend you, or maybe even some positive reviews on your website.
This content helps to make them feel sure about their purchase because it shows that others have already trusted your product with the same problems they are currently dealing with.
How Social Proof Works
63% of consumers need to hear company claims 3–5x before they actually believe it.
Social proof works on a psychological level because it shows that you’re not alone in thinking this is an excellent choice.
For example: suppose someone sees their friends are using your new AI writing assistant tool, or you’ve received testimonials from experts in your industry.
In that case, they’ll feel better about buying it because others have successfully purchased and used it first.
Most people don’t want the burden of being the first to try a product or service. However, if they see that someone before them has already given it a shot and received great value from it, then they will feel much better about buying into the product themselves.
Most people know what it feels like to have buyer’s remorse.
Your prospect can think long and hard about their purchase only after making a choice, second-guessing what type of software they should buy, or whether or not this book is right for them.
The fear of wasting time and money is something that every customer experiences when purchasing an item online (or in-person).
People want to know what other customers are saying about you before making a final purchasing decision.
Social Proof Psychology
73% of consumers only pay attention to reviews written in the last month — Bright Local
Social proof is a psychological phenomenon that occurs when people copy the behavior of others in an attempt to reflect correct behavior for a given situation.
The concept of social proof was first developed by psychologists in the 1950s, who noticed that one way to encourage children to behave was to tell them to look at how other children were behaving.
Social proof is a powerful force that we all use to determine which behaviors are correct, and, by extension, it guides our behavior and the decisions we make.
Social proof occurs in four ways:
We look at others’ actions and adopt those actions as our own. We look at others’ emotions and feelings and embrace those feelings as our own.
We look at how other people feel about a particular person, thing or idea, and adopt their feelings toward it.
We look at what other people think about something or someone and assume that those prevailing thoughts are correct.
Social Proof Principles
There are several principles of social proof that you should keep in mind when designing content strategies.
The first is that social proof works best when it’s perceived as being relevant to the reader.
That’s why testimonials are so effective because they are specific to the product or service you’re offering.
The second principle of social proof is that it tends to work better in conjunction with scarcity. So, for example, if you have a special promotion or offer where you can get something for 20 percent off, make sure to tell your readers about it.
The third principle is that the best social proofs come from trusted authorities in your industry.
These could be people within your company who’ve built up expertise and authority across social media channels, but they might also include outside influencers.
The fourth principle of social proof is that people will follow others who are most like them. If you’re selling an expensive high-end product, likely, your readers won’t trust a testimonial from someone who doesn’t look or sound anything like them.
The same goes for any influencer whose audience doesn’t match your publication’s demographics.
Types of Social Proof
There are several types of social proof that you can use to increase your conversions and engagement levels. These include:
Customer testimonials — these come from people who have purchased or used your products and services. Testimonials don’t need to be long, but they should provide some context and highlight the benefits of using those products or services.
Social shares — Social shares show how many times a piece of content has been shared on social media. Social shares also indicate the number of followers who’ve liked or followed any particular influencer. This type of proof tells your readers that others value this information and should be doing the same.
Word-of-mouth recommendations — these come directly from customers; there’s no go-between, and because they’re coming from real people, they carry far more weight than anything else can.
If you can encourage someone who trusts you to make a referral, you’ll likely see increased engagement for those types of posts.
Statistics — these typically appear in list form or graphics and let readers know how many users have engaged with certain products or services.
For example, stats could display how many subscribers your email newsletter has or how many times a particular article on your blog has been viewed.
Statistics can be valuable as long as they’re presented in an objective and unbiased way.
Social Proof Examples in Digital marketing
Testimonials:
Ballen Brands, a digital marketing company that builds websites, showcases testimonials on the home page.
“Love my new website created by the Ballen Team. Thanks so much and thanks for all the assistance along the way and always answering questions. Highly recommend.” — Claudia Nelson
Stats:
Monday.com features a testimonial stat at the bottom of their pricing page. This statistic shows a success story, similar to a case study.
How do you Show Social Proof?
Testimonials: Testimonials are the most powerful kind of social proof. They come from unbiased third-party sources and prove that your product or service is worth using.
But, don’t rely on fake reviews because this will only harm your conversion rates. Studies have shown that websites with fake reviews have lower conversion rates than those that do not have any reviews at all.
To display testimonials on your website, try using a slider. Testimonial sliders automatically cycle through recent testimonials, showing your clients in all their glory.
If you are using WordPress, you could add a testimonials plugin.
Social Shares:
Social shares are also very effective because they show how popular an article is, which means it’s likely full of helpful information.
If someone has shared something, it’s more worthwhile for someone else to check out.
You can also use share buttons to encourage people to share something after reading it, but make sure you’re not too aggressive about this.
Otherwise, you risk coming across as spammy and pushing people away from your website instead of bringing them closer to making a purchase.
To display social shares on your website, you can add a social shares plugin like Shareaholic.
Badges: Give visitors a post-purchase reminder that they’ve just made the right decision by buying your product or service. You can do this by using badges, testimonials, statistics, or social media share counts specific to whatever you’re selling.
I use Canva templates to create stats, testimonial images, and badges.
Word-of-Mouth: Word-of-mouth recommendations are compelling because if someone trusts you enough to ask for advice on something, they’re almost certainly going to follow it.
They’ll especially feel more confident about purchasing if their friends have already done so successfully.
So encouraging readers to refer their friends is one of the best ways to significantly increase engagement levels and conversions rates.
One way that brands reward Word-Of-Mouth social proof is by creating an affiliate program. With an affiliate program, brands can offer a monetary reward for a qualified referral.
Stats: A list of stats shows how many other customers have used your product or service before them.
If plenty of people have used it, then others are more likely to take the plunge as well.
Push Notifications: These are pop-up notifications that automatically display if someone purchased something from your site.
To display push notifications, you can subscribe to software like Nudgify.
Social Proof and Brand Image
Since social proof shows others how popular your business is, it can also improve your brand image.
The more popular you are, the more likely people will see you as reputable and trustworthy, leading to higher conversion rates.
However, what qualifies as “popularity” will depend on your target audience and their buying habits.
For example, if you’re targeting teenagers, then having thousands of followers on Instagram could potentially give you social proof that boosts conversions because teens would trust their friends’ opinions about what’s cool or not.
How To Get More Social Proof
You can collect social proof by encouraging your customers to leave reviews on review websites, forums, and wherever they talk about your business.
If someone has written a testimonial for you, then ask them to share it on their blog or website because that could bring even more traffic, increasing conversion rates.
It would help if you also encouraged anyone who’s read one of your articles or watched your tutorial videos to give a star rating and a comment, which will add social proof that boosts conversions.
Brand24 can help with reputation management.
Set up a sales funnel that launches a request for reviews after the conversion.
Give everyone who’s bought something from you the opportunity to enter their email address into a pop-up that leads to a page where they can leave feedback and reviews (but not until after they’ve purchased).
Add conversion software to your website that displays purchase notifications automatically.
Use live chat software and ask visitors to share their opinions on their purchases.
Ask new customers if they would mind sending an email that asks whether they liked your product or service, what they bought, and how it’s helped them.
Keep this email as a testimonial that you can use in the future.
Give away free samples for people to try out and then review on their blog or website after they’ve made a purchase (if possible).
Give people an incentive to leave reviews by offering discounts or free upgrades for their next purchase if they take time out of their day to provide feedback.
Run contests to offer prizes related to your product/service to encourage customers to share their thoughts publicly.
For example, you could give away T-shirts, pens, stickers, etc.
Pro Tips for Using Social Proof Effectively
Since social proof is such a powerful form of content, you need to make sure that you use it correctly and avoid making these common mistakes:
Don’t let testimonials sound like ad copy — customers who provide their contact information and offer up glowing endorsements should not sound like they’re reading from a script written by your marketing team.
For example, it’s essential to keep the language casual and conversational rather than overly polished and professional. Make sure that any wording matches what you’d expect to see from your customers, but avoid sentences that are too long or sound complicated.
Don’t use fake testimonials — if you put up an obviously fabricated review, it could have the exact opposite effect on your business since the social proof is all about authenticity.
For example, a paid actor or someone who’s never used your product/service before cannot provide accurate feedback to potential buyers and make you look like you’re trying to deceive them.
However, giving say as much as 35% of people would not recommend this product to their friends does not tell well for those interested in buying it either.
Do not overdo endorsements: If 100 out of 200 reviews mention how great your business is, there might be a problem with its popularity.
For example, you might work at a small company that only has 20 employees, or you might offer very niche products or services.
Additionally, excessive testimonials could also raise suspicions because some negative reviews should be mixed in with the rest of them.
Don’t leave generic comments — if everyone who leaves an endorsement says pretty much the same thing, then it doesn’t add any information to your page, and you’ll lose out on the power of social proof.
For example, keeping testimonials short and sweet is a good idea because it prevents readers from reading generic comments that ruin their experience.
Social Proof Software
FOMO
You’re a business owner, and you know that social proof is important. But you don’t have the time to manually update your website with customer interactions.
Fomo makes it easy for anyone to show off their customers on their website in real-time. Fomo helps you do just that by showing recent events, fomo feed, and live social proof on your website. With Fomo, you can focus on what matters most — growing your business!
With 97 integrations, FOMO works with nearly every website platform such as Shopify, WooCommerce, and WordPress.
Fomo has a lot of useful features that help you develop high-converting user journeys.
- Geotargeting
- Insights
- Roundups
- Page Rules
FOMO features include:
- Easily embed social proof widgets on your website to grow your following
- Create custom feeds showing all kinds of customer interactions, like new product purchases, page views, form submissions, etc.
- Quickly create engaging user-generated content with Fomo’s Instagram scheduling tools.
- Increase user engagement on your website through real-time notifications and live feed updates.
- Integrate fomo with platforms you already use, such as Shopify, WordPress, MailChimp, and more!
Fomo is a valuable tool used by marketers everywhere to make sales easier. With 97 integrations available at the click of a button, exploring features like geotargeting or team collaboration is quick and easy.
Nudgify
A nudge is a subtle prompt that reminds followers to take specific actions using persuasive copy and images. It’s much more effective than a pop-up or banner ad because it blends into the natural flow of content rather than disrupting it.
Nudgify is an easy-to-use social proof app for WordPress, Tumblr, and Shopify that helps you to increase conversions with minimal effort.
It comes with several different templates to choose from, so you can create nudges that are aesthetically appealing, which makes them more likely to engage your readers.
You can also upload text, insert links, customize colors, formatting, size, timing & placement, apply designs to specific pages/posts/categories on your site shortcodes.
The Nudgify app also has a stats tool that tracks the number of clicks and conversions associated with each nudge.
Nudgify is powerful social proof software that can improve your website by adding share buttons to monitor what people are saying about you.
This allows you to get more input from visitors before they convert into paying customers, giving you a chance to improve your conversion rate.
Nudgify also comes with email notifications that let you know when someone posts an opinion about your business on their blog or website so that you can respond with gratitude and maintain a healthy relationship with them.
Display recent conversions or registrations on your website and increase trust with your visitors considering a purchase. With an automated feed, you can show real-time inventory information.
Record your visits, track your interactions, monitor traffic, and count conversions with the social proof app: Nudgify.
Social proof helps your prospects by showing how many other customers you’ve helped, how many experts in your industry recommend you, or maybe even some positive reviews on your website.
If you aren’t using social proof, you are missing out.
