Added: 07/20/2005 |
Testimonials in advertisingTestimonials in advertising
Advertising and promoting products, it is very important to win customers' trust. Frequently, people are directed more by their subjective emotions, motives or opinions, than by logic. Trust is one of such subjective motives, able to direct people in their decision making process.
However, in the marketing and the advertising, there are often used psychological motivators; a successful product promotion requires deep knowledge of the human nature. You cannot manipulate customers' emotions and sell products based only on them, without it possessing various benefits and advantages, promised in the advertisements. The product really has to match up to people's expectations and trust bestowed on it.
One of the ways to build up the trust to your product is to use the testimonials in your advertising. Mostly, testimonials are used in TV advertising trailers. Such trailers have role models, people, who represent your product or service. They tell about its use, benefits and how it has worked for them.
Famous people, such as actors, singers, sportsmen, etc are usually invited for the role models. It is the most effective means in women's oriented ads. Researches show that, if there is a famous woman, representing a product in a trailer, its efficiency increases by twenty four-twenty seven percent.
People are able to learn not only from their own experience, but also from others' and more they trust those people, more they become the role models and examples for them to resemble.
Thus, selecting a person to represent your product, you have to be careful to involve only those people, who will be relevant to your products. They have to be trusted by your target customers and people have to believe they really use your products or services. They have to speak from their own experience. For instance, if you invite a famous actor to advertise some meat food product, though he is a vegetarian, they will not believe and feel that you cheat and mock on them. Certainly, that is an extreme example; nevertheless, there can be plenty of other things of the same sort, like models, advertising cooking pots or stoves, when women understand that those models have hardly time to cook.
Your goal is to convince people that your role models are trustworthy and your product is really as useful as they state. Consequently, these role models have to seem relevant, attractive and convincing.
It is very effective to select sportsmen for such models. Fans of various sport teams or sport idols are usually very loyal to the brands, supporting those teams or people advertised by them. They feel it is an honor for them to use the same products or services their idols do. It might give them a sense of getting closer to them. Such strong emotional links are able to form new patterns of behavior in people, including the buying behavior.
You may also use professionals in the product field of expertise for their role models. People like to get recommendations from the experts. It gives more value to your product, if it is used and recommended by a doctor, dog trainer, hair dresser, stylist or some other experts. If those people are not famous and well recognized by the society, the text of your ads has to tell about their field of expertise and professional skills.
Certainly, you may use common people in your testimonials, however, they have to be much alike an average consumer of your product; hence, people will feel as if their neighbor or friend is giving them a good recommendation. They have to look natural and trustworthy.
Therefore, the testimonials are a strong marketing and advertising tool. If you choose the right role models, it can be very effective and can greatly build up customers' trust to your products.
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