The Trouble with Testimonials

What value do testimonials actually provide anyone? Do they benefit a clients selection process and/or create any point of difference for professional services firms?

Every marketing department of every professional services firm will want to point prospective clients in the direction of their testimonials. It's traditionally been a key pillar of promoting firms who are selling a future service. Often headed with confident boasts like ... "Our testimonials speak for themselves" ... the testimonials page inevitably leads you into an endless list of happy clients, awash with lashings of praise that extol the virtues and life enhancing benefits of using that particular firm. But if everyone is promoting similar testimonials then where is the value and what is the point, apart from 'keeping up with the Jones's'?

The following scientific perspective could easily crossover into my world of business sales;

"Testimonials are not useful because they cannot be used as confirming or dis-confirming evidence as they're isolated events that lack the comparative information necessary to rule out alternative explanations.

The problem of relying on testimonial evidence is that if testimonials accumulate to support any specific remedy, all the competing remedies also have supporting testimonials. What we all want to know is which remedy is best, and we cannot determine this by using testimonial evidence" How to think straight about psychology (2001) (Keith Stanovich)

We have our own testimonials pages, festooned with love and appreciation for what we do but in reality, what does it mean to the rest of the world? How can prospective clients measure it when every other firm in our sector does the same and has the same?

It's particularly important to get underneath this spin when selecting an advisor and/or process to help sell a business. For most business owners, this will be a one off event that needs to generate a suitable reward for the time, risk and effort committed over the years.

But how does a business owner make this selection? What are the criteria to consider? How do they search through the quagmire of marketing spin to isolate the good, the bad and ugly? A few thoughts;

1. Market Reputation: What is the market reputation of said firm? What does your trusted advisor (accountant, solicitor) think about the different types of service and firm? Gain a professional perspective;

2. The Process: Understand the different types of service available and what is the deliverable reality behind the marketing of each suitor?

3. The Spin: Does the marketing spend and reach being employed to grab your attention necessarily mean that firm will provide you with a great service? Is it a good indicator that if they found you, they will find your buyer? Are they more focused on gaining your signature than selling your business?

4. Online Chatter; The web can be full of nonsense but a simple google search might help you pick up on any consistent themes about the firms and people you're considering;

5. The Agent: Do you like the person you're dealing with? Selling businesses is often about people, trust and integrity so if you feel confident about this individual then so might the buyer of your business.

6. Experience & Support: What experience do they have? What deals have they done in the past and what support mechanisms can they provide ie memberships, partnerships etc.? What is the CV of your advisor or will your file be handed to a junior with no commercial experience or knowledge of your business?

7. Peer Reviews/Online Forums: Anyone you know who recently sold a business and/or used a professional services firm of a similar nature? Visit some Business Forums and discover the experiences of others? How does the actual delivery of their service compare with their marketing?

8. Testimonials: These utopian landscapes might still play a part in the overall assessment of a firm and help provide a sense of what makes them different (or at least what their partners think makes them different);

9. The Beauty Parade: If remaining undecided then consider an old fashioned beauty parade. Select 3 different types of agent or process and ask them to illustrate how/why/where they add value over and above the competition;

10. Instinct: The great challenge is to wade through the marketing, the testimonials, the glossy presentations and understand what works for your business. On many occasions the evidence is supported by an instinct - no matter what those happy clients keep telling you.