David Goymour presented the education slot on 4 March 2010, on the subject of providing testimonials to fellow members.
Why give a testimonial?
Well, why not? Didn’t your mum tell you always to say “thank you” when someone gave you a present, or when something did something nice for you, or paid you a compliment?
Why not? After all, it doesn’t cost us anything to say “thank you”. More to the point, it has a disproportionately positive effect on the person who receives it. When you’ve finished a job, you may be tired, you wonder, perhaps, whether you’ve done a good enough job… but when the client says “thank you”, those doubts all dissolve!
A testimonial is not just a verbal “thank you”: it’s in writing, on your letterhead.
So, why give a testimonial?
The purpose of giving a testimonial is to build up the confidence of chapter members, to refer the person whose name is at the top of the testimonial.
That’s why, when we give a testimonial, as well as handing the letter to the member concerned, we read it out to the chapter meeting. You’ve heard me tell the member how good his/her work is, so you will be likely to give this member referrals.
To achieve this, the testimonial needs to do three things:
• It should be succinct and sincere. (Don’t write: “The beauty of your workmanship reminds me of sunrise over the Sahara,” when what you mean is: “You did a good job and completed it on time.”)
• It should explain exactly why the product or service supplied was exceptional.
• It should be typed on your letterhead, so that when the member who has received the testimonial shows it to other clients or potential clients, they will know it comes genuinely from a satisfied customer.
As well as giving the testimonial on paper to the member concerned and reading it out to the chapter meeting, we also put a copy in the chapter’s testimonials file (which is available for anyone to study, and should be on the welcome table as people arrive). This means we need to bring two copies of each testimonial – one for the member, one for chapter files.
Thank you, for your attention!
Tags: Education, Words for Business
on Thursday, March 4th, 2010 at 20:26 and is filed under Education. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
