10/10 users found this social proof guide useful. You will too. 👍
Social proof works by tapping into the basic human instinct to follow the actions of others, building trust and credibility, and lowering barriers to making purchases online. It’s a great way to build trust between your business and your ideal customers.
This blog will go through 7 types of social proof as well as examples that you can use on your small business website.
There are many types of social proof – and many ways to present it to your audience. Here are seven of the most popular ones.
1. Trust Icons
Trust icons give your business credibility by showing the credible businesses and associations you work with or are registered with. If a trustworthy company trusts you, why shouldn’t your potential customers?
Momsy uses their trust icons to show what they stand for:
2. Case Studies
These are great for B2B products and should be data-driven and in-depth. Try to make the customer and their problem as relatable as possible.
3. Testimonials
These are very common, probably because they’re easy to put together. Try to make testimonials credible by including as much information about the person as you can. For Alphabet Social, we included the client’s image, business logo, name, and position.
4. Reviews (the testimonial’s more objective cousin)
These are great for overly technical products or highly competitive industries – they show the good and the bad. Look for these reviews on third-party listing sites to copy onto your homepage.
Third-party reviews from places like Google Business Profile, Trip Advisor, Yelp and even Facebook are extremely valuable. Do the leg work to gather these reviews where you can.
5. Data and Numbers
Numbers often speak louder than words. These can be anything from how many units you’ve sold to how many results you’ve delivered.
You can even use a number to spice up the heading for another form of social proof. For example, “100,000 people love this product, here’s why” followed by some testimonials.
Beaut’s website has numbers summarising their focus group results:
6. Press mentions
Have you been mentioned in the press? That’s amazing! Showing your audience that you’ve been reviewed by a publication that they trust, they’ll trust you more easily. The simple way to do this is by simply including the logos of the publications that have mentioned you under a title like “As seen in” like Cards for Conversation has on their home page.
7. Live Purchase Notifications
If you sell products online, have pop-ups saying who just bought what while your customer shops. This gives the impression of a real store that’s bustling with customers. It also creates a sense of urgency to buy fast. This example is great because it gives a name, a location, and the product:
The Proof is in the Pudding
Those are our top 7 types of social proof for small business websites. We don’t necessarily recommend that you use all of these but, as a small business, you’ve likely got at least two of these that you can add to your home page. If you’re wondering how you can get started with gathering your own, we compiled some tips here on how to collect more social proof.
Still unsure about social proof? Read this blog about how prioritising social proof made a huge difference to a website we designed.
