Here at the Seattle headquarters of copywriting agency We Know Words, we’ve notice a pervasive problem in the marketing communications of our clients. It’s called…the testimonial.

Huh? Why is a testimonial a problem? Because people (i.e. your customers) hate writing them!

The best endorsement is a third-party endorsement, all copywriters and marcom people know that (or should). But it can also be the hardest to get. That’s because so many people freeze up when asked to write something, even something as simple as a testimonial. It’s so bad, we tell our copywriting clients to offer to write the testimonials themselves (or have us do it) and then just have their customer approve them.

In reality, though, it shouldn’t take but a minute. But people over think it, they try too hard, put too much pressure on themselves, don’t know what to say…OK, I’m guessing here, I don’t actually know what the problem is, but then writing is kinda easy for me.

But I offer up a shining example of how fast and easy and real a testimonial can be…

Here I am raving about 37 Signals being real in communicating to their clientele while suffering downtime, and that same day I get an unsolicited testimonial. And I just laughed because it was real! Yet it still works as a credible testimonial. It tells you about us, that this client is happy with our work, and even what it’s like to work with this crew of copywriters:

"The company I work for has been using Sharon Baerny and her crew for quite a while. I first laid eyes on her as a speaker at one of our Sales and Marketing Roundtables. Man, is she FUUNNNEEEE!!!! But she has some great marketing tips! I signed up for her newsletter. Her style is breezy and concise. And I know she's a witch, because she spreads magic everywhere she goes! You can also tell by the long, red hair thrown over her shoulder! Anyhow, she and her marketing wizards do a GREAT job!"

Thanks, Sam, for making my day and for demonstrating that even a simple testimonial can be real.

Maybe with UGC and the ever-growing number of reviews available online testimonials will get easier to solicit in the B2B world? Or maybe we just call them reviews instead? Maybe a simple name change will generate a whole lot more of those third-party endorsements that work so hard to help us market?