How to collect testimonials: when to ask, what to say, and how to get permission

Most advice on how to ask for a testimonial comes down to an email template. Write to your customer, be friendly, include a link, follow up twice. That suits a consultant with thirty clients. It suits a site with a few thousand visitors less well: you have no list to write to, and most visitors never buy.

I'm a UX designer and I make a feedback widget, Two Cents. Collecting testimonials turned out to be the same job as asking for feedback. You ask one question at the right moment, and you make it easy to say no. Below:

• What a testimonial is
• When to ask
• How to word the request
• Getting permission to publish
• Where to show them
• How I do it with Two Cents
• Questions people ask

What a testimonial is

A testimonial is a few words from a customer about your product, shown on your site with their agreement. A star rating alone isn't one: it counts, but it doesn't say why.

The hard part is the blank box. People freeze in front of a field labelled "testimonial", so the way you ask matters more than the place you put the form. I ask a real question, and I ask about publishing as a separate step.

When to ask

Ask after the person got something out of your product, and while they remember it. A few moments that work:

• Right after something went well: a finished order, a first successful setup, a problem solved by your support.
• Some time after they started, once they have had a chance to form an opinion. One course creator I found waits two months after a purchase before writing. For a course or a service, that sounds right to me.
• When they already said something kind. A thank-you email is the best opening you will get.

And a few moments that don't:

• Before they have used it.
• In the middle of a task, with a popup.
• Right after they hit a bug or wrote to complain.

A request shouldn't interrupt. I went through the research in my article on UX feedback: a link or a line of text that sits on the page is more polite than a window that jumps up.

How to word the request

I have one rule for questions, and it comes from my list of website feedback questions: don't presume the answer. "What do you love about our product?" tells the person that they love it, and it makes a lukewarm customer feel awkward. A question that leaves room for "nothing special" gets you answers you can trust, so the good ones mean something.

A testimonial question should invite a sentence you would be glad to show. It goes with a star rating: the stars say how it went, and the sentence says why. Questions I would use:

• What do you think of this feature?
• What would you tell someone who is thinking of trying it?
• What did you use it for, and how did it work out?
• Did you find what you were looking for quickly?
• Is there something you'd miss if it disappeared?

Each of them is a question about the product, and the person is free to answer it any way they like. A "yes, found it in seconds" is already a testimonial. A "not really" tells you what to fix, and it never gets shown. What I avoid is a question with a yes or a no for an answer, because "yes" gives you nothing to quote.

A few points on the request itself:

• Keep it to one question and one free-text answer.
• Say who is asking. A message from a person reads better than one from "the team".
• Tell them what will happen to the answer. "I may show your answer on my site, with your first name, if you say it's fine" takes five seconds to read.
• In an email, offer a few words to start from. A blank page is a good reason not to reply.
• Follow up once, politely. After that, let it go.

I wouldn't offer money or a discount in exchange for a positive review. If you reward people for their time, say that you want an honest opinion.

Getting permission to publish

This is the step I would never skip. An answer to "how was it?" is not permission to put that answer on your homepage under someone's name.

What I do, and what I'd advise:

• Ask for permission separately from the answer. A tick box saying "I allow this answer to be displayed as a testimonial on this website" is clear, and it is never ticked for them.
• Say what will be shown. A first name and the initial of the last name is enough for a testimonial to read as real, and it exposes less than a full name.
• Make the name optional. Some people are happy to be quoted and not named.
• Keep the answer when permission is refused. A private "this was confusing" is still worth having.
• Keep a record of the consent: who, when, and for which text. If you edit a testimonial for length, send them the edit.

I'm not a lawyer, and the rules on personal data differ from one country to the next, so check yours if you show names.

Where to show them

A testimonial works best on the page where the visitor hesitates, and that is rarely a separate "testimonials" page that nobody visits.

• Next to the price, or the button that asks for money. That's where doubt is highest.
• On the page about the feature the testimonial is about. A comment on dark mode belongs on the dark mode page.
• On the home page, a few of them, as cards or as a carousel. Stars summed up in a badge tell a visitor how many people rated you before they read a word.

Show real ones, short, with a first name. Pick a handful that cover different doubts rather than ten that say "great product". Don't invent any, and don't edit one into something the person didn't say. You choose what to show, so don't present it as an independent verdict.

How I do it with Two Cents

The widget already has four standard questions, and one of them is Leave a review, with the line "Tell us how we're doing". A visitor opens it, gives one to five stars if they like, and writes a few words. Under the message there's a box, "I allow this answer to be displayed as a testimonial on this website", and it is never ticked for them. If they tick it, a name field appears, and only their first name and the initial of their last name are shown.

That is the basic version, and it needs nothing from you. You can go further and turn any question of your own into a testimonial question, like "What do you think of dark mode?" on your dark mode page. It gets the same stars and the same permission box.

The visitor answers on the page they are on and decides there whether you may quote them. There's no separate form to build and no link to send. Without the tick, the answer stays private in your inbox, and its stars still count towards your average. With the tick, you choose which ones to show.

What you choose goes back onto your own site as a badge, a breakdown of the stars, cards or a carousel. I describe how that works on the testimonial widget page. For past customers who no longer visit your site, the same questions work in an email.

Two Cents is free for one site and 25 messages a month, with no card, and testimonials are included.

Questions people ask

How many testimonials do I need? Enough to cover your main doubts. Three to six in the right places is plenty, and better than twenty on a page nobody opens.

What if someone writes something negative? Keep it and reply to it. You are under no obligation to display it, which is why I ask for permission before publishing and not after.