Today, we will be going over what is called Social Proof. I have a definition for you and a couple examples of it. This will be a pretty straightforward episode, but I think it should. Stok a couple of fires in your head on the topics related to social proof and the things you can do to leverage it to help with sales inside of the business.
As you know, we typically gravitate around caring about sales on this podcast. That’s what we’re going to be talking about again today. Social proof is the idea that consumers will adapt their behavior according to what others are doing. I ran an ad in the past that we used for quite a while, but it’s the good kind of peer pressure, and the whole effect is what we call it.
So, kind of simply said, it’s like, if you see many people doing it, it influences you, making you want to do it. Or if you know many of your friends doing it, that’s a little bit stronger. Right. Cause then you have a personal testimony. Someone, you can ask, what did you experience with this service or product?
Then that can also lend to social proof. That’s why testimonies are crucial for every type of business because it’s a friend or family. Or some sort of thing that’s telling you, Hey, this place is fantastic or like reviews on the internet. So, one of the first kinds of social proof is an expert stamp of approval.
That is when someone is either an industry leader or accredited somehow. The product or service you offer has given you their validation or stamp of approval. The experts’ stamp of approval is the first kind. That comes in many different ways, and getting that can be a little challenging, but that would be, I’d say, one of the better ones.
There’s a local place here in town that was on a cooking show like in California years ago. It still impacts. For business, positively to this day because she’s that lady on that show. She had the expert stamp of approval for attending it and going there.
That’s an example that celebrity endorsement is the second kind. It’s very similar. We’re all very familiar with influencers in the social media world if you will. These are typically people. That is unpaid endorsing, if possible. But as you know, that’s not always the case; even if they don’t tell you, the influencers or celebrities that are promoting a product are getting paid a lot of the time.
There are even things like cameos where people are paying them just to say something on a script. Many benefits can come from celebrity endorsements or local influencers. As you all know, I kind of just said, somebody is going out there and—posting on your behalf, giving their validation to what you’re doing.
Very similar to the expert stamp of approval. Obvious. Number three, as I said, is the reviews. So user testimonials, I’ll read what this little tidbit noted—I kind of just like the way it’s phrased. So says, there’s a reason businesses create case studies about their customers’ successes using their product.
