Customer testimonials and customer profile article guidelines?

[PhilipGledhill]

I want to help people who give testimonials by writing an article about their business including a good quality link. This will be on the site that received the testimonial, possibly linked from an our customers page.

I want to make each customer profile testimonial into a separate page.

I don’t want to compete with the customer who gives the testimonial for their keyword phrase but I do want to boost their page rank if possible.

What would be the best formula for title tag, headline and linking keywords etc?

[RobertFisher]

Phillip, I am not sure others will be confused, but I am. This is what I hear you saying:

You have a site Company1.com that is a client.

Whoever gave the testimonial ("review" is what I think you mean) for a given company would get something written up on that companies website profiling the reviewing company. So, they give a review on Company 1 from their site JoetheMortician.com. You will put a page on Company1.com that is about JoetheMortician.com and link from that page to JoetheMortician.

Where did they leave the review? Google+, Yelp, Citysearch, YP, etc.? assuming it was Google and/or possibly Yelp, you could be creating a penalty situation for your client (I am assuming your client is Company1.com). You are inducing people to leave reviews it would appear.

Next, I think a blog post would be just as helpful with a link as a page. The issue with the page is that if others do not link to it, it won't have much PA and that link won't be helpful. Are you planning to link from a home page (remember each new link dilutes the others) or some other page with PA that is high?

As to title tag: http://www.seomoz.org/learn-seo/title-tag,

headline (assuming you mean the H1 and H2 here)http://www.seomoz.org/learn-seo/on-page-factors and

linking keywords (anchor text)  http://www.seomoz.org/learn-seo/anchor-text

For each of these, you would follow the conventions in the links I have provided. BUT, It would help to have a clearer picture before you go down this road. I would hate to see you wasting time and money otherwise.

Best,

Robert

[PhilipGledhill]

Hello Robert
Thanks for the help, sorry about the confusion.

I want to make a win win situation for people who provide testimonials.

If you give me a testimonial, I write an article about you and link to your website.

I'm not talking about Yelp etc. just my own website (or a site I make for my customer).

I hope the graphic below makes it a bit more understandable.

Image

[RobertFisher]

There are a couple of things to consider with your approach. First, will it provide you what you are looking for - reviews that matter for the site. First, is having them on the site the best/only place they should be?

With Google, being highly ranked in the seven pack is valuable real estate. Your reviews on the site will not carry any real weight as a review for the purpose of ranking; we have clients who literally have hundreds of reviews on their sites that I am sure bring them business for those that go to the site. We strive to show them ways to get the reviews put on Google, CitySearch, Yelp, etc. This is because it will help them rank better in local search.

If, you want to encourage people to put them on the site, are you going to state that somewhere on the site or will it simply be a reward? (By saying, hey, give us a review and we will put a page up about your company, it is really a bribe.) Not in the worst sense obviously, but in the literal. My concern would be the quid pro quo would cause you problems with Google and Yelp specifically.

The problem lies in giving something to someone and then stating it is not for just good reviews. When you do that, human nature is such that they tend to give better reviews for that because they feel they have to "pay back" the favor.

So, yes to doing it on the site. I would not if it is off the site as above.

Cautionary: words like "valuable link" are subjective. If you give them their own page and the link is from that new page, there will be no value in it in the beginning and likely none going forward. (Obviously, my 'no value' is subjective as well. It won't be a single link from a PA of 50 is my point.)

Phillip, I hope this is helpful and not confusing to you. If it is, let me know and I will continue to respond. One last thing is we are big in local and we have developed good and bad mechanisms to get reviews; experience is a dear teacher.

Best to you in your endeavours, (I think that's the Brit spelling;)

Robert Fisher

[PhilipGledhill]

Hello Robert

First, thanks for taking the time to provide such detailed replies. As you say “experience is a dear teacher”, and yours is much appreciated.

My new plan...
Forget about articles and concentrate on helping local businesses get on local listings like Yelp etc.

I wasn’t thinking in terms of bribing people, my plan was to help local businesses in a tight economy when every little helps. I can now see how this could look a bit fishy.
“My concern would be the quid pro quo would cause you problems with Google and Yelp specifically.”

The Google seven pack...
“We strive to show them ways to get the reviews put on Google, CitySearch, Yelp, etc. This is because it will help them rank better in local search.”

This makes a lot of sense, I'll rethink my plans and try help them get on Yelp etc.

Cautionary: words like "valuable link" are subjective.

I live in Bradford England, many small local businesses have basic websites and make no attempt to optimize them. I've come across several websites with no inbound links at all. These are the people I was hoping to help.

My new plan...
Forget about articles and concentrate on helping local businesses get on local listings like Yelp etc.

Thanks once again Robert
Best wishes
Philip.

[Esaky]

Thanks for the thread ! i want to start a page for testimonal in our blog, from sponsors and advertisers and other bloggers !

With their profile and and link to their site ! Can i add the rel=nofollow in the link ?

If they accepted it will be like 100+ Testimonals and links ! Will it be ok. I think mine is something different from the about site. Like review in Google.

Just a page for the Fellow bloggers and get worthy review from them !

[RobertFisher]

Philip

SEOmoz is a great help for local and in our firm we have a saying we use with every new client. If you only have a little to spend, wait on everything else and let us get local tight for you. We have a local coordinator who stays on top of local and insure we get it right.

On moz there are several who have a ton of Local knowledge and as an associate, Miriam, is invaluable. You can also read Mike Blumenthal, etc. for a ton of data.

Hope it helps, best to you and your clients.