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Fake social proof WITHOUT being misleading?
The other day I came across an interesting dilemma: You "need" social proof to get users, and you need users to have social proof.
So I asked myself: how do you get social proof with no users WITHOUT being slimy, shady, and misleading (i.e.: being blatantly obvious that the social proof is fake)?
In my research, I came across a 2-year-old thread (https://www.indiehackers.com/for...) and those two websites with fake testimonials came up: https://chatthingy.com/ and mathpix.com (they do have real reviews at the bottom though)
I did my own version at https://koupi.io
So my questions to you is: yay? nay? would you do it? Do you have other original marketing tricks like that?
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@rjplaton ooooo I love this idea! two "real" fake people and one question mark saying "This could be you" or "this is where we'd put your testimonial"!
Let me ask: Why do you need social media users? What is your product and what stage are you in?
@alex_papageorge Social proof is not social media users :) it's things like testimonials from users, or the company logos you see on landing pages, but those are things you cannot have until you actually have users.
My product is a no-code automation tool for IT administrators. It allows them to create automation scripts in minutes without needing to write code.
Currently I just launched the MVP, but like an idiot, I didn't do any marketing beforehand so now I have no users :(
@caroline_chiari Got it! Do you have current beta testers or all you in that stage right now?
@alex_papageorge I am in the stage of getting beta users/early adopters. Or maybe it's just a crappy product. we'll see what my conversion rate is.
@caroline_chiari Don't worry! Most of the products in the stage you are, are relatively crappy đ
My suggestion: Go to your target users directly. You built this product for a reason (to solve X problem). Do unscalable actions by reaching out to your ideal customer directly and ask them to use it. Then collect their feedback. If you say this solution will make you life easier by a and b, people should want to give it a try (unless the pain is not felt enough).
Your product is going to evolve all the time, and if you're doing it right, it should evolve based on the data/feedback from your users your collecting.
Start small. Get the info you need and the masses will follow.
Just be sarcastic, just joke around with testimonials. Humor is a good selling source :)
I am running into this very same issue with https://moneyminx.com, we didn't launch yet so we don't have user feedback yet. I am thinking of solving this in 2 ways?
1) I am asking people on my list for feedback on what they think of screenshots we sent so far. That could give me something to write.
2) I am looking at what potential users say about the state of the current market that I can use. For example: updating a spreadsheet every month is really painful.
For your site option #2 may work well. If you find quotes on twitter from systems engineer complaining. You can reach out to them and ask if you can quote them on your site.
This site did it that way: https://founderpool.co
First Round Capital Founderâs field guide
â ...the best safety net is the wisdom of the community and the experience of fellow entrepreneurs.â
That list of quotes like the above as an example has nothing to do with them. They are just quoting famous people from the industry. It's not a lie.
I understand your pain pretty well, that's what I'm also struggling with.
I'd say having fake testimonials isn't bad in case you're not scamming anyone. Humans have this cattle instinct that stops them from trying a product unless someone recommends it.
On the other hand, it's kinda obvious that testimonials can be bought.
I'd test this option, but my startup Whoonid https://employplan.com/ is B2B for companies with 10+ people and bigger corporations, so we need to post logos of our clients, not anonymous testimonials.
@aleksandra_vovchenko That's true that B2B likes logos (I'm B2B as well), but ultimately, you don't sell to a business, you sell to people, having feedback from actual humans can be helpful.
@caroline_chiari1 For startups, I think the best strategy is to continue offering genuine value and then reaching out to a handful of promising users to test certain features of the product for free. Once that trust and relationship is built, these users can be your source of social proof and testimonials in the beginning.
Mockup Mark