Convert browsers to buyers: 9 social proof tactics that work

The main forms I will cover in today’s email:

Okay, let’s get into it

Influencer/Celebrity Mentions, Quotes or Content

This is what everyone thinks is the pinnacle of social proof — the reason these endorsements work so well is because it taps into the buy-in that someone already has with the celebrity, so if I don’t directly trust JASPR, I do trust that Lauryn knows the best products, which may be good enough for me to justify a purchase.

Leveraging these quotes can be risky, especially if you don’t have a relationship with the celebrity or influencer. Technically, using the content or quote without their permission can land you in hot water. However, that doesn’t mean you can’t amplify when a celebrity or influencer becomes a fan of the product.

Here are a few ways to leverage it:

  1. Get earned media coverage: Just because you can’t talk about the fact that Sydney Sweeney loves using the Solawave wand doesn’t mean that you can’t pitch People Magazine to publish an article titled, Sydney Sweeney Revealed That the Secret to Her Glowing Complexion Is a
 Face Wand?“
  2. Bring those celebrities in: After Cadence realized they had a fan of the brand, in Taylor Hill, they co-created a product together. The Supermodel Set is available for purchase on their website and provides both Cadence and Taylor Hill with content and something fun to highlight.
  3. Leverage celebrities as your way in: When you don’t have the ability to tap into your customer base and ask them to create together, you can do what WhatsApp did and hire the Modern Family crew. They leveraged the humor and likeness of Modern Family to get people who would’ve otherwise never taken a second look at WhatsApp to maybe give it a shot.

Creator Content

Working with creators is multi-beneficial from a marketing standpoint and also comes with a lot more benefits around usage than celebrity mentions do.

With content creators, there are generally three reasons you work with one:

  1. Their reach
  2. Their content
  3. Their co-sign

I recently covered this part in my previous deep dive, so I won’t get into the details for this one. You can read it here.

Customer Reviews

There is nothing as prominent, useful, and authentic as genuine customer reviews. You can tell when they sound genuine from the way they’re written, and believe me, authentic vs inauthentic customer reviews absolutely impact the conversion rate of your PDP or landing pages.

Encouraging and even incentivizing your customers to leave reviews should be a standard practice. Collecting as many reviews as possible should be a goal. Whoever is in charge of collecting reviews should have a bonus structure tied to the number of reviews collected.

Being able to use stats like “40,000+ 5-Star Reviews” makes any ad, landing page, email, or affiliate article 10 times more credible and tempting to purchase from. Make it extremely easy for customers to leave reviews, ideally, with additional characteristics.

PR/Affiliate/Performance PR Articles, Headlines & Snippets

Getting mentioned in articles can be helpful so you can leverage the publication’s logo, or getting a nice feature, and you can leverage a direct quote, goes a long way. Depending on the audience you target, you want to choose which set of publishers to display quotes/social proof from.

For people who are 35+, I would include logos like the New York Times, Town & Country, Good Morning America, etc. For people under 35, I would show logos like PopSugar, Refinery29, VICE, etc. You get the gist.

Example: If the page is trying to push messaging around better hair and skin, then I would pull a quote like this: “I would specifically recommend it if you deal with breakouts on your body, especially your shoulders and back, or have curly hair.” — Apartment Therapy.

Partnerships & OOH

This one isn’t as impactful as customer reviews, per se, but this is something that I think adds a ton of credibility and social proof to a brand. Partnerships are where you align up with another brand or media company to do something fun for both sides. OOH stands for “out of home” and can be anything from a screen in Times Square.

Here are two examples of how this plays up social proof, credibility, and trust:

American Express and Equinox: When they partner together, it lifts the credibility and standing of both brands in someone’s mind. For one of them to leverage the other in their marketing materials makes the one leveraging look stronger, too.

Leveraging a billboard creative: Proudly display it on the homepage of a website or through organic social channels. Imagine if you had a picture on your homepage, halfway down, with an image of your brand on a billboard in Times Square… everyone knows you have to be a big deal or a legit brand to have that. It immediately inspires trust and two times as great social proof for the site.

Social Media Content

Two main places I think social proof is prevalent for brands are Instagram and TikTok.

On Instagram, you can curate and pull all the reposts of mentions into a highlight that lives on your profile. This allows new customers who land on your profile because of an Instagram ad to be immediately met with social proof about the brand.

On TikTok, you want to make sure that when, not if, but when people search your brand name in the search bar, they see content that speaks back to the benefits that you’re pushing in your funnels. This can happen in two ways:

  1. You incentivize or encourage your own customers to post about the product on TikTok. Or… don’t? Some brands, have so many customers posting about the brand when never asked. I think it has to do with people wanting to signal to others that they are cool, hot, and trendy enough to have a product from an X brand.
  2. You pay a ton of creators or incentivize a ton of TikTok affiliates to start making content with the brand. Similar to what you see brands like Liquid IV, Mary Ruth’s, and Smackin’ Sunflower Seeds doing.

Certifications

Have you ever seen certifications on a beverage bottle or a food product you just bought from the grocery store? Or seen an icon across all your skincare items that let you know it’s cruelty-free? That’s what these Certifications are. Unfortunately, everything is pay-to-play. Some are more expensive than others—the Non-GMO certification is $105 a year, and Leaping Bunny (certifies cruelty-free) is, I think, $500/product/year. Whole30 Certified can be in the thousands or tens of thousands.

These certifications are expensive, but they certainly help move products. Being Whole30 Certified means you also passed the test that the certification comes with. For example, being Whole30 Certified would convince one of the millions of people who know Whole30 to take your product over the next one.

This single article recommends 11 certifications. Everyone is making recurring money. I think there’s an opportunity for an all-encompassing new stamp/certification so brands don’t have to spend 5-6 figures on certifications.

Awards

Awards are like the earned-media version of Certifications. You apply for them, they also require some upfront deposit/payment, and then you see which award you win. It doesn’t necessarily matter which specific award you won from a publication or media company, but rather that the media co/publication that awarded it to you is trusted.

For example, if you have a cleanser and you won in the Viral Product category with Allure’s Readers Choice Awards, the badge still reads, “Reader’s Choice. Award Winner. Allure. The Beauty Expert. 2024.”

It doesn’t matter which one you win; that badge on your landing page or product page is going to go a long way. On Crown Affair’s Collections Page, the awards from Allure, Glamour, and Cosmopolitan are proudly layered on top of the product images. I absolutely love that brand.

Clinical Trials

The last form of social proof I wanted to make sure I covered here is clinical trials.

You can actually make claims, go to market with them, and have the supporting study as evidence for anyone who wants to see. What is better than a clinical trial? It’s also a high barrier to entry to get one. In the US, it can be $150,000 to get a proper clinical trial done. I know of brands who have done clinical trials in India for $30,000 USD and have had no different results than a company spending $150k here.

Clinical trials are all done by a third party, and the “branding” of a clinical trial is well-known and understood as something that carries a lot of weight with consumers. You can buy a certification, but you can’t just buy the results of a clinical trial. It’s why Mary Ruth’s new hair growth product launched with a clinical trial.

Brands typically wait a long time to get clinical trials. I encourage you to look into how to do them cost-effectively and put that on blast. It’s high-leverage and allows you to advertise and say things that your competitors can’t. They’ll get in trouble.

Okay, now the only other thing I wanted to cover was where are all the places you can leverage this social proof:

  1. Ads — all your paid social ads, influencer ads, ad copy, etc.
  2. Website + Landing Pages — put it in your LP hero’s, collections pages, homepage, product pages, etc.
  3. Emails + SMS flows — all your cart/site abandon flows, up-sell flows, and anytime you mention a product, include social proof. Even if it’s an education-forward email, you can tailor the social proof to match the punchline of your email or text.
  4. Organic Social — The new version of Googling a brand is just going to their organic social channels. Yours should be flooded with social proof or very easy to discover where it is.
  5. In-Store Display — In stores, the on-shelf signage, any end cap displays, pallet displays, or register displays. You can mention your social proof there, and it’ll do wonders.
  6. eRetail Listings — Your Amazon, Nordstrom, Walmart, etc., listings should all include elements of social proof from above. You can sync your reviews and carry over UGC, certifications, and/or awards.

Have questions/feedback? Use this form.

I’m also going to be actively posting DTC content on my Twitter and LinkedIn channels – you can follow for daily updates.

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