// putting social proof to work selling online training in the TrainHeroic marketplace

When potential clients land on your marketplace sales page, they want to know three things before they buy your programming*:

Our team did a killer job setting you up for conversion success with the new Marketplace 3.0 PageBuilder, laying it out in a super pro-looking but still easy-to-manage way.

By now, you’ve nailed your value prop, amping up potential clients (niche) and selling them on the many features and benefits of working with you (offer). Your next task: overcome objections with FAQs and social proof.

Cool, cool… So what is social proof?

*This golden nugget is courtesy of Angie Lee, digital marketing ninja and nailer of niches.

// social proof: the lowdown

Social proof taps into our psychological desire to conform, harnessing the “But everyone else is doing it!” feeling your Mama warned you about. 

Social proof can be a powerful sales tool, but only if you execute it correctly by finding the relatable sweet spot.

Generic Testimonials: Not believable

On one end of the spectrum are written testimonials. They often feature a one-sentence soundbyte, the kitschiest of which may be attributed to “John S.” with a suspiciously stock image-like headshot. There’s a time and a place for real written testimonials, for sure, but they can also feel generic and anonymous if you forget to add the flavor packet. 

Influencer Testimonials: Not relatable

On the opposite end, there’s celebrity/influencer testimonials. These are more aspirational. If your training program was what helped Gerard Butler transform into King Leonidas for the movie 300, you KNOW you could sell clients on that alone. Ehh, maybe… because your clients only have so much in common with Gerard Butler.

The sweet spot

The most impactful social proof lands us in a relatable sweet spot between anonymity and celebrity. Your potential client wants to know that your programming has worked for other people just like them. People who are also busy professionals and/or parents, preparing for the college hockey season, training for their next Olympic weightlifting competition, trying to lose 15 lbs. after years of inactivity, etc.

// the anatomy of great social proof

We’ll get into how to track down social proof below, but let’s start with some ground rules. 

What makes for good social proof?

Feels authentic 

Effective social proof uses the language of your ideal client and sounds like something a real human would actually say. Err on the side of conversational; it feels more genuine, making it more credible.

Reinforces the benefits your training offers

Focus on feedback that connects back to your benefit statements. If your programming is designed to increase athletes’ speed, share social proof from clients who’ve shaved time off their 200m, etc. Provide evidence that what you’re selling works.

Showcases your ideal client / niche

If you’re training former competitive gymnasts who are getting back into the gym after giving birth, those are the women whose testimonials you should showcase. Rookie firefighter Sam’s experience won’t pack the same relatability punch.

Pro tip for nailing social proof on your new marketplace page: Get creative with the Descriptor line in the PageBuilder. Descriptive titles or context lend authenticity to your testimonials AND help your potential clients see themselves in your current ones.

Because if it worked for them, your potential clients can envision success for themselves. Boom, you’re one step closer to conversion.

// Where to find social proof

If this isn’t your first rodeo running a business and promoting it on the interwebs, your social proof is already out there. In comments, reviews, mentions/tags, DMs…

The goal is to find positive experiences with you and your coaching business, as shared by current/former clients. Pro tip: When you come across social proof, screenshot it in its original context! The best social proof looks and feels organic and genuine. Highlighting it in its originally formatted glory can be powerful.

Here are three examples from a quick social media search of some of TrainHeroic’s top marketplace sellers:

While the first two are examples of social proof in its natural habitat, Derek Woodske has actually taken the next step and shared the last one to his Instagram story. (Bonus points for tagging @TrainHeroic! You know we shared that to our story.) 

Need more ideas?

Here’s a quick and totally non-comprehensive list of places to look for social proof:

* NOTE: Best practice is to blur out identifying details or ask for permission to share emails/texts, DMs, and in-app messages. They’re not public by nature, so be respectful of your clients’ privacy!

If you’re newer to the game OR are in search of longer written or video testimonials, you can always ask for them, either directly or via a social media call. You know who your most committed and passionate clients are, right? The ones you wish you could sign 100 more of? Ask them if they would be willing to write a Google review, share their session summary to their Instagram story, comment on your latest Facebook post, etc. 

// the power of leveraging instagram stories to source social proof

Instagram stories are an especially powerful form of social proof, because they become a sort of content flywheel. When a client mentions you in their story, engage! If it’s a strong piece of social proof, share it to your story. If it’s not really representative of your brand/business, like and/or reply as positive reinforcement. *Fist bump*

Your other clients and followers will recognize that you share stories and begin tagging you with that goal in mind. The more stories you share (within reason, Friends), the more stories you will find yourself and your business being tagged in. And remember: once you share a story, it lives in your archive as a source of repurposable social proof!

A couple of Instagram story troubleshooting tips:

• If you’re seeing clients post Instagram stories about your business, but aren’t tagging you, message them! Saying something like “Hey, these stories are BADASS. I would love to share them if you are up for tagging me next time.” will usually do the trick.
• If your Instagram is set up as a business profile, you may not be able to share stories that use the music sticker. Your average Gram Fam probably doesn’t know that, so shoot them a quick DM letting know that you would like to share their story, BUT… Some users will delete and repost, while others are just game for future behavior change.

// what’s next?

Want to see all of this in action? Follow @TrainHeroic on Instagram.

Now that you’re a social proof pro, be sure to get creative on your TrainHeroic marketplace page. Then, regularly work it into your social media and marketing efforts. When you show off your star clients, you attract more just like them.

// don’t let perfection stall your progress

If you haven’t already, be sure to read this blog describing our Marketplace 3.0 PageBuilder, benefits of the new pages, and some of their features. I probably waxed a bit philosophical on the design magic our team threw into making them. In that post, I told ya, “hey Pal, go update those pages today.”

And you might’ve been thinking, “well gee Ben, when will I make the time to do that? It looks cool, but it looks like a lot.

Or, maybe you were thinking: I don’t feel like I have all the “right” images at my disposal.

Or perhaps: I should probably wait until I have an uber professional video to post, right?”

No. Hell no.

Don’t let yourself think that. Not any of those things. Bad Coach. You know better.

It’s natural to bias towards perfectionism in any creative endeavor. After all, a blank canvas is the most intimidating thing in the world. It’s the dark unknown. An endless possibility. And such possibilities can make it feel impossible to know where to start.

So let me make it simple for you.

Start at the top.

Start today.

Start right…now.

We kitted the template editor out with enough (not so) little hints to give you a well lit path to maximal conversion destiny. It’s all you need to put something out in the world that’ll move the needle.

Legendary author, creative, coach, and generally smart dude Steven Pressfield is noted for saying:

“The Principle of Priority states (a) you must know the difference between what is urgent and what is important, and (b) you must do what’s important first.”

As it relates to updating your Product Detail pages, I’m gonna let you in on a couple of secrets:

1. This is important – It will improve your conversions and help you make more sales with TrainHeroic online.
2. This is urgent – Those who complete their new pages first will rank higher in our Marketplace search results.

Double whammy.

I bet our boy Steven would agree that this looks like a pretty good P1.

So, ya, time is of the essence! 

Don’t wait. 

It doesn’t have to be perfect. In fact, I’d recommend you not let perfection get in the way of progress. 

// a guide to getting mud on the table

If you’re still intimidated by that mountain of writer’s block covered in a shit-smattering of excuses sitting in front of you, let me help you out with a trick I’ve used for years to drown that little self-destructive, doubt-whispering, confidence-killing, inner monster like a first time Kook at Nazaré. 

set up your sales page in one hour

1. Perform 30s of movement to get your wiggles out (yes, I said wiggles and yes, we all have them. Some simple push ups or Russian twists are really all you need to get ‘em out)
2. Go to this link for an easy to use online timer. Set it for one hour.
3. Shut out all distractions (see: close all other browser windows, put your phone in the other room, etc.)
4. Open up your Marketplace 3.0 Editor.

5. Hit “Start” on the timer

6. Write, create, and Publish like your damn pants are on fire

7. Eat something nice at the end to reward yourself when you’re done

8. Take a walk or do something fun for 30 minutes

Here’s why that little shimmy works:

1. The first part gets your blood moving and releases extra energy. It also literally gets you out of your head and into your body so you can do the work. 
2. The second one is about establishing an effort that is short enough of a commitment that A) you can make the sacrifice relatively immediately, and B) you can give your maximum focus without passing out or losing your mind.
3. Deadlines work magic. They drive intense focus and suck the fat out of your efforts like the most aggressive Lipo in Hollywood 
4. The modern world is basically designed to rob our attention. It’s a minefield of ping ponging nonsense and nuisance. If you don’t control it, it’ll control you.
5. Hitting a tangible “Start” on something is exciting and gamifies the experience of work*
6. This is that flow stuff people talk about. It feels good to play when the stakes are high.
7. Knowing you get to eat something awesome is motivating (at least for apes like me). The feedback loop will make you want to do this again sometime soon. 
8. You probably just did something more useful and valuable in that hour than you’ll do in your next two days. Treat yo’self to a breeze around the neighborhood. 

*this is a shout out to my Mom who literally tried to turn all of our chores** (and we had a ton) into a game to make them less tedious. I found it annoying at times, but it turns out it actually works if you let it. Thanks Mom.

**my wife says I still suck at chores 

Need more proof?

This basic model shows up all over the high performance, creativity world. You get all the nonsense out of way and in a very short amount of time, try to get something “good enough” on the table that you can eventually shape into that perfect little snowflake you’ve always dreamed of.

In Leadership, growth master Brene Brown calls this lump of potential her SFD (Shitty First Draft)

In tech, Startup guru Eric Ries calls it the MVP (Minimum Viable Product)

I don’t care what you call it. I just care that you get it done. For your sake. For the world’s sake.

You don’t need to do anything nuts. You just have to get it out there. Champions are made over the long haul. They’re made in the editing, not the drafting. So never let your first one get in your way.

If you’re making pottery, you’ve gotta just throw some damn clay on the table. I assure you, once you do, you’ll enjoy improving it and it will only get better from here. 

But getting the clay on the table is the hardest thing, so reduce the anxiety by constraining the effort. Do it as fast as possible with as little judgement as necessary.

Get out of your comfort zone, get out of your own way, and just make the damn thing.

Novices think that creativity is knocking it out all at once. Masters know this whole thing is a game of repetition. Need proof? Here’s my buddy Wayne tellin’ you kids how it is.

So put on that whitebelt, Kaizen mindset and get after it, Champ. 

Start now, refine later

Then, over the next week, dig into the rest of our educational content, so you can polish and spitshine your product detail page until it’s gleaming like a high performance converting machine. 

Let’s get it.

And, cheers to you and your amazing, totally shitty, and absolutely necessary first draft. It’s beautiful, kind of 😉

// selling training online just got a whole lot easier

The vision for 3.0 was simple: Make coaches look pro, with less effort, by delivering an easy-to-use sales page builder. 

No coding. 

No wrangling hard-to-manage contractors. 

And no need to retain a graphic designer on your payroll. 

Just clean, compelling listing pages any coach can design, update, and manage themselves.

As much as it may dishearten your well-intentioned mama, people do judge a book by its cover. So if you’re trying to sell your training online, a professional presentation of your offerings is critical to your success.

As Daniel Kahneman famously asserted in “Thinking Fast and Slow,” humans are cognitively lazy. We use simple, reductive signals to make quick decisions in an increasingly complex information landscape. 

Your buyers are only human. They buy based on emotion (fast), then rationalize their decisions using logic (slow) so they feel smart and self-satisfied.  Knowing this, our team leaned into the natural decision-making process of your prospective buyers as we designed these new listing pages.

The TrainHeroic Marketplace PageBuilder 3.0 template is optimized to excite your audience, then turn that excitement into buying action. Its vertical flow first sells to emotion, then down the page, works to back up that emotional resonance with strong appeals to logic. 

To bring it all together, our team adhered to three simple principles in the design process:

1. Maximize Personalization and Branding

Our animal brains are drawn to bright colors. So with the updated design, we wanted to amp up the number of visual branding opportunities at your disposal. Now, you can add pictures to grab your buyer’s attention, reinforce your benefits, showcase your product, and humanize your digital offering. We also introduced an option to overlay a tagline atop your header imagery to quickly communicate your value proposition and help you stand out.

2. Make it Easy for Coaches to Execute

Most of our sellers are small business owners and solopreneurs, not designers. So we wanted to deliver a winning solution anyone could use without technical expertise.

Rather than using one gigantic and tough-to-format “hero” image at the top as a banner, we broke this into two simple 1X1 images you could grab straight off your Instagram. Our 3.0 template magically stitches these images together and layers a filter on top so you don’t have to deal with the Photoshop fuss. 

Our page editor is filled with little tool tips and “paint by numbers” helper text to walk you through the basics of building a high-converting page. The in-line editor allows you to build your page while previewing exactly what your audience will see.

Rather than forcing you to monkey around adding checkout buttons throughout, our team’s done the work for you. We injected bright blue buttons at each peak motivational stage in the browsing journey, with a persistent “call to action” floating on the screen as viewers scroll. That way, whenever your buyer is excited, they can take action, check out, and get to training. 

Oh ya, and you can even do all of this page building from the convenience of your mobile device. We’re putting the power of this tool right in your hands.

3. Address the Objections

And for the logical pieces of the buying decision, we embedded a structured list of features that use clean iconography to professionally frame your offering. We injected an easy to consume sample week of training to better layout expectations for the training. We sprinkled in a testimonial section to deliver some desired social proof. And we finished it all off by adding customizable FAQs to handle any anxieties and concerns your buyer might have. 

The proof

With years of experience building marketing pages, we thought we had something special with this new design, but we wanted hard proof this would drive real outcomes for our sellers. 

So before jumping into engineering, our team battle-tested the conceptual design with longtime TrainHeroic Marketplace seller, California Strength. Using their marketing website as a laboratory to vet these principles, we tweaked, tuned, and dialed in the design until we saw spikes in the buy-rate of their traffic.

After a couple weeks of adjustments, we saw a  38% increase in conversion, which in the first month following launch, has helped fuel a 10% increase in online training revenue.

Having validated the power of the page design in the wild, we’re now unlocking these optimized templates for all, bringing seller performance to the people. 

Today, any coach selling their online training products in the TrainHeroic Marketplace can take advantage of this new template. 

And, as we always try to put our customers first, we’re not forcing a transition of existing pages. Once you use the new template, we’ll simply replace your previous page. Until then, no work is required.

However, it’s worth noting that these 3.0 pages will be ranked higher in our Marketplace than the old templates, so we encourage you to jump on this opportunity to crank up your conversions and update your pages whenever possible.

Getting started

If you are an active TrainHeroic coach with Marketplace enabled, you can get to the new PageBuilder 3.0 two ways.

Navigate to your account settings and click the blue button under the marketplace tab.

Or, navigate to your current TrainHeroic marketplace sales page while logged into your account, and select the blue button in the nav bar. 

P.S. stay tuned for more

Stay tuned for more content in our power seller series that will teach you to position and package like a pro. We’ll take you from concept to your first customer, sharing the techniques that the best online sellers use to maximize the impact of their offerings.