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If you believe word of mouth is the best form of advertising, then social media is your bullhorn.

To turn up the volume, there's Testimonial Tree, a Bonita Springs technology company that helps customers gather and publish testimonials.

The company's winning pitch: Imagine your customers sharing their testimonials about how great your product or service is with all their friends on social media from a single, easy-to-use website. “The content is so powerful,” says Jason Dolle, the 37-year-old president and founder.

For $29 a month or less depending on the number of testimonials, Testimonial Tree subscribers can ask their customers to visit the website, write a testimonial and share it with their friends on social media. Customers can do it easily from a single website, which saves them time. In addition, Testimonial Tree subscribers can track the customer responses and post them on their own website, too.

The average Facebook user has 400 friends, so testimonials are a gold mine of potential referrals for new business. What's more, testimonials can boost a company's Web search-engine results because the original content gives it a higher score.

A testimonial request can also help identify disgruntled customers before they start ranting on other websites, where you have little control. For example, a testimonial button on your website can take a customer to a survey. “If it's negative, you ask questions to find out what's wrong and fix it,” Dolle says. “If they're happy, take them to the testimonial.”

Dolle realized the power of the tool when he developed it for his own business. A computer engineer and programmer, he sold real estate for a short time with his wife, Mindy. “It was really easy to get testimonials from customers,” he says, shuttling prospective homebuyers around town. “They're in your car for days.”

Dolle reasoned: “Wouldn't it be cool if the customers shared that testimonial on their own social network? The key is to make it easy. It's one ask and you get a much higher conversion rate.”
Dolle says he followed the “lean startup” method. “I built it for me,” he explains.

His first customer when he launched Testimonial Tree in January 2013 was Michael Saunders & Co., the upscale real estate firm in Sarasota. Right away, Dolle says he had hundreds of real estate agents using Testimonial Tree. “I feel incredibly blessed,” he says.

Since then, Dolle formed a deal with a group of 500 real estate agencies affiliated with an organization called Leading Real Estate Agencies of the World. “I could add 20,000 agents over the next month,” Dolle says.

Already, Dolle says he has more than 5,000 customers. Besides real estate, customers range from motorcycle dealers to travel operators. He's also targeting chambers of commerce and large organizations that could offer this service to their members. “My focus has been driving the huge pipeline of revenues,” he says.

But Dolle acknowledges that Testimonial Tree will have to raise capital to expand. He estimates raising $2 million to $3 million in angel funding to hire more programmers to help him develop products such as video testimonials. In addition, Testimonial Tree will likely need more staff for sales and marketing. “It's all been bootstrapped so far,” he says.

Follow Jean Gruss on Twitter @JeanGruss