Getting top positions in the catalogs of top rating and reviews platforms like Clutch and Manifest is something many companies seek to achieve. Why? Top positions increase your company’s trustworthiness as a service vendor and can generate high-quality leads that have a big trust in your company’s capabilities.
From my experience as the Head of Marketing and a marketing mentor in several IT companies, I can confirm that Clutch ratings do work and get you leads. And it is much more than the number of positive client reviews that define your position in Clutch ratings.
How to Start Fast?
The simplest way to get to the top is to purchase a sponsorship, especially when you have a new company profile.
Clutch offers a variety of sponsorships to choose from depending on your budget. However, you can’t always get the position you pay for. Sometimes, newly emerged sponsors can get listed higher in the listing even if you paid for your specific sponsored position earlier. That’s the major Clutch trick.
What Influences My Company’s Position in the Rating?
According to Clutch, “all sponsorship positions on Clutch directory pages are dynamic”. Your position in any listing can either increase or decrease during the time of your paid sponsorship. That’s because any other company can pay for the opportunity to get listed at any time, or any sponsor can stop their sponsorship at any point.
However, you will never know the exact level of sponsorship of your competitors. There is only a ‘sponsor’ label indicating that this placement is paid.
How Does It Work?
Clutch says that its sponsorship works as an auction.
There are 9 sponsorship tier levels: Starter, Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum, Diamond, Double Diamond, Triple Diamond, Quadruple Diamond. The cost of sponsorship depends on the company size, level of sponsorship, and the number of pages sponsored.
The sponsors with higher-tier sponsorship appear above the companies with lower-tier sponsors. If both companies have the same sponsorship tier then other Clutch algorithms define who comes first.
As a rule, IT companies buy sponsorships from Starter to Gold. The price varies from $650 to $4500 for mid-sized companies (50-249 employees).
How to Improve My Clutch Rating?
According to Clutch, all sponsors are subject to a thorough vetting process.
You should publish your clients’ lists, case studies, awards, and any evidence of industry leadership both on your website and Clutch profile so that the Clutch research team could easily assess this information. Clutch also evaluates your company’s marketing presence (blogs, press releases, social media). It collects and verifies the trustworthiness of information to help vendors identify the best company to hire.
The addition of new positive feedback to your Clutch profile will improve your profile performance. There is a recent bias for ranking companies and it is best practice to try to add a new review every 2-3 months to capture that. Adding more reviews can also help with click-throughs for your sponsorship and make your listing stand out more.
How to Get in the Clutch Leaders Matrix?
Each company featured in a Leaders Matrix is evaluated based on client reviews, past work, market presence, and specialization in a given service. Paid sponsorship does not guarantee you a place in the Leaders Matrix, as it is a complex parameter.
Ability to Deliver includes the company’s client reviews, past work, market presence, and prestigious awards. Focus is a company’s level of specialization in a given service.
The best companies to hire are, of course, Market Leaders. They have the strongest ability to deliver, high focus on the offered service, and strong feedback from its clients.
More about the Clutch methodology here.
For example, here is the Leaders Matrix of AI Developers. 15 companies featured out of 3,000.
Will it Work for My Niche?
Sure. First of all, there are plenty of categories from Web & Software Development to Business Services such as Real Estate, Supply Chain & Logistics, and Human Resources and others in a variety of locations. You can check how much traffic a particular Clutch directory gets in your target region. If it is less than 400-500 visits per month then you should probably opt out for another channel. Otherwise, your investment will be too long to pay off.
One more thing – your company location (HQ) can define your presence on a certain page. For example, if your recruiting company is located in the USA, you can’t be listed among the recruiting companies in Canada, unless you have an office there (see an example).
Why You Can Trust My Opinion?
In 2018 my team at XB Software contributed to the company’s promotion to the 4th place in Belarus and 100th place worldwide (out of over 15K companies) as the top web development company (note: without paid sponsorships involved)
In 2021, my InData Labs team efforts helped our company to become a Market Leader in the Top 10 AI Software Companies in the Global Clutch Leaders Matrix (out of about 3000 companies) within a year.
Order Clutch analysis for your niche by sending your email to info@leadcap.one.