Id rather have a forum for clients to post in for their testimonials in as it gets peoples openions out there as well as gets potential clients to look around a bit more...Best way maybe to quote part of the testimonial on a page then link it at the bottom that says "Read more...". I always look at it, the longer people are looking around the more likely they are to buy.

As for design if a company wants to show how professional it is then you would think that they would get the more professional looking site that they could afford, I mean there are loans and credit cards.