Do you get referrals without having to ask? If not, there are a few steps you can do to increase your word-of-mouth marketing and be more referable.
Although it may sound great, it is difficult to measure the success of word-of-mouth advertising and marketing. The simplest way to measure it is to see if you are receiving referrals without having to ask for them.
Realizing these things can help you to understand that customer referral marketing doesn’t have to be complicated. You may have realized that there are things you do that make customers want to share you with their friends. You might notice that having a good attitude and knowing about what you’re selling can work in your favor. You may have also noticed that putting in some extra effort has gotten you some good online reviews, which has also increased your referrals. Realizing these things can help you to understand that customer referral marketing can be simple.
There are other things you can do to be referable.
Step 1: Establish a foundation for word-of-mouth advertising
In order to start effectively utilizing word-of-mouth marketing, you need to have a solid foundation in place. This means creating an environment where word-of-mouth can occur. Here are a few tips on how to do this.
The dirty secret
The best way to ensure good WOMM for your business is to focus on your customer service.
Word of mouth relies on more than just a good product. It relies on the whole experience being good. If just the product is good, it is not enough.
It’s important to provide good customer service because it makes people more likely to recommend you to others. If you have a great product and provide excellent service, people will be more inclined to tell others about you. This is known as social currency.
Brand matters
In order to be successful, you need to give customers a great experience. This means making it easy for them to communicate with you and offering a product that they want.
No matter how easy it is to share things digitally, you still have to put in effort to be referred to. Creating a team marketing effort will help make promoting yourself easier. Everything can be considered marketing, and when your whole team is part of it, it’s simpler to put your best foot forward. It’s important to remember that every customer interaction is a marketing opportunity.
A great way to promote and solidify your brand is by interacting with customers directly. Getting a sense of the customer’s experience with your brand can give you a more informed perspective, and enable you to adjust your brand strategy as needed. Additionally, this can help you to identify problems that your employees may be experiencing.
If you want to improve your brand and culture, remember that it starts with the qualities of the founder. If the leaders of the business aren’t setting a good example, the whole brand could suffer. But if the brand values are funneled down from the top, the overall experience for everyone should be better.
Step 2: Understand where your referrals come from
Understanding why your customers buy your product can help you to improve your business. There are a few basics you can look at, such as the cost of your product, the quality of your product, or your customer service in comparison to your competitors.
It is not only important to have the minimum requirements or features you need to beat out your competition, but also to get feedback from customers. Review and recommendations from customers are just as important as primary information like price and product.
Customer feedback can give you an idea of what works and what doesn’t. It can also show you what your customers want. This conversation will help you understand why customers buy, and it will create a foundation of trust that can bring in more customers.
Step 3: Design your program with the user in mind
This is the question you need to have in mind if you want word of mouth to occur. By designing your referral program idea with the user in mind, it’s pretty easy to get open channels of communication going on.
Templates
You are more likely to get customers to refer you if you make it easy for them. This can be done by providing them with a template for the message they will share with their friends. This template can include images and a brief description of your business. You can even let your customers customize the message.
Programs that don’t provide prefilled messaging often find that customers aren’t sharing. Customers may like you and may share you, but if they have to do too much they’ll often abort ship and move on.
Rewards
The incentive is key to getting people to share your referral program. Making the reward appealing will make people more likely to take part in your program. Be sure to make it clear what the benefit is for sharing so that people are more likely to do it.
You can make people more likely to share your product by offering rewards. This incentivizes word of mouth and also gives users a reason to spend their social currency. Any good referral or rewards program software can help you distribute and choose rewards.
Step 4: Automate and create repeatable processes
To create a good experience for users, it is important to have repeatable processes. Creating new resources is easy, but the real challenge is making everything consistent. This is because your brand image and tone are strongest when they are consistent across all channels.
The same principles that apply to regular marketing campaigns also apply to referral programs. Referral programs cannot be haphazardly put together and sent out carelessly. They require more planning and strategic thinking, and must take into account the timing of when to promote the program and when to ask for referrals. There is a general timeline for asking for referrals, which is usually based on specific actions.
For example, you are less likely to ask a customer to recommend your business to their friends if they are becoming frustrated with you. You are more likely to ask for this type of referral when they are already happy with your business, but not ‘just met you’ happy. This type of ask takes a little more effort.
You don’t need software to automate the referral process, but it’s a great option.
Software
Automating your referral process and referral program will help make your channels consistent and repeatable. This can be done by triggering your referral program at certain points in your sales process and marketing campaigns.
Referral marketing software is the easiest way to create a consistent look and feel for users. You can set reminders, create easy sharing options, and automated reward fulfillment to make the process easy and repeatable. There are many referral marketing software options on the market, so be sure to check some out and see what fits your needs.
Step 5: Send products for free
Reach out to relevant influencers and see if they’d be interested in reviewing your product. Keep in mind that some influencers may be overwhelmed with free products and only review items that they really like, so you may not get a review from every single influencer.
You can reach out to micro-influencers who have a smaller following to produce tutorials, shout-outs, guides, and vlogs about their day-to-day life.
Step 6: Connect with a worthy cause
Aligning your brand with a purpose, such as sustainability or racial equality, will make it more appealing to consumers and influencers alike. Forty percent of consumers said they seek out companies that share their values, and influencers are often eager to support causes they believe in.
Step 7: Encourage user-generated content (UGC)
Most social media users trust user-generated content (UGC) more than branded content, according to Offerpop.
Even though brands would benefit from consumers sharing content, they don’t want to seem pushy. Only 16% of brands provide specific directions on how to create and share content. User-generated content builds trust by showing that other people like it.
You can encourage customers who are satisfied with your product to share user generated content (UGC) by hosting giveaways on social media. For example, you could offer a prize to people who post pictures of your products with your branded hashtag. Another way to incentivize UGC is to offer rewards through a loyalty program. For example, you could give loyalty program members extra points for posting photos or videos of your products.
Step 8: Push ratings and reviews hard
Collecting customer reviews is a modern way to do WOM marketing. Set up feedback channels to collect testimonials, such as Yelp reviews, emails, feedback surveys, and website analytics. Display honest reviews of your business prominently in as many places as possible, including review websites, social media posts, online marketplaces, and your own website.
Most consumers read at least seven reviews before deciding whether or not to trust a business. In addition, 85% of consumers say that online reviews are just as trustworthy as personal recommendations.
Step 9: Create an official referral program
Referral marketing happens when happy customers advocate for your brand in exchange for some sort of incentive. This might be called a refer-a-friend program, and it’s a popular way for ecommerce stores to grow sales while minimizing the cost per action.
If you give customers reasons to talk about your brand, they will be more likely to do so.
Rewards can be anything from:
- Discount off first-time purchase.
- A gift card or coupon.
- Cash payments or cashback.
- Free gifts.
Step 10: Know your Customer Lifetime Value (LTV)
How much revenue a single customer brings in over the course of your business relationship is referred to as the average customer lifetime value. The LTV metrics tells you how much money to spend on customer acquisition.
If your customers typically spend $200, then you shouldn’t spend more than this amount on WOM initiatives, or you’ll end up losing money.
Summary
You can start generating word-of-mouth marketing simply by following the steps outlined above. Even though it’s not going to be easy, having a strong product knowledge will help you become more referable.
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