How To Create A Referral Marketing Strategy

The Basics of turning your existing customers into referrers

Don’t forget to invite them

Make sure that you are encouraging your customers to refer their family and friends through emails and other widgets that could be launched at the right time and with the rules you give.

Convert them into customers

Your potential customers should be invited by emails from referrers, a social network post, or even a private message, that would turn them into your customer. And they could also have the possibility to become like the people who invited them, referrers/ambassadors.

Don’t forget to give rewards

You could have an incentive catalog or you can have a designated incentive for every success your referrers give to you. Make sure that your incentives are something your customers would be interested in.

Be motivating

You can implement scenarios that are automated through emails, widgets, and SMS to support the programs you have. You can also keep inviting your customers into inviting new people and encourage them to act as ambassadors for your brand and motivate them by having different contests and incentives that are growing the more they refer.

But that’s just the tip of the ice berg

But if we talk about this in depth, referral marketing is not just about getting more leads through the customers that are satisfied with your brand. Referral marketing isn’t just for short term. When you achieve a program that’s built well, you are given the chance to implement brand loyalty with the customers that always go back to you, while having the chance to increase your customer base.

But it’s not all about you. The above is a win win situation for you, but how about your customers? You should never forget about your customers, especially in referral marketing because they are the ones working for your business. And that is why, your incentive and reward details should be fundamental to your strategy’s success.

In a lot of surveys and studies done, it all shows that word of mouth is a key influencer in decisions they make regarding purchasing. Referral marketing has become an important part of the market place today because it has given impressive results. Now that you know all the good stuff about referral marketing that you have to know, do you know how to create one for the customers that you already have?

How can you harness your customer’s power? How can you turn them into fans that are vocal about you? Don’t worry if you’re feeling lost, I’ll guide you through what you need to know below.

Identify the things that would motivate your customers and decide on the incentives from

There are chances where your customers would be sharing your services to their friends, family, and social media because that’s just how much they love you. But this isn’t the norm and this won’t be happening all the time. So when you give your customers incentives that they would actually enjoy, you are giving them rewards that they would desire and would lead them into sharing about you.

Determine how you could make your top customers know they are appreciated

Incentives aren’t just related to referrals, you can also give incentives for customers who does something amazing for your company. You could give a lot of different things to make your customers feel that they are appreciated like, free shipping, x2 points for rewards, additional discounts and other things for your loyal customers.

Simplify the structure and logistics with referral marketing software

You won’t be here unless you are aiming for your referral marketing program to become a success. And in order to achieve that it has to have a well planned structure and your company commitment. You could also think about referral programs as an investment, especially since you should be aiming your referral program to be fun and simple for the customers you have.

You also want the program to be easy to manage and track, right? that’s why a lot of brands choose streamlined platforms in order to make sure that both the customers and company staff would be satisfied.

You should master your referral marketing strategy

Exciting invitations

In order to start your referral campaign, you have to set up a referral marketing software appropriate for your company. You could start by rounding up direct invitations. You should also collect a list of customers, and friends that would participate and likely be active in promoting your campaign and referring.

Basically you would be sending your initial invitations to:

Your business partners, your employees, your customers, your past customers, and your prospect customers.

Now, you have to make sure that your invitations are tempting, and exciting in order for you to begin establishing qualities your brand would adhere. I’ll let you know ahead of time that it would take time for everything to balance out, but you should not forget to explain how your referral program works without sounding boring and bogging down people.

Effective Promotion

There isn’t any campaign, business, endeavor that would be successful if not because of effective promotion. If your customers didn’t know you have a referral program then no one will benefit from it because no one would use it, thus there would be a lack of motivation in the referral part. You should always make sure that your referral marketing campaign would get the attention that it actually deserves.

There are many ways that you could show case your referral program like:

Sending your loyal customer emails: those who are subscribed to your email list is probably more likely to be interested and has already given referrals. You should not forget to send them an email blast about your new amazing program and incentives that they sure would be excited about.

Banners: Banners as well as buttons is two things on your website that you wouldn’t want to waste. Especially since you have a referral campaign. Banner ads, and eye catching buttons should lead to informative pages that would make your customers more interested.

Persuasive incentives

Even if you have the most loyal customers in the world, customers would put in more effort and time if you have rewards that are worth it. you should also offer rewards that would make your customers go back to your brand an do a purchase. For example, instead of offering money for every referral, you can offer a discount on their next purchase.

Here are some qualities your program should definitely have:

It should be valuable, because obviously adults wouldn’t be motivated to receive a cheap sunglasses for putting in so much effort and time. you should think about your customers and base your rewards on them.

It should be something relevant, unless you are giving percentages off, or goods from your shop them your offer should be something related to your brand.

It should also be on the right time. Make sure that they don’t have to wait months in order to receive their rewards, but also make sure that you don’t give it right away and it doesn’t expire quickly.

Tempting Personalization

Referral marketing is also a personal way to attract different business. When people tell people they care about, about your brand they are risking their reputation just for your customers, they also want to be appreciated. So in your referral marketing materials, make sure to give them the choice to use their names, it might be a small gesture for you but it could have a big impact on your customers.

And also, your customers would have different preferences and lifestyles, so make sure to try to offer reward package options.

Conclusion

Referral marketing is something that could turn powerful as long as it’s done right.  like all the other businesses, you don’t usually create a powerful campaign right away, but if you have tools that you could rely on, customers who are engaged and interested, you will easily find success in referral marketing.