Five Steps to Referral Success
These days we trust—and make—referrals all the time about just about every product and service. The Web, email and social media contribute to the ease and ubiquity of recommendations, reviews and referrals. We Tweet, post to Facebook, forward emails, and recommend Web sites.
That's because we trust referrals. 90% of us trust word-of-mouth as the most reliable source of information about products and services. 92% of us look online before we begin the purchase process. Not surprisingly, 26% of marketers plan to increase social networking and word-of-mouth marketing efforts. Over 70% of B-to-C marketers already have or plan to implement referral marketing functionality.
If you're sending emails, reaching customers and prospects via Facebook and Twitter, or simply keeping your Web site up to date, you're enabling peer-to-peer marketing. The next steps involve ramping up efforts, measuring, and improving tactics… and seeing measurable referral marketing results.
Climbing the Online Referral Ladder
Here's how we recommend brands climb the referral ladder:
1. Outreach
Sending good, high quality emails with the right call to action to the right list and including a forward to a friend link is the first step on the referral ladder. Make sure there's something tangible to help referrals, such as an email, business card, Facebook page. Update your Web site, post and follow on Twitter.
2. Initiate and Plan
Develop a plan for an online (and offline) referral marketing initiative. Hopefully your outreach to date can help you target the audience, figure out prizes and incentives, and set up metrics to measure success.
3. Introduce and Measure
You introduce a referral marketing initiative, such as a short-term Peersuasion campaign. Now you are providing a mechanism that enables referrals, and you can watch them, track results and measure return-on-investment according to new purchases or additional opt-ins.
4. Let More Flowers Bloom
Go social, go offline. Use your Facebook page, Tweet, use public relations and other offline efforts to get the word out. Depending on your product or service, blogs, YouTube or news feeds can help to amplify your voice. Multiple channels and an open system make for a better referral program.
5. Revise and Refine
Once your initial referral program is complete, you'll want to look at results, survey users (either officially or unofficially), look at return-on-investment. You revise elements so that they work more effectively and efficiently, and you're on your way to a lasting, measurable, impactful referral marketing program.
