Thanks to the Internet, there are all sorts of new ways of advertising that can get the word out about your business. However, nothing beats word-of-mouth advertising. Many businesses try to capitalize on this natural, most trusted form of marketing through referral marketing programs. Technology makes even this traditional form of getting the word out about your business easier with the use of a referral marketing platform.
However, before you launch into a new marketing campaign, there are a few things you need to make it successful. Referral marketing is marketing like any other, although it is more organic, and you need a carefully executed plan to make it a success. Here are the things you need to pull it off.
1. A Clear Idea
Every marketing campaign needs clarity. You need to know what your campaign is hoping to accomplish. What are the goals, and how will you know if your campaign was successful? Now is also a good time to put together milestones and key performance indicators, which you will use later to track the performance of your campaign.
During the brainstorming period, it’s also a good idea to figure out why you are launching this type of marketing campaign in the first place. Referral marketing fills a new niche because it relies on personal relationships to succeed.
2. Research
Research is involved in almost every single aspect of expanding your business. You need to know the market to know how to expand and find success in this arena. In terms of referral marketing, you need a lot of research about your existing customer base as well as the potential customers you are looking to attract. What is the segment of the market that is your target audience, and what incentives can you offer that will make them more likely to join your program?
During your research phase, you can also check out referral marketing programs from competitors to see how they structure their programs and how you can make yours even more successful.
3. Incentives
The best way to get people to share your business with others is to give them a reward for doing so. Think about the rewards you will offer customers if they share their enthusiasm for your products or services with others. Will you offer them a simple coupon code, or send them free samples of a new product?
Make sure you have incentives in place because, without them, people have less of a reason to talk to others about your business. Plus, standardizing these incentives means you treat all your customers equally.
4. Communication Channels
Launching a referral marketing program requires a lot of communication. You need to alert customers to this opportunity and follow up and let them know if someone they referred made a purchase.
Before you start planning your communications, think about how you will communicate with your customers. Email marketing is a standard avenue of communication at this point. However, if your relationship with your customers is closer, you can also use text marketing, which is the new frontier for digital advertising.
5. Templates
Once you put together your brilliant referral marketing program, you need to communicate to customers that you are launching this amazing program. There are a few ways you can do this. One is by launching a call on social media. However, it is more personal if you send emails or communication to customers after a purchase or other interaction letting them know about this opportunity.
Create email or communication templates which you can use to send information about your referral marketing program. That way, you can convert new customers to agents in your referral program with the press of a button. Most email templates can be personalized with information about your customer to make them feel more intimate.
6. Personalized Trackers
Any marketing campaign relies on tracking, and this is even more true for referral marketing. Not only do you want to track the success of your campaign, but you also need to know if your customer’s referral worked (the customers will want to know as well).
The easiest solution to this problem is creating personalized referral links or codes that customers can give to their friends. Then, you can tell from the links which business came from referrals and give rewards to your customers. A good referral marketing software can generate and track these links.
7. A Referral Marketing Platform
The last and most crucial thing you need to manage a comprehensive referral marketing campaign is a strong platform. Modern referral marketing platforms are powerful software tools that can handle all of your needs in one place. Your referral marketing platform can analyze the market before you launch your campaign, manage communications, and easily track personalized referral links for each customer.
With all of these elements, your referral marketing campaign will be a success.