CHENNAI: Wouldn’t it be awesome if people just kept on sharing news about your app to their friends and themselves recommended to download? Wouldn’t you get lots of downloads?
A recent study was done to understand the success rates of different marketing activities.
Very interestingly, around 80% of sales happen when someone personally recommends it or introduces to it. In a B2B partnership, this could be a mutual friend or network and in case of B2C sales, this could be an existing customer who suggests the product to his friends.
The main reason for this kind of success rate is the ‘Trust Factor’ during referral marketing. It is very difficult to establish this trust during a cold call. When a friend however refers you, the trust is immense. There is a very high probability of you converting the lead.
An interesting thing to note is that when you are referred by someone, the client does not really worry a lot about pricing as long as it is in within or around the budget. Also if this is a B2B deal (and in some cases also in B2C lead), you can offer a customised solution to the prospective client because the referrer will be able to give you decent enough background on likes or dislikes of the prospect.
Here are five tips on how to use referral marketing to your complete advantage:
Tap on social media: Over 67% of people suggested in a survey by Harris Poll that they are most likely to purchase a product when it is shared by a friend of family member on their social media. No wonder some big companies incentivise sharing content on social media.
Coupon Codes: Unique customer coupon codes can be designed that can give a certain discount to the referrer as well as the prospect. This offer has been heavily used by cab companies.
Free exclusive content: Another campaign could be where you offer certain content exclusively free only if the referrer is able to get the app downloaded by X number of friends
Email Marketing: Personal recommendations on emails are one interesting way to attract the prospect. What better if your existing customer forwards the mail to prospects. Figure out a way to incentivize it.
Website Reviews and UGC: User Generated Content are another superb way of referral marketing. People read reviews and weigh their next purchase. What better to call or mail your existing customers and requesting and incentivising them to write honest feedback and reviews for your prospective customers.
Happy Marketing!
If you have any queries around events, write to me on Rajeev@TBSPlanet.com
Rajeev Tamhankar
Twitter@rajeevtamhankar
The writer is IIT-R Alumnus, Entrepreneur of The Year’17 (Print Business) and the Founder of TBS Planet Comics