How likely are you to recommend us to a friend?

This is a guest post from Andy Sernovitz — CEO of WordofMouth.org and SocialMedia.org and New York Times bestselling author of “Word of Mouth Marketing: How Smart Companies Get People Talking.”

That question may be the most important question you can ask — and the business innovation of the decade. It comes from Fred Reichheld‘s Net Promoter Score concept and his book The Ultimate Question. You should read the book and start using it immediately.

Of course, I love it because it’s a word of mouth question. Measuring your success in terms of working for the referral takes a lot of complicated business goals and boils it down to one simple idea — is the customer so happy that they will refer us?

It’s a question that works for every department. The CEO knows that referrals are important, but so does the delivery guy. Each employee can succeed by defining their job in terms of the did I earn the referral today? objective.

You’ll be amazed at how easy it is to start asking this question and how quickly it aligns your company around what really matters: customers that love you so much that they sing your praises to their friends.

Here’s a great email I got from Rackspace:

image

Learn more from NetPromoter.com.

About Andy Sernovitz

Andy Sernovitz builds organizations that help people help each other. His company, GasPedal, builds peer-to-peer communities for people leading meaningful change at the world’s biggest companies, including SocialMedia.org and SocialMedia.org Health. He wrote the best-selling book Word of Mouth Marketing, which teaches you how to earn the respect and recommendation of your customers.

Tags: , , , , ,

Comments are closed.

Featured Downloads

9 Things to Share That Start Conversations

Use the examples in this guide to help inspire ways to make your message more portable and shareable.

Read More

3 Must-Use Word of Mouth Marketing Tools

These tools will help you kick off any word of mouth campaign no matter what topic, industry, or budget.

Read More

The Top Four Tips for Multiplying Your Word of Mouth

These tips can help you get your marketing to do more work without a lot of extra effort.

Read More

10 Ways to Turn Around Negative Word of Mouth

The most effective ways to stop negative WOM with examples from Zappos, FedEx, Dell, and more.

Read More

The New Topics Worksheet

All word of mouth starts with a topic of conversation — a simple, portable, repeatable idea that gets people talking.

Read More

The Word of Mouth Action Plan

Create a complete word of mouth marketing plan using this worksheet’s eight simple steps.

Read More