Why do you track customers’ referrals?

This is a guest post from Jeanne Bliss — customer experience expert and author of “I Love You More Than My Dog.” See the original post this is adapted from and more like it on her blog.

Consider the customer referral as the true money question; it’s the final frontier of loyalty.

If your customers are willing to stick their neck out vouching for you, they have become your marketers. A customer referral means that you’re firing on two important cylinders.

First, you’ve done enough things right that they meld together into an experience that’s more than the sum of the parts of your organization. Your products, services, people, locations, and contacts present themselves beyond the ho-hum of our daily lives as consumers. You’ve gone beyond the execution of actions and tactics. You create memories customers want to have — again and again.

Second, the connection you’ve created with customers through the delivery of this experience compels them to tell others about it. Your customers become your marketing department, relating their experiences and convincing others to try you.

If you can track the rate of referrals in general and by customer group, you’ll know the strength of your ongoing revenue stream before you even spend another dollar on marketing. Companies completely focused on customer profitability will learn how referral rates differ by customer group and reasons for not referring. They will rigorously apply this learning to constantly adjust and improve their customer experience.

You need to use all of this information to dig into the reasons behind the numbers and drive change as a result of what you learn.

About Jeanne Bliss

As “Chief Customer Officer” for Lands’ End, Mazda, Coldwell Banker, Allstate, and Microsoft, Jeanne got “customer” on the strategic agenda, earned 98% loyalty rates, and changed experiences across 50,000-person operations. Jeanne now runs CustomerBliss to create an actionable path for profitability and business growth -- through earning customer and employee raves. Her best-selling books are Chief Customer Officer and I Love You More than My Dog: Five Decisions that Drive

Tags: , ,

Comments

  1. WordPress › Error

    There has been a critical error on this website.

    Learn more about troubleshooting WordPress.