How to Recruit Advocates for your Business?
The new economy is based on advocacy. A Mckinsey marketing study found that 2/3 of US economy is now based on advocacy: Friends telling friends what is Hot and what is Not. Only 14% of people trust advertising, 69% are interesting in advertising blocking technologies, and 78% of consumers trust one to one recommendation from friends.
If your business is struggling to attract clients, it’s simple because you don’t have enough advocates.
Your advocates are customers, prospects and even strangers who like you and your business. They can’t help but singing to the world nice songs about how great, how magnificent, how terrific you are.
Your business flourishes when more than 10% of your customers become advocates; You thrive when 30% turn advocates and you become irresistible when like Apple 78% of customers are your fans, and go beyond advocacy to create Ads for your brand with their own money and resources.
Frederick F. Reichheld and Thomas Teal found that an increase of 5% of your advocates will yield your profits 25 to 95%.
The question now is how to recruit advocates?
- To recruit customers as advocates, you should become advocate for your customers,
- To recruit peers as advocates, you should become advocate for your peers,
- To recruit friends as advocates, you should become advocate for your friends,
- to recruit strangers as advocates, you should become advocate for strangers
Trust in the law of reciprocity, and you’ll see that happens.
The law of reciprocity states that we repay, in kind, what another person has provided us. It’s a common mantra in our culture – the Golden Rule is another example of the law of reciprocity.
For companies the question to answer is how to become the advocate for customers, peers, friends, strangers.
Adopt IRaaS (Information and Recommendation as a Service) marketing approach.
IRaaS is a customers’ engagement utility that uses “Information as a gift ™ ” to induce positive emotional connections to customers and contacts. The positive emotional connections have the power to turn customers and contacts into voluntary advocates for your organization, generating a consistent word-of-mouth referrals and a Nonstop Viral Buzz for your business.
How it works?
“simply go to that address book and list out the 20 percent of your contacts who matter most. Do you know their interests? Their biggest dreams and goals (professional and personal)? If you don’t then that is a place to begin. Once you do, mark down next to each name what specific actions you can take that will help that person realize those goals. What connections can you make for them? What knowledge can you transfer to them? Call them up. No agenda. No ‘asking for the business.’ Just deliver value relevant to them and keep doing it.”
