Customer Advocates: Navigating the Gap Between Expectations vs Reality

When considering effective marketing strategies, one can't help but see the crucial role understanding your customer needs plays in business growth and customer acquisition. By employing thoughtful problem-solving measures and leveraging your customer community, deep insights can be gained regarding user experience.

Understanding and satisfying your customers' needs, within this context, is like discovering an opportunity for gold. This process involves taking ownership of the user experience, paving the way for a recommendation of your services and thereby promoting client advocacy. This highlights the importance of treating every customer as a VIP, which fosters a satisfying customer experience that cultivates brand loyalty.

On your journey to understanding customer needs, make use of your wide reach on social media channels and software tools. These platforms can serve as an effective means to understand your customer sentiments, including feedback from detractors, and to offer relevant discounts that enhance customer satisfaction. Such a comprehensive understanding of your customer base amplifies the user experience and nurtures a strong customer community.

When was the last time you received an email asking, “On a scale from 0 to 10, how likely are you to recommend this product/company to a friend or colleague?” This question is something businesses often use and is part of Net Promoter Scores (NPS) to gauge customer advocacy. This strategy further emphasizes the role customer success, satisfaction, and a dynamic VIP experience play in fostering brand ambassadors.

The Net Promoter Score (NPS) serves as a valuable metric replicating a connection to the customers' likelihood to recommend your products or services, impacting your bottom line significantly. The higher the NPS, the better. On the other hand, Scores below 50 may indicate dissatisfaction with your product or service and the potential for negative word-of-mouth from detractors. To improve this score and leverage the power of client advocacy, you need to take ownership of the challenges and provide solutions that enhance user experience. Satisfied customer advocates can provide insights that can enhance others' experiences with your products or services.

In his book "The Loyalty Effect," Author Fred Reichhel discussed "finding and keeping good customers, productive employees, and supportive investors... to generate superior results." Utilize Google to delve into this topic, and you'll find this article useful in understanding how customer advocacy plays a role in customer retention and loyalty.

Though "The Loyalty Effect" was penned in 1989, the ideas presented still hold good advice for marketers today. When you have a loyal customer base, you have an opportunity to transform them into brand ambassadors for your business. Amplifying their testimonials on your website, social media pages, and other marketing materials increases visibility and credibility within your organization.

The power of the internet is immense with a staggering 81% of shoppers researching a product online before purchasing. In this initial stage of the customer journey, new customers seek educational content. Having advocate testimonials available, backed by promoter scores, paves a trustworthy path for your products or services, backed by the experiences of satisfied users.

Over the course of history, marketing has made a 180-degree turn. Previously, marketing's stages were linear, and companies mostly focused internally on increasing sales and customer numbers with little regard for customer integration. But today's world requires organizations to leverage the customer experience and engagement with customer advocates to boost revenue and brand awareness, adding up to the reward of improved brand perception and increased sales.

While the marketing team's goal is to reach your target audience and highlight your product or service benefits, they now have to factor in the motivation of customers. The non-linear customer journey unfolding today poses a challenge. This complex process involves multiple touchpoints across various channels and devices, not forgetting the explosion of social media channels. Google, Amazon's website, social media platforms - the journey may start anywhere and end up in physical stores. Diversified approaches, or options, have become a necessity in today's customer acquisition world.

Option-wise, as a business, typically run by dedicated business owners, the importance you place on sales enablement solutions, and a well-versed internal sales team is tremendous. The integration of customer concepts or feedback in the training stages of your sales team can be very useful. The investment in the best training for them is equally significant. Leveraging the words of customer advocates, which often come in the form of feedback, suggestions, and concerns, provides invaluable insights.

These can help formulate compelling handbooks and case studies to keep them in tune with company policy and product knowledge. It was a time of "hard work and little gain," where words would often fall on deaf ears despite the effort put in. However, the reality was the hard grind of the nine-to-five. So when the script flipped and we started harnessing the internet's empowering power, marketing moved into an era of customer engagement with little effort but huge reward.

Be honest. That sounds a whole lot better to me, a world with recognition in regard to the power of the customer voice. This shift increases the options available to businesses for effective marketing and interaction with their customer base.

Take a look at today's marketing climate, and you won't be able to deny that we are in the era of new advertising. Now, brand names are not just spread through TV commercials; they're found in blog posts, shared with customer advocacy efforts, echoed through social media posts and publicized across social media touchpoints. Understanding these stages and keeping track of this advancement is crucial for the success of any marketing strategy.

Marketing is no longer just TV commercials, billboards, etc. It's the internet age, and consumers have developed relationships with online shopping, online banking, next-day shipping, and real-time customer support. We live in a world of online shopping, websites featuring brand reviews, and internet fame through videos and more. As such, marketing engagement strategies needed to evolve to align with the goals of the new-age customers, and they have, often through customer loyalty programs. The perks of this evolution are evident in the effectiveness with which audiences can be reached across various topics. This historic transition has opened up numerous options for customer engagement and business growth.

Today's customers with their suggestions and concerns play a crucial role and have a more significant impact on the success of your business than ever before. And a growing number of companies have taken action, leveraging tools to engage this previously untapped marketing channel, their own customers.

According to JitBit, when it comes to making sales, customer advocates are up to three times more successful than sales reps. This is because customer advocates are a golden ticket to success in marketing campaigns and ad campaigns. Understanding this reality provides a new motivation for businesses to invest and integrate such strategies into their marketing efforts.

Not only is it free advertising, but people trust information from their relationships more than they trust brands. That's why more and more companies are recognizing the role of customer advocacy in their marketing efforts today. By maintaining a strong customer advocacy vision and leveraging referral marketing, brands can witness significant improvement in the way their products and services are perceived.

Customers wield more power than ever before, and when customer expectations differ from reality, they can effortlessly pivot to the competition. To avoid such customer churn, brands need to perform comprehensive analysis on customer behavior and preferences to tailor their offerings precisely.

That's why companies need to have a proactive customer advocacy strategy and invest in sophisticated customer experience management tools, encouraging customer empowerment. This often requires a number of skills and qualifications to understand and implement effectively.

Effective customer advocacy strategy often sets the goals for how your customers interact with each other and share their experiences. By encouraging your customers to engage on social media, review sites, and other online platforms, you can build up a community of satisfied clients who endorse your business and its products. Once you have an accurate profile of these clients, planning strategies become simpler.

But before we get ahead of ourselves, let's use our tools to get a better understanding of what customer advocacy truly entails, through case studies and examples. This approach allows for a more intricate analysis and refinement of advocacy strategies.

Some dismiss it as a buzzword, while others perceive it as a passing trend. But customer advocacy, especially when backed by well-structured customer loyalty programs, has emerged as a lasting and impactful feature of the marketing industry that allows you, as business owners, to extract maximum value from your existing customers.

The concept of customer advocacy rests on the idea that customers are your greatest and most reliable marketing asset. Service-leading organizations, from fledgling startups to seasoned enterprises, comprehend the influence of a well-trained staff and strategic pricing methods. By enabling customers to achieve a fulfilling experience with your brand, you can fortify their loyalty, create active advocates, and cement trust. All of these components can drive significant revenue growth.

Here are the top benefits of astute customer advocacy marketing:

While customer advocacy bears similarities to word-of-mouth marketing, it's like word-of-mouth marketing but on steroids. Through carefully honing in on customer profiles and facilitating skills development in catering to customer needs, you ensure brand messaging resonates effectively. This advocacy is a potent tool that amplifies your brand's reach beyond traditional channels. It is a recognized fact that customers tend to trust the words of other customers more than the brand itself.

Consider that 75% of advocates are likely to share a positive experience. Moreover, brand advocates are 50% more likely to influence a purchase. These advocates providing your brand with free advertising, are drawing the attention of potential customers who haven't heard of your brand before. With every positive review and every share of good news about your brand, these advocates are bringing in more potential customers.

With the internet's global reach, people are not limited to only telling their family and friends about you. They have vast social networks and platforms at their disposal, making referral marketing an essential part of any customer advocacy strategy.

They can engage with acquaintances, peers, and even strangers through chat platforms, exerting a certain degree of leadership and playing a pivotal role in advocating for your brand. Amazon, for example, has used this strategy to build its business at a macro level by encouraging customers to share their purchases with friends, family, and even within their community, which in turn has driven more sales through referrals, cutting down customer acquisition costs, and encouraging repeat purchase.

Depending on the location, in certain cases, a single social media post can undergo a trial by fire, going viral and reaching millions of people in a matter of days or even hours. This is where the company needs to have answers ready to handle the surge in interest. If that social media post is praising the quality of your business or service, the impact can be huge. Even if it only reaches a few thousand people, it's all good news for your business and demonstrates the power of digital communication channels aided by a dose of well-chosen personalization.

The foundations of word-of-mouth marketing are rooted in the trustworthy nature of personal relationships. Though this holds true, the advent of the internet and online community forums have broadened our trust circles. Consumers now actively seek out the opinions and experiences of total strangers online before making a purchase. They look for improvements others have noticed and if there are unresolved complaints, they'll move on to a competitor. However, if most of the reviews are positive, they're likely to stay.

A whopping 84% of people trust online reviews, and over 90% regularly consult review sites like Trustpilot before aligning themselves with a brand or company. This emphasizes the significance of ensuring that your loyal customers, the lifeblood of your client base, are spreading positive stories about their experiences with you.

Customer preferences predominate and play a determining role in establishing client loyalty. Their responses to your messaging, pricing methods, and even elements like location and the efficiency of your staff could significantly determine your revenue growth, particularly for startups looking to break into the market.

The challenge, and also the question here is how can you inspire such customers to become dedicated advocates of your brand? The responsibility of finding the answers falls not only on your product or service offering but on the entirety of the customer experience you provide, with a heavy emphasis on personalization.

Customer advocates, or as we like to call them, "brand spokespeople," are invaluable because they carry a deep passion for the brand they love — a passion that can make or break a campaign in today's digital world. If you want people chattering about your product or service, you need supporters who are willing to stand up, and, with the assistance of your dedicated communication channels, engage in leadership roles and be recognized as an advocate for your business or brand.

Inspiring your customers to be your brand's outreach volunteers is easier than you may think. It all starts with delivering a remarkable customer experience (CX). If a customer has a pleasant encounter with your business, they are more likely to recommend you to others. The role your customer service plays in understanding their preferences and attending to their needs effectively cannot be understated.

What Is Customer Advocacy?

Imagine, for example, your business is selling customized t-shirts, and your customer service ("CX" in industry lingo), along with the product quality, are both top-notch. In such a scenario, the personalized service you provide not only helps in acquiring new customers, but also in making repeat customers who may also become your brand advocates, thus reducing your customer acquisition costs.

This positive experience is bound to inspire customers to share their experience with others, acting as a productive marketing tool for your brand. Your resolution, understanding, and assistance on queries don't merely act as procedures. They, in fact, play a vital role in building communities among your supporters.

The importance of customer feedback cannot be overstated, it is essentially one of the templates to success. It's the launch pad from which businesses can take off and soar. It's the way you'll learn what customers like, don't like, and what they are looking for. Simply put, it's just one aspect of providing excellent customer service to your clients.

One way to build community among your customers is by giving them a platform to express how they feel about you. This interaction can be part of a customer referral program or through a page dedicated to reviews and feedback on your website. Also, by offering webinars where existing clients can talk about their experiences, you can attract potential customers. You'd be surprised to discover how many of your existing customers, your key spokespeople, are willing to show their appreciation and take time out of their day to give you feedback when prompted.

1. Customers become your best marketers.
2. It boosts sales and repeat purchases.
3. It helps you stay relevant through word-of-mouth marketing.
4. It improves customer retention and reduces customer turnover.

Also, make it a habit to request feedback from your customers after they interact with your business. This is an effective form of partnership that not only helps build a relationship with your customers but also ensures you are always on the ball about their sentiment towards your brand. As a responsible brand, further enhance this collaboration by introducing customer advocacy programs designed to incentivize and promote feedback.

But it's not enough to provide a place for customers to leave reviews. You must track your reviews so you can know what's working well and what changes should be made. This way, you can design effective incentives aimed at increasing customer participation.

You don't have to stop at providing a space for reviews, though. You can create a whole customer advocacy strategy to manage better what your customer advocates are marketing at any given time. Let's say you have an email list of happy customers who generally give feedback when you ask. If you have a new product or service, you can launch an email campaign for the new product and let them help you market it. This facet of your strategy should involve collaborative incentives, augmenting the existing partnership between the brand and its loyal customers.

Social media is a great way to get your business' content out there, but it's not so great if you have to do all of the work yourself. Establishing partnerships with your customers through effective advocacy programs can help distribute the workload, and it's worth everything to see your brand grow.

According to Quincy Smith, Head of SEO and Content at Ampjar, “Brand advocates are an excellent way for companies to increase their reach without using aggressive sales tactics that turn off potential customers.” Hence, showing appreciation towards these advocates and promoting their collaborative efforts is vital, making them a valuable ingredient in the growth and success of the brand.

Look at it this way, 84% of people actually trust online reviews, and over 90% regularly consult review sites like Trustpilot before committing to a brand or company. So now you can see how important it is to ensure that your customers, the lifeblood of your client base, are spreading positive reviews about you.

So how do you inspire your loyal customers to become advocates? Let's find out. In this digital age, the precedence of customer preferences is a determining factor in establishing client loyalty.

Why Do Customer Advocates Matter?

Customer advocates matter because they're passionate about the brand they love — that passion can make or break a campaign in today's digital world. So if you want people talking about your product or service, you need someone willing to stand up, and with the assistance of your dedicated communication channels, be counted as an advocate for your business or brand.

Creating Customer Advocates

Encouraging your customers to market your business for you is easier than you think. It all starts with your customer experience. If your customer has a good experience with your business, they will surely recommend you to others when the time comes. The assistance provided by your customer service in tapping into their preferences can go a long way.

Let's say, for example, you sell customized t-shirts, and your customer service and the product are superb. Your resolution and assistance on queries make a huge difference. People will remember you when you can become a part of memorable moments, surpass the customer's expectations, and make them even better.

The Value of Dedicated Feedback Pages

The importance of customer feedback cannot be overstated. It's the way you'll learn what customers like, don't like, and what they are looking for. Simply put, it's just one aspect of providing excellent customer service to your clients.

One way to build community among your customers is by giving them a platform to express how they feel about you. You can do this by simply adding a section or page to your website dedicated to customer reviews and feedback. Also, by offering webinars where existing clients can talk about their experiences, you can attract potential customers.

You'd be surprised to discover how many of your existing customers are willing to show their appreciation and take time out of their day to give you feedback when prompted. Furthermore, 78% of consumers prefer brands that collect and accept customer feedback, demonstrating a unique form of gratitude.

Collecting Post-Purchase Feedback

Also, make it a habit to request feedback from your customers after they interact with your business. This is an effective form of partnership that not only helps build a relationship with your customers, but it also keeps you in the know about their general sentiment towards your brand. Further enhance this collaboration by introducing customer advocacy programs designed to incentivize and promote feedback.

But it's not enough to provide a place for customers to leave reviews. You must track your reviews so you can know what's working well and what changes should be made. This way, you can design effective incentives aimed at increasing customer participation.

Referral Programs

You don't have to stop at providing a space for reviews, though. You can create a whole customer advocacy strategy to manage better what your customer advocates are marketing at any given time. Let's say you have an email list of happy customers who generally give feedback when you ask. If you have a new product or service, you can create an email campaign for the new product and let them help you market it. This facet of your strategy should involve collaborative incentives, augmenting the existing partnership between the brand and its loyal customers.

Social Media

Social media is a great way to get your business' content out there, but it's not so great if you have to do all of the work yourself. Establishing partnerships with your customers through effective advocacy programs can help distribute the workload.

According to Quincy Smith, Head of SEO and Content at Ampjar, “Brand advocates are an excellent way for companies to increase their reach without using aggressive sales tactics that turn off potential customers.” Hence, showing appreciation towards these advocates and promoting their collaborative efforts is vital.

Social sharing and customer advocacy are two important elements of a successful content marketing strategy. When you combine them as part of a coordinated plan, your business gains more visibility and exposure. This collaboration mechanism, when rewarded with the right incentives, tends to yield positive growth and customer appreciation.

To encourage social sharing, you need to ensure that it's easy for people to share your content — and give them the incentive to do so. After all, the gratitude they feel towards your brand often translates into voluntary promotion through their networks.

There are many ways that you can tap into your customer base as a marketing channel with a good customer advocacy strategy. We compiled a guide entailing 6 of the best ways to improve customer advocacy just for you, ensuring that you can fully understand and appreciate the importance of this partnership.

Is Customer Advocacy Worth All The Hype?

We can't deny that when it comes to online marketing, trends come and go. But, if you should look at the world of SEO, you'll see that the landscape has changed a lot over the past few decades. You may wonder whether it's even worth it or too late to ride the customer advocacy wave.

The truth is customer advocacy is not new. The big deal is that we've found a way to amplify its effects by expanding its reach. And if there's one thing we value in customer relations, it is setting and surpassing expectations. The same is true for what you will get versus what you expect from your customer advocacy strategies. Incentives, appreciation, and a spirit of collaboration are all integral aspects of this approach. While there are many benefits of customer advocacy, many companies dive in without first understanding what to expect and how to make it work for them.

So, what should you expect from your customer advocacy program?

What To Expect

If you are running a small business that doesn't have an extensive customer base to begin with, it will take time to see the results. Let's face it, even in today's millennial paradise of instant gratification, most things still take little patience to get off the ground. So, as a small business, you'll find that it takes a couple of months of work before your customer advocacy strategy becomes the well-oiled machine that will be the life and breath of your business. So, be patient and watch it grow.

Developing a good customer advocacy strategy won't be difficult if you already have a large customer base, which is usually the case of large organizations. With thousands of followers on different social media platforms, many niche websites have the ability to reach millions of people worldwide in a matter of days. And while that is potential your business can tap into, the same potential applies to negative publicity.

So, when you open the doors for customers to tell you and others how they feel about your service, you need to be prepared for anything. In today's world, as much as we revel in the thoughts of five-star reviews and traffic beyond our wildest dreams, only some of our customers will leave us glowing recommendations. There will be some that are unhappy for one reason or another. But do not despair. It all comes down to how you handle negative reviews.

Negative reviews are not to be taken lightly. According to Qualitrics.com, a scale-crashing 94% of consumers admit that they have been persuaded against supporting a business because of a negative review! A single negative review is enough to leave a gaping hole in your customer loyalty.

That's why it's so important to keep track of what people are saying about you both on and off your website. Data from MOZ indicates that a single negative review of your business can cause you to lose up to 22% of your existing customers. And this 22% loss triples if you should get up to three negative reviews. For sustainable growth in customer advocacy, you shouldn't have more than three or four negative reviews. With more than three negative reviews, you stand the possibility of losing up to 70% of your current customer base.

Once you understand that using customer advocacy as a marketing channel is a two-way street, you'll have the right expectations to help you succeed. You can't always avoid negative feedback, but you can use it to your advantage. It all boils down to how you handle negative reviews.

How To Handle Negative Reviews

Negative reviews can make a huge impact on your business, but they don't have to be your downfall. You've spent so much time building your brand's reputation that you want to keep negative reviews from destroying it. Instead, see them as opportunities to improve if they do come. Negative reviews highlight the areas of your business or process you need to work on.

Think of it this way. The person who left you a negative review has a problem you need to solve. And once you solve this problem, this same individual can leave you a positive review. When people can see you working on customer issues and resolving them, it increases customer loyalty and boosts your brand reputation.

How To Handle Fake Reviews

Be on the lookout for fake reviews. If you find out that a negative review is fake, report this to the review site and make a public statement proving this. Unfortunately, there are trolls who leave negative thoughts without ever having an actual experience or interaction with your business.

Responding To Customer Feedback

Did you know that 30% of consumers who leave negative reviews change their thinking to positive after their issue gets resolved? So you can bounce back from negative feedback.

Feel free to go the extra mile and reach out to the customer if you need a better understanding of where you fell short in their experience. Apologize for the inconvenience and be accountable. This goes a long way in earning and keeping the trust of your target market.

Conclusion

If you understand the entire customer lifecycle, the job of marketing becomes more manageable. It enables you to attract new customers and engage in more effective marketing. In the case of true service leaders, great service creates loyal fans and advocates.

Aside from being the third element of the E-A-T moniker, trust is also a two-way street. So, while you need your customers to trust your business, it also requires trust when you give them a voice. Let your customers provide you with a hand in spreading the word about your brand. Of course, they may use that voice to sing your praises or leave you a negative review. But having an excellent approach to your customer advocacy program will go a long way in ensuring that you're in a position to handle any situation.

Two heads are better than one. So reach out to us at gardenpatch, and let's work on your customer advocacy strategy together. Let's talk!

Need Help with Your Customer Advocacy Strategy?