Creating Advocates through Customer Centricity
Do you know who the best people are to promote your brand?
It may come as a surprise that it’s not your marketing team, it’s your clients. Well… Sometimes. It takes a lot of work to be an organization that can create customer advocates—and it’s not simply about creating a positive customer experience (even if that helps). Customer centricity is the secret to customer advocacy. But what does that mean and how can you take steps to create a customer centric business? It’s something we hope to discuss below.
Customer Centricity Drives Customer Advocacy—But What Does That Mean?
The Gartner Glossary defines customer centricity as the ability of an organization to understand customers' situations, perceptions, and expectations. Furthermore, customer-centricity demands that the customer is the focal point of all decisions related to delivering products, services, and experiences to create customer satisfaction, loyalty, and advocacy.
Every decision is made with a goal in mind—what does this mean for the customer? From awareness stage to retention, businesses that focus on their customers throughout the buyers’ journey are able to reap the rewards.
What is Customer Advocacy?
Wikipedia describes customer advocacy as, “A specialized form of customer service in which companies focus on what is deemed to be best for the customer. It is a change in a company's culture that is supported by customer-focused customer service and marketing techniques.”
What is Brand Advocacy?
Conversely, brand advocacy focuses on creating the kind of memorable customer experience that inspires happy customers to recommend a brand or business.
Creating a customer advocacy strategy
Authentic customer empathy lies at the core of an effective customer advocacy strategy.
It’s vital that a company centers all operations; from product development to marketing, around a clear understanding of customer problems and their desire to solve them.
8 tips for building effective customer advocacy:
Create a position or team to create and manage your business customer advocacy strategy.
Your clients’ needs must always be prioritized.
Analyze customer feedback to truly understand problems experienced by your customers, and the solutions to help them.
Give your customers what they want.
Focusing on providing solutions for your customers, will turn your customers into brand advocates.
Build a relationship with your customers that’s not just about sales.
Share how-to and other free resources that are beneficial to your customers.
Keep your customers in the loop by sharing your customer advocacy efforts with them.
5 benefits of creating a customer advocacy strategy for your business:
Increased customer satisfaction.
Attracting new customers.
Improved customer loyalty and retention.
A high ROI with low marketing expenditure.
Customers who help to create increased brand advocacy.
3 statistics that demonstrate why brand advocates are so valuable:
Statistics show that word-of-mouth brand advocacy has been shown to increase marketing effectiveness by as much as 54%.
Reports state that brand advocates are five times more valuable than average customers because they spend more on products and increase product purchases.
Brand advocates are reported as being 2 – 3 times more effective than non-advocates when it comes to persuading friends and family to make purchases.
Conclusion
When a brand advocate shares recommendations on their social media channels, they are giving your brand their endorsement. When your brand is top of mind when a customer’s colleague asks for a recommendation, that customer is an advocate.
Businesses are realizing the importance of customer advocacy and the impact it has on marketing, sales, and their overall growth potential.
By implementing a strategy to prioritize your customer’s needs before your business interests, you’ll be converting customers into lifelong fans that ‘shout your brand name from the rooftops.’
If you’re interested in chatting more about putting the needs of your customers first, you can connect with the Sepire team here.