#top_tips

Anyone miss me?! I’ve been ultra quiet over the past couple of months due to a new job opportunity that was in the offing. Anyway, pleased to report I am now settling in to my new customer reference position with a fab company. With plenty of things to consider in setting up a new program, I thought I’d share my thoughts around how you actually secure a customer reference to begin with!

I’ve found myself in the fortunate position of being invited into large multi-national corporates to talk about customer reference best practice. This is an honour but quite funny really, and I’ll tell you why…..customer referencing isn’t rocket science <gasp>, it’s simple common sense. It is about knowing what your customer wants, building relationships and providing mutually beneficial opportunities for promotion.

Simple, right? Wrong! Time after time I read materials that are meant to promote customer reference programs but illustrate just how good us marketers (me included) can be at naval gazing. These materials do an excellent job of showing how we think references will help *our* own business, but totally miss the point of what it means to our customers.

I actually think we should delete our 150 slide PowerPoint decks and tear up the nicely designed reference program Pdfs and get back to basics. Here are my simple tips for recruiting customer references:

1. Listen. Before suggesting any activity to a customer, find out what their personal motivation might be for engaging in a reference program – are you talking to a CXO who you think has an eye out for their next job move and could do with building their profile [don't sell it quite this way!]? What are the business goals of the organisation you are talking to – are they moving into new markets or are they looking to strengthen their position as innovators? If so, talk to them about how you can help them acheive their aims through your reference program.

2. Adapt. One size does not fit all and not all customers will want to take part in every reference activity. Don’t present your customer with a tick-box of reference options. After you have listened to your customer, you can tailor your reference wish-list in a way that is more appropriate and connects better with them. You are more likely to secure a ‘yes’.

3. Be Upbeat. We don’t need to be apologists asking our customers for favours. Always present a reference activity as an opportunity. That last minute press request? “Oh hi Mr/Ms Customer, I’ve been thinking about your objectives and have found a press/thought leadership opportunity that will help…”. Need a sales reference? “Hello Customer Y, we have a prospect who is looking to share best practice and wants to understand how technology/cars/services/toys* (delete as applicable) has supported your business aims….”.

4. Be Open. Don’t be afraid to let your customer say negative things about your company or products. If a customer can be open and show something didn’t quite go according to plan but that your company bent over backwards to resolve things, that is a much stronger reference than the traditional ‘I heart your company because’ reference. It is much more likely to resonate with prospective customers, press and analysts. There is nothing worse than a customer who has been so over-coached by a company, that the analysts and press don’t find their story believable!

5. Build trust. Deliver what you say you will, when you promise to do so. This has the added bonus of helping your sales teams trust that you have their customers’ best interests at heart; that you can deliver, and that your reference program truly is a value-add.

You may feel that this is too simplistic and not scalable but I’d argue that if you want the right references and quality over quantity, this is absolutely the way forward. The proof in the pudding, as they say, is in the eating and all I can do to reassure you that this approach works, is leave you with a recent anecdote:

A few months ago the head of corporate comms at a well-known company rang me up to thank me for the opportunities I had put their way. They opened the conversation up by saying; “I feel really guilty that you have been doing so much to help us over the past few months, what can we do to help you?”. In reality they had done more than enough to help me – they’d attended an analyst event, done a press release and associated media interviews, spoken at events and were working with us on a case study.

That my friends, is really selling the value of a reference program and demonstrating mutual benefits.

What do you think? Do you agree or think this is nonsense?! Would love to hear what works for you.