subject: 4 Tips For Winning New Business With Customer References [print this page] When it comes to business, nothing means success more than customers. And when it comes to getting more customers, the best way to have access to customers with interest is to have them referenced to us somehow. There are lots of great ways to get customers, but there are a few sure-fire ways to get the most out of our customer reference marketing.
There have been many ways developed to reach out to customers. The key is to get the customer to reach back. For instance, having customers connect with us because of an interest in our product or service means that when we do contact them they've already shown a certain level of interest in what we do. That's where having a booth at trade shows and conventions come into play. Potential customers stream by the booth all day, and those who do have an interest will pick up some kind of flyer or brochure or whatever the freebie is. If we've connected well enough, they'll let us scan their badge or we can get their participant number. This enables us to compile a show database, proving that level of reference marketing is effective. They will become the foundation of your customer reference database.
Targeted email links are effective as well. By using these, we can be assured that the source for these email addresses is narrowly defined enough that the people on it would be interested. For instance, if we establish an email link on a car enthusiast site, then it's a reasonable bet that people who hit that link would be interested in automotive related products or services. Having those email addresses and using the references there would enable us to feel confident we do have some interested customers if our products or services are automotive in nature.
Another way to pull in customers is to work with companies that help expose our businesses on the web. Post articles or blogs on relevant sites discussing your product and services, start a facebook account, visit popular social sites that relate to your targeted client. Get your information to people that you normally would not come into contact. But with the links back to your site, your products and your service, you can see a corresponding jump in business as well.
There are a slew of ways you can try to win customers, however, the most effective are usually the simplest. Word of mouth is one of your most effective marketing tools. People want to buy from companies that other people already trust. Regardless of which way is most effective, using all of them will make for a well rounded approach.
