Picture this…

Your customers love you and tell all their friends.

So, you develop and launch an Advocacy Marketing Hub to reward their loyalty, allowing them to collaborate on discussion forums, share latest product releases, and gain points and rewards as they complete challenges and nominate referrals and provide references.

But then you wonder… how will you determine if your Hub is successful? What if your advocates are hoarding gift cards? What if you are seeing little return on investment to your company?

I’m here to give you some key metrics to use to measure the ROI for your Advocacy Hub as well as some tips and tricks to enhance your customer experience.

Key metrics

Demand Metrics are used to show the revenue impact of your program. Engagement Metrics show the impact your programs are having on your customers.

Referrals Won shows how many referrals from your advocates have converted to wins during a specific period of time.  Word of Mouth Referrals have high value, boost demand, are quick to close, and help accelerate your revenue pipeline.

Points Redeemed and Points Earned tell the monetary value of reward redemptions for a specific period as well as the points advocates earned during a specific period. These metrics help monitor your spending.

The Engaged Advocates Metric shows you how many customers have performed an act of advocacy during a specific period of time.  For example, the number of people who shared your content on social media, written a testimonial/review, attended an event/webinar, started a discussion thread or provided a reference/referral in the past 30 days.  It also tells the type of challenges you’re advocates completed so you know which ones are most engaging to your audience.

Tips and tricks for enhancing your Advocacy Hub success

Make it interesting and fun. Provide a wide variety of challenge types for advocates to choose from.  Include a fun quiz/survey, mix in educational posts, and of course social shares.

Don’t give away your call to action in the subject line.  Creating intriguing headlines and images will draw in your readers. Then put your call to action in the content.  Keep the ask clear and simple.  Be sure to include the points value or reward and how to claim it.

Keep it fresh. Post 3-5 new challenges per week to keep your advocates engaged and coming back for more.  Use themes or current holidays to add relevancy.  For example, you could create a series of educational challenges in Sept. when school begins. If your worried about your content suddenly being outdated you can set challenges to expire after an event or occasion.

Acknowledge your advocates. One major benefit of having an advocacy program is to deepen your relationships.  Find ways to recognize your top advocates. Some ideas include giving them a shout out on social media or highlighting them in an Advocate of the Month spotlight.

Offer a variety of features and benefits. We all love gift cards and swag but don’t overlook the value of a unique experience. Think about things like backstage passes for a customer appreciation concert, lunch with your CMO, or subscription to an industry-related publication.

When in doubt – ask!  If you’re unsure whether your advocates are happy, ask them!  Create a survey challenge allowing them to tell you exactly what they’d like to see in your advocacy marketing hub to increase engagement.

We want to hear from you!  Everyone measures results differently based on their company goals.  Tell us how you measure advocacy success.

If you missed our blog post on influencer vs advocate marketing, catch up here.

If you’d like to learn more about how advocacy marketing can work for you, please comment below or fill out this form. You can also visit Influitive’s website to request a demo.