Growing Your Business Through Customer Referrals

A strong customer base is something that small businesses always try to develop. It can be hard for you to gather new clients regardless of the methods being used. One method can be an array of different marketing techniques. Cold calling on potential consumers is another. If you want to you can send mailings directly to target customers at home. Many businesses have untapped resources though. The potential of referrals from their current customers is often something that they fail to take advantage of.

The back bone of your business development plan can be customer referrals if you use them in the right way. The best advertisement for your business is your current customers who are pleased. You can drastically grow the amount of new customers your business generates if you are able to start getting referrals through you current customer base. The difficulty is in finding a efficient method for you to do so.

There are a few different ways that you can efficiently generate current customer referrals. If a current customer of yours refers a new customer, you can offer a bonus or special offer to them as a reward. Both ends of this referral can receive the perk. One example would be to offer a buy one get one free coupon to the current customer and the same offer to the referred customer you signed up. They only drawback to this type of method is the added cost involved.

The normal cost of a new customer is something you must weight though. What was the amount of time you used to get this new client? How much marketing was required to bring them in? Spending time and developing marketing both end up costing you some money. Offering a referral bonus often ends up being equal to the amount of money you spend on these other methods. Making the current customer you have happy is one of the benefits you get from referral bonuses, not only a happy new customer for you.