Get more referrals with personalization

Word of mouth has always been valuable. It’s one of the oldest tactics in the marketing books and the data says it works. A Nielsen survey reports that 90% of people trust recommendations from peers over other forms of advertising. Social proof through customer logos helps, but getting a referral from a trusted friend or colleague is even more convincing. The key is to make it easy for your customers to spread the word about your company.

To build your audience, you can use GTM or the Unless API to pass on customer information into our system, such as the company IP or even the plan they are subscribed to. This way you can choose whether to target particular customers, for example customers on your Starter plan or in your Agency partnership program and so on.

Hyper-targeted headlines

Once you’ve identified the customers you want to involve in your referral program, you can personalize content above the fold on your homepage to make it enticing for them to participate. A personalized headline is the best place to start. Think of: “Join our referral program {{customer name}} and get 5x more email send credits!” Or {{Customer name}}, refer a friend and get $100 in Starbucks rewards.”

Personalized pop-ups and bars

If you’d rather be more subtle in your approach or you want to capture your customers’ attention after they log in, you can also use Unless overlay components to promote your referral program. You can add a subtle side-box or a bar at the top of the page, and personalize it for your potential advocates. For instance: “Love using {{company name}}? Tell your friends and get $100 in Starbucks rewards for every new sign up.”

The company below sells design software and targets long term users for its referral program. They make use of components to show a message with an incentive of 3 months free usage for each referred friend that signs-up.

They also have a Partner Program for their agency customers. This however requires a more prominent messaging. Thus instead of an overlay that can simply be clicked away, they make use of an inline personalization which is more permanent.