What are the most effective ways to measure the success of a customer advocacy program?

Customer advocacy is a powerful way to boost your social selling efforts, as it leverages the trust and influence of your happy customers to attract and convert new prospects. But how do you know if your customer advocacy program is working? How do you measure its impact on your sales performance and business goals? In this article, we will explore some of the most effective ways to measure the success of a customer advocacy program, and how to use the data to optimize your strategy and tactics.

1 Define your objectives and metrics

Before launching or evaluating your customer advocacy program, it’s important to have a clear idea of what you want to achieve and how you will measure it. Depending on your business model, industry, and target audience, you may have different objectives and metrics for your customer advocacy program. For instance, you could aim to increase brand awareness and reach, generate more leads and referrals, improve customer loyalty and retention, enhance customer satisfaction and feedback, or drive more sales and revenue. To track and measure your progress and results for each objective, you need to define the key performance indicators (KPIs) such as the number and quality of customer advocates, customer-generated content, reviews and testimonials, referrals and introductions, customer retention rate and lifetime value, satisfaction score and net promoter score, or sales conversion rate and revenue growth.

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Karthik Ananth

👨💼 Head of Customer Success (EU) @ Freshworks || President's Club 2023 || Formerly with Capillary Technologies || 🎵 Musician || Former CEO @Green Evolution
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Once your advocacy program reaches critical mass in terms of a "community" of promoters, the 2 metrics to track imho are : A) QoQ Referrals/leads B) YoY renewals & expansions. Happy customers empower our selling motion! Happy customers display loyalty & are good 'cross-sell' cohorts.

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Praburam Srinivasan

Growth Marketing at ClickUp | B2B SaaS Organic Growth | PLG | Ex Freshworks (Customer Marketing), Animaker. I also curate unique eco-friendly travel experiences through @navigotoo, my side-hustle on Instagram!
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"Revenue impact" would be another important metric to track from the advocacy program. Every advocacy act is defined, tracked and measured against its application. Whenever we leverage an advocacy asset (testimonial, case study, reference call) for a prospect, it impacts the decision-making and reduces the sales lifecycle. Giving proper attribution to advocacy assets and advocates (just like how we do to marketing teams) would help showcase $$ impact that your leadership would love! That way, you prove to the team that Customer advocacy is no longer a cost function. Instead, we help make $$

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Alejo Marin U.

Helping B2B businesses generate more sales | SaaS | Head of Sales | Business Development & Strategy | AI & Data Science for Business Impact
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To gauge the efficacy of a customer advocacy program: retention rates, Net Promoter Scores, referral counts, and customer lifetime value are paramount metrics. Engage with qualitative feedback and monitor advocacy growth trends. Success is not just in the numbers—it's in the stories your customers tell.

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2 Collect and analyze data from multiple sources

Once you have defined your objectives and metrics, it is essential to collect and analyze data from multiple sources to get an accurate picture of your customer advocacy program's performance. For example, you can use customer relationship management (CRM) software to track and manage interactions with customer advocates, and social media analytics tools to monitor their activity. Content marketing analytics tools can measure the performance of customer-generated content, while online review platforms can help you collect customer reviews and testimonials. Additionally, customer feedback surveys can help you evaluate satisfaction and feedback, which can influence customer loyalty and retention.

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Alejo Marin U.

Helping B2B businesses generate more sales | SaaS | Head of Sales | Business Development & Strategy | AI & Data Science for Business Impact
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One must employ a multifaceted metric system. Primarily, scrutinize customer engagement levels—social media traction, community involvement, and program participation rates serve as potent indicators. Next, dissect customer feedback—surveys, Net Promoter Scores (NPS), and testimonials offer invaluable insights into customer satisfaction. Lastly, monitor the conversion metrics—referral rates, upsell figures, and customer lifetime value (CLV) directly reflect the program's impact on the bottom line. These rich data streams, when harmoniously analyzed, provide a robust measure of your program's success.

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3 Benchmark and compare your results

Once you have collected and analyzed data from multiple sources, it's important to benchmark and compare your results in order to understand how your customer advocacy program is performing against your expectations and goals, as well as against your competitors and industry standards. To do this, you should set SMART goals for your customer advocacy program and track your progress and achievements over time. Additionally, use historical data and trends to see how your customer advocacy program has evolved, as well as industry benchmarks and best practices to compare yourself to peers and competitors. Moreover, customer feedback and testimonials can help you gauge how your customer advocates perceive and value your brand, products, and services.

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Alejo Marin U.

Helping B2B businesses generate more sales | SaaS | Head of Sales | Business Development & Strategy | AI & Data Science for Business Impact
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Juxtapose these figures with industry standards or past internal data. Monitoring incremental sales and engagement rates post-advocacy activities can also yield insightful data. Regularly contrast these findings against your benchmarks to steer continuous improvement and capture the true resonance of your program.

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4 Optimize and improve your strategy and tactics

Finally, after you have benchmarked and compared your results, you need to optimize and improve your strategy and tactics to enhance your customer advocacy program's performance and impact. Segmenting and personalizing communication with customer advocates based on their preferences, needs, and behaviors is a good way to start. Providing incentives and rewards such as discounts, freebies, recognition, and access to exclusive content and events can also help motivate and appreciate them. Additionally, setting up guidelines, templates, tools, and platforms for customer advocates to create and share content, reviews, and referrals is beneficial. Monitoring feedback from customer advocates and responding to their suggestions can help improve products, services, and the overall customer experience. Finally, testing different formats, channels, and campaigns for the program can measure their effectiveness and ROI.

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Alejo Marin U.

Helping B2B businesses generate more sales | SaaS | Head of Sales | Business Development & Strategy | AI & Data Science for Business Impact
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Enhance with qualitative feedback for nuanced insights. Continuously refine your strategy with A/B testing to distill potent tactics, ensuring your advocacy initiatives resonate and yield sustained growth.

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5 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?

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Alejo Marin U.

Helping B2B businesses generate more sales | SaaS | Head of Sales | Business Development & Strategy | AI & Data Science for Business Impact
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Consider also the growth in customer lifetime value (CLV) and retention rates, as they are indicative of long-term advocacy success. It’s crucial to align these metrics with broader business outcomes to ensure the advocacy program is not just resonating, but also delivering tangible business value.

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What are the most effective ways to measure the success of a customer advocacy program?

1

2

3

4

5

1 Define your objectives and metrics

2 Collect and analyze data from multiple sources

3 Benchmark and compare your results

4 Optimize and improve your strategy and tactics

5 Here’s what else to consider

Social Selling

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What are the most effective ways to measure the success of a customer advocacy program?

1

2

3

4

5

1 Define your objectives and metrics

2 Collect and analyze data from multiple sources

3 Benchmark and compare your results

4 Optimize and improve your strategy and tactics

5 Here’s what else to consider

Social Selling

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