If you market a product or service in a local geographic region you're going to absolutely love this referral strategy.
It's extremely easy to implement.
It taps into people's natural referral relationships.
And it has the potential to generate at least two referrals for every new client or customer.
It's called the "Neighborhood Referral System."
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How the Neighborhood Referral System Works ______________________________________________
As you know, word-of-mouth and referral marketing systems are based on getting people to tell their friends about your product or service.
Right?
Well, a large majority of a person's friends live right in their own neighborhood.
Think about it.
A person's circle of friends could include...
1. Parents of children who play on the same sports team as their own children.
2. People with whom they attend their local church.
3. People that they meet at local community events.
4. People who live on their same street and perhaps play with their kids.
5. Parents in local school associations like the Parent Teachers Association or "school room Moms."
6. People who belong to their local health club like the Y.M.C.A.
7. People who volunteer for local charitable organizations.
8. People who join local special interest groups who share the same interests like a sports car club or a dog owners club.
There are numerous opportunities for people to establish local friendships, but the one thing they have in common is, they all live in the same geographic area.
So chances are, if you were to contact people who lived near your custoer and client, you would be tapping into the heart of their base of friends.
With the Neighborhood Referral System, that's exactly what you do.
So here's exactly how it works.
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STEP 1 - Get Permission
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Get permission from your customer or client to contact their neighbors in behalf of them with an endorsed offer.
A simple way to do this is to offer your customer or client something extra of value in exchange for their permission to contact their neighbors.
For instance, if you're a pool builder, perhaps you could give your customer a bonus package consisting of a set of towels or extra chemicals.
Or if you're a realtor, you could add a package that included a few advanced marketing activities.
And when all else fails, you simply ask your new customer that if they're satisfied with your service, could you do an endorsed mailing to their neighbors.
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STEP 2 - Get a Testimonial
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Get a testimonial from your new customer or client and create a greeting card or direct mail piece that highlights their endorsement.
Here's a great example of the front of a card of a customer who just purchased a water filtration system that would be sent to all their neighbors.
http://www.TheReferralNewsletter.com/a/neighbor.jpg
(copy and paste the link into your browser)
Notice how this card is actually coming from the customer and NOT your company. That's what we call an endorsed mailing.
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STEP 3 - Create Your Mailing List of Neighbors ________________________________________________
Go to www.InfoUSA.com. InfoUSA is a list management database company in which you can select a list of either business addresses or a list of consumer addresses.
You pay for the list by address (or "lead). One lead can cost you between $.05 - $.10 and you can mail to that lead as much as you want.
Click on the "consumer database" section of their website and as you select the parameters of your list, you'll be offered to generate a list of addresses within a specific distance around one address.
You simply enter in the address of your customer and the distance from your customer whose addresses you want.
You can adjust with the distance to eventually get the amount of neighbors to whom you want to send your direct mail piece.
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STEP 4 - Send Your Endorsed Mailing
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Send your mailer to your customer's neighbors. The best mailers are the ones that appear as though they are actually coming from your customer.
By that I mean, the mailer has your customers return address and the message inside comes from your customer, not you.
HINT: It's best to create an offer and have your customer give that offer to their neighbors as a special gift. Your reponse rate will go up dramatically.
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How to Automate Your Neighborhood Referral System ___________________________________________________
Using SendOutCards you can literally automate this entire process and complete a high impact endorsed mailing in less than 20 minutes.
Here's how...
First, take a digital photograph of your customer.
Second, upload that photo using "Picture Plus" in SendOutCards and create a heartfelt, personal card from your customer.
Third, download your list from InfoUSA and upload it into a new group in your contact manager in SendOutCards
Fourth, attach your new group to your new endorsed Picture Plus card and hit the "Send" button.
You're done.
That's it.
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Isn't It About Time You Started Using SendOutCards?
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Send Out Cards has the ability to literally transform your business forever.
It's a simple tool that allows you to generate referrals, almost on demand.
All the best.
John
P.S. If you'd like to see a demo of how to create a custom card in Send Out Cards, just email me at renegademarketers@comcast.net
