5 Tips for Drafting Effective Referral Marketing Value Propositions

Why should your target customer purchase a product from your brand rather than from a competitor’s?

The answer may be obvious to you, but conveying the value of your products to potential customers is one of the most important components of a successful brand. This statement is also true for an effective referral rewards program. Getting people to arrive at the landing page is only half the battle. The real effort begins when it comes time to prompt customers to sign up.

To help you get started, here are five tips to writing a killer value proposition for your referral rewards program.

1. Be in tune with your audience. There’s something to be said about a value proposition that speaks to you on a personal level. And that something is an effective way to ensure that you’re getting the highest engagement possible from your referral program. However, unless you have a clear idea of whom you’re targeting, your proposition will be lost on your customers.

So here are some questions you should ask yourself before your fingers hit the keyboard:

• What types of rewards are our customers interested in?
• Where do they live?
• How do they talk?
• Are we writing to B2B or B2C customers (or older customers versus younger ones)?

These kinds of questions are an excellent foundation when you start tailoring your value proposition to a specific audience.

2. Stay relevant. The copy of your value proposition creates a make-or-break moment when readers decide whether or not to sign on. Establish relevancy by reminding your customer of their connection to your brand, and be sure to restate the reward right away to drive the value home.

3. Be brief. Since most people are super busy these days, they don’t like to get caught up doing one task for too long. So you need to find a way to summarize your message into one compelling statement. Normally 20 words or less is a good target to shoot for. And keep your message on point. Succinctly answer this question for your customers: “Why am I reading this?” You’ll find a much higher proportion of readers following through on your referral program if you do.

4. Include an effective call to action. If your readers are engaged enough to arrive at your landing page, then chances are they’re serious about wanting to learn more about your rewards program. It’s critical that you ensure they have some way to follow up on the offer and pursue a defined goal. That means your call to action should be short and actionable. Words such as get or receive will inform site visitors that there’s an offer on the table. Convey the benefit of the rewards explicitly. And make sure your call to action is easily identifiable. You can include a large button or some other engaging image to help with this. If you’re working with text only, then you might include a link anchor or use boldfaced words.

5. Talk about the value, not the offer. A 30 percent discount is nice. But that offer isn’t compelling enough to gain real traction with a referral program. Your product holds the value, and conveying that to your reader is more effective than throwing deals at the wall and hoping something sticks. Ultimately a rewards program’s value lies in the relationship between your customers and their friends and family. Focus on the why of the program, not the what.

Writing an effective value proposition for your referral rewards program is crucial when it comes to incentivizing more referrals. Just keep it short, sweet, and targeted, and you’ll be ramping up referrals in no time.