8 years ago
February 21, 2017

3 Steps to Leverage Your Customers to Find New Prospects

Using these three steps, you can leverage new prospects from your existing customers, without seeming pushy or tacky.

Rhys Metler

One of the hardest tasks in sales is finding new prospects. No matter how many new prospects you find one day, it always seems like you need to find more the next day. It’s a never-ending cycle that can try the patience of even the most-seasoned salesperson. Fortunately, there are shortcuts to finding new prospects. Leveraging your current customers lets you access a pool of new prospects who already share many of the same needs and interests as your customers. While it can seem tacky to try to leverage your customers, there are subtle ways for you to access their family, friends, and coworkers. Using these three steps, you can leverage new prospects from your existing customers, without seeming pushy or tacky.

Invite Them to Your Social Media Pages

Almost everyone has some kind of social media presence these days. Your customers are likely to have their own social media accounts, filled with potential new prospects. These are likely to be high quality prospects, since they often share the same interests as your customers. By inviting your customers to join your social media pages, their social media friends will be exposed to your products and services. The more active you are on your social media pages, the greater that exposure can be. When friends of your customers visit their social media pages, they’re likely to see stories that you’ve posted to market your brand. Best of all, social media pages are generally free, so you get that exposure with nothing more than an investment of time.

Rewards for Referrals

A lot of businesses reward their customers for referring new prospects. They do this for a simple reason: it works. When dealing with customers, offer them discounts or special deals based on the number of new prospects they send your way. Your customers are likely to deal with a variety of people who can benefit from your services every day. Word of mouth is still a powerful marketing tool, and referral bonuses promote word of mouth. Most people won’t promote products to friends and coworkers unless they believe they will benefit from them. That helps you to access new prospects who are already disposed to buying what you’re selling. Again, this marketing technique only costs you money, in the form of referral bonuses, when it works. You don’t end up paying anything unless the referral program is successful. If it is successful, the referral bonuses are well worth the benefit of finding pre-qualified new prospects.

It’s Ok to Ask

Sometimes, getting new prospects can be as simple as calling up some of your existing customers. Let them know about your great new products and services and, even if they’re not interested, ask them to refer you to anyone they know who might be interested. That way, your customers don’t have to feel pressured to provide you with contact information for their friends and coworkers. The ball is left entirely in their court. If they do refer someone to you, it’s likely to be someone who is already interested in making a purchase. You enjoy the benefits of getting new prospects that are already qualified, and your customer gets to do a favor for you and their friends. In the business world, favours still go a long way toward motivating people.

Rhys Metler

Rhys is a tenacious, top performing Senior Sales Recruiter with 15+ years of focused experience in the Digital Media, Mobile, Software, Technology and B2B verticals. He has a successful track record of headhunting top performing sales candidates for some of the most exciting brands in North America. He is a Certified Recruitment Specialist (CRS) and has expert experience in prospecting new business, client retention/renewals and managing top performing sales and recruitment teams. Rhys enjoys spending quality time with his wife, son, and daughters, BBQing on a hot summer day and tropical vacations.

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