John Jantsch at Duct Tape Marketing provides some great advice on how in involve and activate your customers. In a nutshell: Show your customers that you care about their participation and their opinion, and they’ll rally to your cause.
Here are the highlights of John’s post:
1) Educate – Take the time to do two things with every customer. Teach them exactly who makes a great lead for your business and how to correctly introduce your business to a prospect. Give them the tools to do this whenever the occasion arises.
2) Testimonials and Case Studies – For every happy customer their should be a testimonial of results and perhaps even a full blown written, audio and/or video example in the form of a simple case study.
3) Peer-2-Peer Education – Invite several happy customers to participate in a panel discussion on some issue in their business or industry and include four or five prospects as well.
4) Create a Customer Community – Once a quarter or once a year invite some or all of your customers to enjoy a great speaker, lunch, drinks or to paint the day care center at the local community center.