What is Ambassador Marketing?
Brand ambassador marketing is a powerful method for driving sales through active customer engagement. It’s a branch of influencer marketing that rewards your loyal customer base for becoming ambassadors and promoting your products or services.
Ambassador marketing basics
The concept of ambassador marketing isn’t exactly new. It’s actually a modern spin on one of the oldest marketing strategies in the book – word-of-mouth marketing. In fact, the technique has been around since the dawn of commerce itself.
At its core, ambassador marketing is about leveraging individuals who have a genuine love for your brand—known as brand ambassadors—to endorse your products or services. These individuals could be your loyal customers, content creators, pros, or influencers. The end goal? To have these individuals so happy with your brand that they can’t help but sing its praises and recommend your products.
Brand ambassadors are different from traditional influencers or endorsers. They don’t just promote your brand; they embody it. They are deeply connected to your brand’s mission and values and are eager to share their positive experiences with their personal networks. Their endorsements are based on real-life experiences, which brings an authenticity and credibility that traditional advertising often lacks.
Get personal with your audience
One of the most effective strategies for reaching your audience in today’s digital marketing landscape is the use of brand ambassadors. They champion your business via their personal networks and social media platforms, opening up avenues to fresh customers.
Whether it’s a common interest, lifestyle, or demographic, brand ambassadors can help your business reach its target audience. This mutual connection enhances the credibility and relatability of their endorsement of your brand. Traditional advertising often lacks this peer-to-peer connection that can be cultivated through such relationships.
As opposed to lackluster results from other marketing strategies, many brands are now turning to ambassador marketing. This approach leverages three significant assets:
Strong personal networks
Brand ambassadors have well-established networks of friends and followers on social media. This is a goldmine for your brand as these networks form the first set of potential customers your brand can reach out to. While social media certainly plays a significant role in today’s marketing campaigns, brand ambassador marketing goes a step further. Ambassadors reach the market on a deeply personal level.
Brand alignment
Brand ambassadors are individuals who resonate with your brand’s identity. Often ambassadors are driven by the identity that your company offers. They are not just interested in promoting your products; they want to be an integral part of your brand’s success story. This alignment is a big win for your brand as it can significantly cut down on the cost associated with Pay-Per-Click (PPC) marketing and other forms of advertising.
Rewards and motivation
The individuals who choose to become your ambassadors are usually driven by the rewards you offer. This could range from discounts and freebies to financial compensation. One of the most common ways is to give them samples of products. In this business this is called “product seeding.” By incentivizing your brand ambassadors, you foster a strong relationship with a growing customer base who are more than happy to promote your brand organically.
Another option to consider how to hire a brand ambassador.
The power of trust
Ambassador marketing taps into these connections to drum up buzz about the company and its offerings. Just like word-of-mouth marketing, this strategy can be a fantastic way to pique potential customers’ interest, drive sales, and build a robust brand presence. A good brand ambassadors can represent your brand in an authentic, believable way. Something that paid ads simply cannot do.
According to HubSpot, a staggering 75% of people turn a blind eye to advertisements. However, when it comes to recommendations from family and friends, trust levels shoot up to 90%. It’s a potent reminder that authentic, personal connections often carry more weight than any ad could.
“75% of people don’t believe adverts, yet 90% trust suggestions from family and friends.” (HUBSPOT)
When a brand ambassador recommends your brand, it’s like a trusted friend suggesting a product. Consumers are more willing to give your product a try if they hear positive feedback about it from someone they trust.
Build a brand community
Beyond individual endorsements, ambassador marketing also involves building a community around your brand. Your ambassadors serve as the bridge between your brand and your customers, fostering a sense of belonging and engagement. They start conversations about your brand, respond to questions, and share their genuine experiences. This creates a vibrant brand community where customers feel heard and valued—a powerful tool for building customer loyalty and advocacy.
Does ambassador marketing work?
Research underscores the efficacy of ambassador marketing. Building and leveraging relationships with brand ambassadors is emerging as the most potent type of influencer marketing..
Online studies involving 1,753 influencers and 102 marketing professionals were conducted by Tapinfluence and Altmeter. Their findings provide intriguing data on how ambassador marketing measures up against other marketing approaches.
Ambassador marketing is by far the most effective type of influencer marketing a brand can do. Long-term partnerships with ambassadors work seven times better than affiliate links and 50% better than brand-produced content.
Implementing ambassador marketing
Implementing an ambassador marketing strategy involves several key steps.
Connect with ambassadors
First, you need to identify potential ambassadors. These could be individuals who frequently engage with your brand on social media, loyal customers, or influencers who align with your brand values.
Creating passionate brand advocates is the foundation of any strong ambassador marketing strategy. Think about your consumers first when choosing which people to represent and promote your brand. Instead of picking just one recruitment strategy, employ several methods. When you use several tactics, you have a wider range of applications.
Learn about the benefits of using customers for influencer marketing.
Engage ambassadors
Once you’ve identified potential ambassadors, the next step is to nurture a relationship with them. The easiest way to get going is to engage with your loyal customers through the Roster ambassador portal. Let them know about attractive rewards they can earn through endorsing and promoting your brand. Run campaigns that are clear and easy to do. With a good ambassador marketing app keeping track of this engagement, you benefit from social media’s measurable word-of-mouth promotions.
A great resource for ideas is our brand ambassador social-media-campaign-templates. The list is updated every month and backed with unique ideas that are easy to implement.
Reward your team
Make them feel valued and appreciated. Provide them with exclusive perks or early access to new products. The goal is to make them feel like an integral part of your brand’s journey.
Measure results
Strong brand ambassador marketing strategies are those that value your customers as the driving force behind your campaigns. They are based on measurable metrics across all the parameters of ambassador engagement.
The Roster Platform gives a dynamic visual of the most important KPIs. For instance, social feed, ambassador engagement, campaign reach, UGC, sales attribution, and many more crucial and actionable metrics.
All of this occurs free of charge, without requiring any sponsored advertisements. The inherently organic nature of an ambassador marketing strategy makes it more profitable than conventional affiliate programs. (See the chart above.)
Roster ambassador marketing
With Roster, you can see word-of-mouth promotion in action. You design an ambassador marketing strategy that’s flexible and result oriented.
Not only do companies have a dynamic platform, but their ambassador team has their own portal. The ambassador portal is customizable and has everything your team needs—campaigns, actions, referral links, discount codes, points, and more.
As recommended by Growann.com, the Roster platform allows you to scale your ambassador marketing strategy, encourage your social influencers to take action, and build a brand community of authentic brand advocates. Plus, ambassador marketing turns customers into brand lovers and brand lovers into ambassadors.
Ready to learn more about how the Roster app can enhance your approach to brand ambassador marketing? Get in touch with us today.
