Demand Curve - The Growth Newsletter #067

The Growth Newsletter #067

Welcome to the 952 new marketers and founders who joined last week!

 

This week we're covering word of mouth (and referrals), offboarding, and product page copywriting.

 

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Before we dive in:

 

We're giving away the entire database of our most actionable, highest-leverage growth tactics. We typically only share these tactics with readers who refer at least two friends to the newsletter—we don't publish them anywhere else.

 

But you can get the database by filling out this short analytics and data survey (takes less than 5 minutes).

 

We'll send you the database page and password after you complete the survey.

 

1. When starting a referral program, research your online word of mouth

Insight from Demand Curve.

 

Referrals are like adding fuel to your existing word of mouth (WOM) fire. They encourage WOM by offering an incentive for recommending your business to others.

 

While you’re investing in building a referral program, do some research to see if people who are already referring you organically want to do so formally.

 

Two ways to find organic referrals: 1) Check your site analytics, and 2) dig into your social media.

 

1. Site analytics

 

Check which sites are referring significant traffic to yours. In Google Analytics, navigate to the Acquisition tab > All Traffic > Source/Medium.

 

If a source in your list is reputable and speaks fondly of your product, reach out to them. See if you can form a relationship and test a formal referral program.

 

Set up goal tracking in Google Analytics to measure the number of new users who visit your site from a referral source. Use that as a source of truth when negotiating compensation or other forms of incentives with partner websites.

 

2. Social media

 

To find out how customers are talking about your business organically, do some social listening.

• On Twitter: In the advanced search window, type your product and business’s name in brackets in the “any of these words” section. This will show you all the public tweets that mention your business or product name. You can also use Tweetdeck to track mentions. Engage with high-quality posters. See if they’re willing to join your formal referral program.
• On LinkedIn: In the search bar, type the name of your business. Then click Posts > Date Posted. Set the time frame to “past month.” Click Show Results > Sort By > Latest > Show Results. You now have a filtered list of all the posts from the last month that mentioned your business. Search the results for any that speak highly of your brand. Reach out to see if they’d be willing to join your program.

For more on referrals, check out our process for launching a program here.

 

2. Optimize your customer offboarding flow

Insight from ProfitWell.

 

Some companies make customers jump through hoops to cancel their subscriptions.

 

Instead of offering easy, online cancellation, they force customers to cancel by phone during business hours. Or if they do offer an online cancellation option, they make it difficult to find.

 

But these tactics are unethical and, in some cases, can even lead to legal action from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC).

 

You should make it easy and straightforward for customers to cancel your service. Remove the friction.

 

Customers aren’t necessarily lost forever when they cancel. Some might return at a later time. Others might reconsider and decide to stay. Whatever the case, a smooth offboarding flow should accomplish two things:

• Allow customers to leave, easily, on a positive note.
• Without adding friction to the cancellation process, entice users to stick around.

Here are five tips for creating a smoother offboarding experience:

• Make cancellation as easy as the method used to buy or sign up. If customers can sign up easily online, they should also be able to cancel easily online. Simple as that.
• Remind users of your product’s key benefits. Consider how Canva (left) reiterates the features users will miss out on by canceling—it even shows an example image comparing its free and pro plans. This is more likely to persuade users to stay than Otter.ai’s approach (right).

 

• Give users an option to pause their subscription or skip a month. Sometimes the reason customers want to leave is a matter of timing, or something else outside of your control. By offering the ability to pause or temporarily deactivate their accounts, you can stop customers from leaving altogether. And if you note that you’ll save their data, there’s a better chance they’ll return later on.

 

• Include a “salvage” offer to retain customers. If you sell a subscription, offer a discount to renew customers’ contracts. Or, depending on your product, offer users an extension of their trial (e.g., for another 60 days) or the ability to swap out a product for another one. Just be sure to present your salvage offer alongside your cancellation option—you don’t want customers to feel cornered.
• Make it easy to identify the cause of cancellation. Set up a quick, one-question survey with options like “Too expensive,” “Technical issues,” or “Switching to another product.” Include an optional field where users can add any comments. Don’t ask for a phone call to collect feedback—it can feel like a burden and further sour unhappy customer experiences.

 

3. A framework for writing better product descriptions

Insight from Mathias von Appen Schrøder.

 

Try this copywriting framework to create more compelling product descriptions:

1. List all of the product’s features.
2. For each feature, explain its benefit(s).
3. For each benefit, explain its value. In other words, translate each benefit into its real-life implications—state why customers should care about it. For extra punch, inject emotionally appealing language at this step.

Here’s an example of this framework applied to a reusable water bottle.

 

Feature → Benefit → Value

• Wide bottle mouth → Faster refills → You can spend less time standing at a water dispenser—and more time running, hiking, etc.
• Straw lid → Easy sipping → Since you don’t have to twist off a bottle lid, you can drink with just one hand—perfect when you’re on the road.
• Double-wall vacuum insulation → Protects liquid's temperature for hours → You can be refreshed for any adventure with your drink either as cold or hot as you’d like.

Marketing news

Brought to you by mParticle.

 

mParticle is the customer data platform (CDP) powering Spotify, Airbnb, and Gymshark. It captures real-time data and delivers it across your marketing tools. The result? Powerful, timely, and respectful personalization. Demand Curve community members can claim either one year of free mParticle or $25k in credits here.

 

News you can use:

• Last week, Facebook announced new ads and messaging tools to connect with customers and identify quality leads. That includes being able to manage WhatsApp conversations in Business Inbox, and send promotional messages via Messenger.
• Beginning tomorrow, Google Ads will enforce new consent requirements for brands remarketing and using conversion tracking for European visitors.
• Coming up: Pulse, TikTok’s new contextual ad feature, will be available to U.S. advertisers in June. Pulse will let brands place ads alongside trending creator videos and split ad revenue 50/50 with creators. 

Top new marketing jobs

 

If you're looking for a top growth role, check out the opportunities below from our job board.

Something fun:

Courtesy of @coreykindberg.

Want more growth tactics?

We're giving away our entire back catalog of tactics to folks who refer two friends to this newsletter. Here's your referral link to share: https://sparklp.co/385a143f. You can track your referrals here. We'll automatically email you the password-protected tactics page once you've referred two people.

 

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Who's Demand Curve? We’re who marketers and founders rely on to solve real marketing problems. We skip trends and fluffy stories and only share high-quality, vetted, and actionable growth content from the top 1% of marketers.

 

How we can help you grow:

• Read our free playbooks, blog articles, and teardowns—we break down the strategies and tactics that fast-growing startups use to grow.
• Enroll in the Growth Program, our professional course that will help you get traction and scale revenue.
• Hire our agency, Bell Curve, and we'll grow your startup for you.

• Engage with our audience by sponsoring Demand Curve.

See you next week.

 

— Nick, Grace, Joyce, Dennis, and the DC team.