. This trust from friends and family is much stronger than any advertisement, as it comes from a personal connection.

Incentivize your past customers to refer new ones with a referral program. Through this, your past customers can earn a discount, cashback, and other rewards for every new customer that they bring in. 

When setting up your referral program, keep these best practices in mind:

• Set up a clear reward for customers like $15 credits or a 20% discount on their next order.
• Provide a shareable link that customers can send to their friends and family easily, letting you track every sale generated through WOM.
• Let customers know about the program by sharing its information within your post-purchase email.
• Make it easy for customers to see how many people they referred and the rewards they earned. 

For example, Latico Leathers is an ecommerce leather goods brand that incentivizes customers to become affiliates by offering 15% of the sales they generate through their referrals. Using Social Snowball, they were able to generate an additional $18K in referral revenue, lowering acquisition costs.

Strategy #2: Leverage User-Generated Content (UGC) 

User-generated content (UGC)—such as photos, videos, and reviews shared by your real people—serves as authentic, unpaid endorsements for your brand. Unlike traditional promotional content, UGC is seen as more genuine and trustworthy, as it reflects real customer experiences. 

Unlike referral marketing, UGC prioritizes content created by customers, often having them share visuals of their experience with the brand, making it a powerful word-of-mouth marketing strategy. Some ways to do this are:

• Promote a branded hashtag: Create a unique hashtag for your brand and encourage customers to use it when sharing their experiences. This makes it easier for you to find and share their content, showcasing real-life endorsements.
  
  
• Run contests to encourage content creation: People often need an extra incentive to create content. Run contests that will motivate customers to share photos, videos, and stories about their experience using your products. Offer rewards like a 10% discount, a giveaway for a $50 gift card, or a freebie on their next order. This increases the amount of authentic content your brand receives, increasing reach.
  
  
• Engage with and share UGC: Regularly repost customer-generated content on your social media channels. This makes customers feel appreciated and motivates others to share their experiences, creating a cycle of social proof.
  
  
• Encourage and showcase reviews: Simplify the review process to make it easy for customers to leave feedback. You can then share these testimonials on social media to build social proof among followers who haven’t already bought from you. 
• Partner with UGC creators: While organic UGC is valuable, it can be inconsistent in both quality and quantity—some customers may create amazing content, while others may share visuals that don’t align with your brand’s aesthetic. UGC creators solve this by producing high-quality, authentic content that mirrors real customer experiences. They help maintain a steady flow of content that can be repurposed across social media, product pages, and ads—all at a much lower cost than mainstream influencers.

Solawave is a skincare brand that often partners with UGC creators to drive word-of-mouth through authentic content. 

, a skincare brand, features customer testimonials, reviews, and before-and-after images from real customers within their product pages.

But customer content shouldn’t be limited to product pages alone—integrating social proof across your entire website can further build trust and improve conversions.

• Feature testimonials on the homepage to establish credibility from the first interaction.
• Create a dedicated ‘Wall of Love’ page with UGC, customer feedback, and social shoutouts.
• Display customer photos and videos on-site to show real people using your products.
• Enable video shopping with UGC content to provide an interactive shopping experience.

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Strategy #4: Gamify your affiliate & referral program

Gamifying your affiliate program increases motivation and creates competition, which creates an engaging experience. Through gamification tactics, you can motivate affiliates to achieve more and, in turn, generate more word-of-mouth marketing for your brand.

Here are some ideas to gamify your word-of-mouth strategy:

• Implement tiered programs where affiliates earn a larger commission after referring 20 customers.
• Reward a bonus for affiliates for reaching a milestone like generating $100 in sales.
• Send freebies to affiliates during their first anniversary.
• Set up leaderboards to create competition among your affiliates.
• Allow customers within your loyalty program to earn points for referring new ones. Since these members already have brand loyalty, they’ll be eager to refer and earn points.

For example, PurelyB, a superfood brand, implemented a tiered structure in its affiliate program, driving higher engagement from affiliates.

Looking to gamify your affiliate program? Download our 20-page playbook with winning strategies and real-life examples to help you get started.

Strategy #5: Automate capturing word of mouth with email & post-purchase flows

Email flows are a great way to engage and motivate your existing customers to become promoters of your brand, turning them into active advocates who can boost your credibility and influence new buyers.

Here’s how you can use emails to drive positive word-of-mouth:

• Remind customers about the value of sharing your products and their experiences, including the rewards they can earn.
  
  
• Keep customers engaged with your brand and motivated with updates about the referrals they’ve brought in and the total rewards they’ve already earned. Inform them about any additional rewards you have in place (like milestones or bonuses).
  
  
• Integrate your affiliate program with your email marketing tool to set up triggered email flows based on specific actions. With Social Snowball's integration with Klaviyo, you can seamlessly incorporate affiliate data into your existing email flows, creating additional touchpoints to nurture referrals. For example, you can include referral codes or links in your post-purchase emails, making it easy for your customers to start sharing your brand.

For example, Fanjoy, an ecommerce brand in the merchandise space, uses Social Snowball to send a follow-up email explaining how customers can earn money by promoting the product within their social network. If the customer doesn’t engage, follow-up emails are sent to remind them to join the affiliate program.

By incorporating these reminders into their post-purchase email flows, Fanjoy was able to generate $100,000 in new incremental revenue from customer referrals.

Ready to scale word-of-mouth marketing for long-term growth?

To truly make word-of-mouth a part of your digital marketing and scale personal recommendations, it’s important to think of it as an ongoing effort to build trust rather than a short-term marketing effort. Each interaction with your customers is an opportunity to reinforce that trust, motivating them to share their experiences and spread the word.

By offering rewards and incentives for sharing, you can leverage the power of word of mouth to increase your ecommerce brand’s social proof. Over time, this becomes a strategy for consistent, long-term customer acquisition.

Ready to increase social proof for your brand through genuine recommendations? Social Snowball can help you automate this process, turning your customers into motivated advocates and acquiring new customers successfully.

Frequently asked questions

How can I measure the impact of word-of-mouth marketing on my ecommerce sales?

You can track the effectiveness of your WOM marketing using referral sales data, affiliate program performance metrics, social media mentions, and customer reviews. Additionally, use tools like Social Snowball to attribute revenue to word-of-mouth efforts and Klaviyo to set up emails to launch your campaign.

What types of products benefit the most from word-of-mouth marketing?

Products that solve a specific problem, create a unique experience, or have a strong emotional connection tend to perform well with WOM marketing. Categories like beauty, wellness, fashion, and tech gadgets often see strong word-of-mouth engagement.

How do I encourage customers to leave reviews and share their experiences?

To encourage your customers to share their stories you need to make it easy and rewarding for them. You can do this in a few ways:

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• Automate review requests via post-purchase emails.
• Offer incentives for UGC and referrals.
• Engage with customers on social media and reshare their experiences to make them feel valued, increase customer loyalty, and turn them into vocal advocates.

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Categories

Referral Marketing

Published on

March 25, 2025

Written by

Pia Mikhael

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