3 Reasons Your Business Needs to Build an Organization of Ambassadors

Ambassadors are essential to any institution:

They are bridge-builders, key communicators, and interpreters. They translate between one entity and the rest of the world: They communicate ideas and philosophies and garner support with outside individuals, or even countries.

Every institution needs ambassadors.

Businesses are no exception.

On this episode of the Lead to Grow podcast, Amy Franko joined us to show how ambassadors can radically impact your customer base, your ROI, and your employee retention.

Amy is an author, keynote speaker, and Founder and President of Impact Instruction Group, a sales consulting and sales leadership business.

Here's what she had to say:

Why Your Business Needs Ambassadors:

1: Connect With the Outside World:

Ambassadors internalize the values of an organization and simultaneously maintain their own personal brand. They take the DNA of a company and connect it to others, turning one-time clients into lifelong customers. They inspire loyalty and encourage excitement.

Wherever they go, "ambassadors are fantastic at building loyalty and building lifetime value," said Amy.

2: Help Retain Top Talent:

Further, they don't just breathe life externally: They offer a huge retention boost and bring a general buzz to your talent base as well. A more experienced, enthusiastic, and loyal employee base will only provide better service to your clients and prospects.

3: Ambassadors Differentiate Your Company:

Organizations are having to think differently: Satisfaction is no longer an aspiration for a category leader. It's a minimum for a category entrant.

We have to move our prospects and clients from satisfaction to loyalty, so they're staying with us longer and creating more value.

Statistics show that a business is times more likely to sell to a current customer, than land a net-new client.

Start by Understanding How to Create Lifetime Value for a Client

Lifetime value is a two-way street between client and company: It's a mutually beneficial relationship that continually adds, not subtracts, for both parties.

No matter where you sit in an organization, lifetime value should be a constant motivator -- Because the types of clients you bring into an organization determine your success in the long run.

Amy encourages her team to consider these characteristics of a prospect:

• Does your organization have philosophical alignment with the prospect?
• What's the experience level of this new client?
• What is the overall compatibility between the client and the company?
• In the long run, are we valuable to them?
• Are they valuable to us?

The stronger that mutual value is, the better the odds you have of building an organization that is consistently working with the right clients, and attracting and retaining top talent.

If Someone Had Lunch With You, What's the Key Thing You'd Want Them to Walk Away With?

We ask this question to every guest on our podcast.

Amy answered it in two parts:

1: She'd hope that any person would walk away knowing that she is truly interested in them and interested in what's important to them.

2: She'd hope she walk away with something she could do for the other person, some way she could add value to them, so she can extend her network.

Well said, Amy!

This blog post is from a podcast interview with Amy Franko, Founder and President of Impact Instruction Group.

Click here to hear this full episode. If you don't use iTunes, you can also find the full list of episodes by clicking this link.