Sales needs a customer story for a prospect. Customer success knows someone who might help. Marketing has an old quote, but nobody can find permission to use it.
Build your customer advocacy program around fixing one of those gaps first.
Choose one buyer question, one customer action and one person who owns the handoff. Collect the response, check it, get permission, and put it somewhere the team will use it.
The pilot below collects written customer experiences for sales and marketing. It is a proposed operating plan, not a campaign with promised results. You will leave with:
- A specific ask and a customer permission request.
- A documented setup and review process.
- A copyable tracking sheet and a decision about what to repeat.
| Pilot decision | What to write down |
|---|---|
| Buyer need | The question your next customer needs answered |
| Output | A written customer experience relevant to that question |
| Owner | The person responsible from invitation through approved reuse |
| Participants | Customers with direct experience who agree to take part |
| Completion | A checked response, recorded permission and a known destination |
| Measure | Requests delivered, responses, permissioned assets and actual uses |
Pick the buyer question before the advocacy activity
A customer advocacy program is a repeatable way to invite customers to share their experience and manage what happens next. Reviews, testimonials, referrals and reference calls are different activities inside it.
Start with a question sales or marketing already needs answered. For example: can customers describe how they use your product for a particular workflow? Treat that as a planning example, not a customer result.
Ask the salesperson requesting the story where it will be used. A prospect's email needs different detail from a homepage quote. Record the use case and the customer context needed, such as industry or region. Avoid asking the customer to supply confidential details.
You can compare the types of customer advocacy programs before choosing. This guide follows written testimonials. If buyers specifically need independent reviews, choose the platform using our Trustpilot vs G2 vs LinkedIn comparison and use the separate review rules below.
An NPS score or customer count does not decide whether you can run this pilot. You need customers with relevant experience and someone who can finish the work. If nobody owns the requests, permissions and follow-through, assign that responsibility before sending anything.
Build your first customer advocacy program in six steps
1. Name an owner and define the finished asset
Customer marketing or product marketing can own the pilot, with customer success helping make introductions. Where those titles do not exist, a founder or marketing generalist can do the job.
The owner should agree on the output with its user before approaching customers. Write down the destination, required context and person who will check the final text. Ask a customer-facing teammate to confirm that your question reflects something customers can answer.
Use this copyable plan. Replace every bracket; the values are yours to decide.
Buyer question: [What is the prospect trying to verify?]
Customer action: [Describe one workflow in their own words]
Pilot owner: [Name]
Relationship owner: [Name]
Response reviewer: [Name]
Intended use: [Specific page, deck or sales conversation]
Permission needed: [Quote, name, role, company, logo, channels]
Invitation window: [Dates]
Reminder rule: [When to follow up and when to stop]
Review date: [Date]
Reward: [None, or approved terms and fulfillment owner]
Keep the pilot focused on this action. A customer who agrees to a quote has not also agreed to an introduction, a webinar or future reference calls.
2. Invite people who can answer, and make participation optional
Ask your relationship owner which customers have direct experience of the workflow. Confirm who can speak for themselves and whether company approval is needed. Let customers choose whether to participate and where their name may appear.
For this testimonial pilot, use relevance and willingness to choose participants. A public-review campaign needs its own invitation rules: do not screen people by satisfaction and send only favorable experiences to a review platform. G2's in-app prompt guidance rejects positive-only segmentation. Trustpilot's business guidelines require fair invitations and prohibit incentives. Both were checked on October 19, 2026.
Customer participation should stay optional even if an account manager introduced you. Record a decline so another teammate does not repeat the same request. For an unresolved support issue, let the account owner handle the problem; do not pressure the customer to endorse you as part of getting help.
3. Set up a question customers can answer
We checked HighAdvocacy's published setup, testimonial, library and reward documentation on October 19, 2026. We followed the handoffs in the docs and inspected the existing product screenshots. We did not send a live customer campaign or measure completion rates.
We rechecked the linked setup, Inbox and Library instructions on October 26, 2026. The steps below use the current controls; the screenshots show the older interface. The form records permission to feature a testimonial with the customer's name. Keep any additional permission for edited wording, specific channels or company assets with the pilot record.
In the campaign builder, open Asks, find Testimonials and tick Written testimonial. Click its row to open the written testimonial settings. Set Heading to explain the request and Question for customers to ask about the chosen workflow.
The optional Detailed questions field turns each non-empty line into a bullet beneath the main question. These are prompts for one combined response, not separate answer fields. If you need customer role or company context, ask for it in your instructions and check the response; do not assume the form collected it automatically.
Customers give a star rating, name, work email and a response within your character limits, and confirm you can feature the testimonial with their name. Ask separately about company-logo rights and the specific wording and destination you plan to use. Keep that approval in your pilot record.
Existing HighAdvocacy product screenshot, reviewed October 19, 2026, showing the older setup interface. Use the current controls described above. Its sample values are not recommended limits.
Set Min. characters and Max. characters to fit the response you need, then preview the result. Do not impose a long essay when the destination needs a short explanation. The testimonial overview explains the customer's permission to feature their response; save any agreement about further uses separately.
The campaign guide documents an embedded widget and a hosted webpage. Use the hosted link for a personal invitation if you want to avoid installing a widget for the pilot. At least one channel must be enabled for an active campaign. The sharing guide says renaming a campaign changes its hosted URL while previously shared links keep working. Confirm the right channel is on before sending it.
Your email or CRM process still owns whom you invite, reminders and stopping further requests. The hosted link alone does not prove those systems are connected. Check the contact record before each send.
4. Send one clear ask and record the stop rules
Explain what the customer is agreeing to and what happens after submission. Here is a suggested invitation for a written experience. It has no promised reward or completion-time claim.
Invitation to share a customer experience
Subject: Could you describe your experience with [workflow]?
Hi [First Name],
We're collecting customer experiences about [workflow] to help buyers understand how it works in practice.
Would you be open to sharing what you did, what changed and anything you would want another team to know? You can respond here: [collection link].
We'll check the response with you before using it in [specific destination]. You can decline, and it won't affect your account or support.
Thanks,
[Name]
Replace every [bracketed] field before sending.
Choose a reminder date before sending. A single reminder is a reasonable pilot setting to test, not a measured optimum. Stop on a response, a decline, an opt-out, a bounce or the agreed end date. Check for requests from other teammates before following up.
For public reviews, use review request email templates and the platform's current invitation rules. Our best time to ask for reviews guide covers timing; judge the result against your own delivered invitations, not an assumed conversion rate.
5. Review the response, then approve its exact use
Open Inbox → Need action to review the submission. Check the rating, identity and full response in its drawer. Approve adds it to the Library; Reject keeps it outside the approved collection. Check whether approval also sends a reward before choosing it.
Before approving, check that the response concerns the intended product and workflow. Ask the customer to clarify an ambiguous result. If they give a number, record its period, basis and what the customer allows you to publish. A neat percentage with no explanation does not become reliable because it arrived through a form.
Use the Library filters to find proof by type, campaign or date. Open a card to see its proof details. The drawer's More proof actions menu offers Copy text, Open original and Download video when each applies. Check Consent for OK to feature or Internal only before using it publicly.
Manage approval in the Inbox. You can change an approved submission's decision while it still has decision buttons; a rewarded submission is final. If the content should no longer be used, remove it from its placements and check copies already placed in decks or on pages. A change inside HighAdvocacy cannot recall text pasted elsewhere.
Send the customer the exact proposed excerpt, attribution and destination. Ask separately about a company name or logo. Save the reply alongside the asset record and note any expiry or restrictions. Collection, internal approval and customer permission each get their own status in the sheet below.
Permission for a specific quote use
Subject: Please check this quote and where we'd use it
Hi [First Name],
Thanks for sharing your experience. We'd like to use this excerpt:
[Exact proposed quote]
Attribution: [Name, role and company, as agreed].
Destination: [Specific page, deck or channel].
May we use this wording and attribution there? Please tell us what to change or leave out. We will ask separately before using a company logo or expanding the use beyond this request.
Thanks,
[Name]
Replace every [bracketed] field before sending.
Once permission is recorded, give the person who requested the story its location and approved use. Log each actual placement or sales use. An item sitting in a library is a collected asset; a salesperson using it is a different event.
6. Assign reward fulfillment and check failures
A no-reward pilot keeps this handoff smaller. If you offer a thank-you, agree on it before outreach and check the customer's employer rules. For public reviews, also check the platform's terms. Disclosure does not override a platform's incentive ban. Our FTC guidelines guide is further reading, not a guarantee that a particular offer is allowed.
In HighAdvocacy's reward catalog, Manual by team and Reward connection have different responsibilities. Manual rewards need a person to fulfill them. A connection sends a webhook payload; the receiving system provisions the gift, credit or other reward. Creating a connection does not itself purchase a gift card.
Reward Activity distinguishes Needs fulfillment, Delivered and Failed. Manual items should be marked complete after the owner actually fulfills them. Check the receiving system when a webhook fails, because an error response alone cannot tell you whether a payment happened.
Existing HighAdvocacy product screenshot, reviewed October 19, 2026. This empty workspace shows the controls, not pilot results.
The docs identify two controls worth settling before offering a reward. Activity has no per-recipient deduplication: each fire creates a row. Keep a recipient/action ledger to prevent paying the same promised reward twice. Also, failed-send retries retain the original reward, URL and custom headers. Editing today's connection does not replace an old failed send's settings.
Choose a fulfillment owner who can inspect that original record and check what was delivered before retrying. Keep reward status separate from internal content approval and publication permission. For a deeper review workflow, use our review automation guide.
Use a proposed four-week pilot, then decide what to repeat
This schedule is a planning option. It has no forecast for reviews, referrals or revenue. Pick a manageable invitation list based on your team's ability to review and follow through.
| Week | Owner's work | Evidence needed before moving on |
|---|---|---|
| 1: Prepare | Agree on buyer question, participants, prompt, permissions and reward terms | Named owner, working collection path, reviewed invitation |
| 2: Invite | Send requests; check delivery and record declines | Send log and reminder stop list |
| 3: Finish | Review responses, request clarification and exact-use permission | Checked response, permission record, fulfilled commitments |
| 4: Reuse and review | Place permitted assets; ask sales what helped or was missing | Destination/use log and decision about the next pilot |
Walk through the collection path yourself before customer outreach. Mark your test record so it stays out of pilot totals. Confirm that a teammate knows where to review it and how to remove it afterward.
If you need independent reviews immediately, the seven-day review campaign guide covers that separate activity. You can also draft a broader roadmap with the Customer Advocacy Program Builder, then assign a real owner to each action.
Copy the tracking sheet and measure the handoffs
Copy this tab-separated header into a spreadsheet. Keep customer details in a system your team is allowed to use. The columns describe an operating record, not fields automatically synchronized by HighAdvocacy.
Contact ID Account Workflow Relationship owner Pilot owner Invited at Delivery status Response status Next action date Stop reason Submission link Reviewer Review status Permission link Allowed wording and attribution Allowed destinations Permission expiry Reward promise Fulfillment owner Reward status Asset location Actual use date Actual use destination Notes
Count delivered invitations, responses and permissioned usable assets separately. Divide responses by delivered invitations for your response rate; show the counts as well as the rate. Compare like windows and keep test records out. With few responses, a percentage can swing because one person replied.
Track time spent and actual reward costs to understand effort per usable asset. Log whether the intended team used the output, and ask what detail was missing when they did not. Our customer advocacy metrics guide covers a broader dashboard.
A closed deal that used a quote is an observed association, not evidence that the quote caused the sale. Keep deal notes if useful, but do not turn this small pilot into a revenue-lift claim.
| What you see | What to inspect next |
|---|---|
| Invitations fail to arrive | Contact data and sending setup |
| Delivered requests get no replies | Relevance, permission to contact, wording and customer effort |
| Responses lack useful detail | Question and guidance shown to customers |
| Good responses cannot be published | Permission request and company approval |
| Permitted assets go unused | Original buyer question, destination and handoff to sales |
| Rewards remain open | Fulfillment owner, original send record and receiving system |
Repeat the part customers completed and the team used. Change one blocked handoff before expanding into another activity. If the problem is tracking approvals and collecting responses, that is the job of customer advocacy program software: try HighAdvocacy or sign up free. For tool selection, use the customer advocacy platform comparison rather than adding a software evaluation to this pilot.
For a broader definition, read what customer advocacy means. The review collection health check and Customer Advocacy Maturity Quiz can prompt a team discussion; judge your pilot using its own recorded work and results.
