In this article, I would like to discuss with you about what steps you should take in order to build brand advocates. But before that, I would like to let you know what is brand advocate, why it is important to have them and how social media plays a crucial role in building brand advocates.
What Is Brand Advocate?
Brand advocates are nothing but highly satisfied customers who go out of their way to actively promote the products they really love and care about. They are more influential than an average customer.
A brand advocate is usually created through a combination of customer satisfaction and trust. If the customer is highly satisfied with the product or service he received, and believes that the company will continue to deliver the same level of service, he is sure to recommend that company to others.
Why Are Brand Advocates Important?
They are important because:
- They increase the brand awareness
- Word of mouth fuels growth of the brand
- More likes, tweets, recommendations, etc. follow
- Stick on to the customer loyalty and increased lifetime value.
Why Is Social Media Important in Creating Brand Advocates?
Social media is the primary part of most businesses’ marketing plans. It builds brand awareness and drives more traffic. It even generates sales. Moreover, for some companies, it also acts as a direct customer service tool.
According to the statistics shared by Michael Brito in his book “Your Brand: The Next Media Company” 92% of consumers purchase the product or service based on the recommendations of their peers. With more and more consumers choosing to follow their favorite brand in social media, it creates a great opportunity for the businesses to turn those followers into the advocates of their brands.
So, businesses of all size, small, medium and large, should consider social media to build brand advocates. Finding, encouraging and rewarding about 15 or more brand advocates is very important to mark a foot in your business niche.
Now, let’s have a look at the steps you need to take to build brand advocates:
1. Identify Potential Brand Advocates Using Analytical Tools:
To create brand advocates for your business, first you must find out currently who is your brand’s biggest advocate.
For example:
You can find out which followers engage most frequently with your content through likes, comments, shares, etc. You can do this by using analytical tools like Argyle Social, ReFollow, Traackr, Twitter Reach and Twitter Search.
Once you have identified them, empower them with highly qualified and relevant content. Take a look back at previous links and posts that you have already shared on social media which received the more engagement. It helps to identify the type of content that seem to really vibrate with your audience.
2. Find out What Motivates Them:
A statistic reveals that 83% of the brand advocates are more likely to share the information than the average user. In fact, most of them are sharing the content as relaxation.
There are many reasons that motivate brand advocates:
1. To be entertained
2. To solve problems
3. To provide information
4. To learn how to do the things
3. Apply Social Sharing Buttons to Share Your Content Easily:
a) Make social sharing buttons visible:
Make sure the social sharing buttons are easily visible on each page of your website or each piece of content you have created; so that it can be easily shared by others.
b) Ask brand advocates to share the content:
Don’t hesitate to ask your brand advocates to share the content because they would love to help. For asking, you can put call to action like “please RT” on your tweets.
c) Use Tribber:
You can actually pick up an immediate boost in promoters when you join Triberr. This website assembles like-minded bloggers together in a tribe and provides various assistance.
d) Increase the reach of your content:
You don’t just belong to one tribe. Try to join various networks and expand your network exponentially.
4. Give Freedom to Your Brand Advocates:
Don’t force your brand advocates; give them enough flexibility to talk about you and your brand in any way they like. Just encourage them to give their feedback.
Here are few tips to support that kind of freedom:
a) Ask:
Collect the list of top advocates using email and get their honest feedback on a particular post you have written, or the idea or product you are working on.
b) Tell:
Ask permission to your brand advocates to share their valuable feedback. Generally, people would like to be known for their valuable insights.
c) Reward:
Don’t forget to intimate your advocates that you are starting a program that rewards your best critics. It is highly recommended to make that program public; it can even turn the haters of your brand into advocates.
Final Words:
Building a large group of advocates for your brand is really a great marketing stratagem that can pay large dividends in the growth of your brand, and increase the number of subscribes as well as the amount of profit.
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