Via FreshPeel.com I came across this excellent short documentary looking at influencers, how brands & creativity become contagious. Watch it. Now.
INFLUENCERS FULL VERSION from R+I creative on Vimeo.
If you have target market X surely you should talk directly to them?
In all likelihood – yes.
However there is ALWAYS room to target the second tier.
Who influences this market? Who else do they interact with? Whose opinion do they pay attention to?
The best example of this is the most effective campaign in getting women in for cancer screening. Conversations were held with hairdressers whom were to then relay they conversations with their clients. By targeting this second tier they were able to reach their target audience in an effective manner.
The key here is to miss the same boat that your competition are taking ON PURPOSE!
Great engagement model when you do not have the capability to do so directly.
First sit down and have a think.
What is a passive user to me?
and then
What is an active user?
Ok.
Now what does a passive user have to do (actions) to become an active user.
Now what barriers are there in that process? Remove all barriers. Make it easy.
Done.
Now, what action am i stimulating?
Make the engaged user emotive enough to begin the process.
You get the picture of customers becoming evangelists and some ways of doing this.
It was on this and Julian of [business:ProWorkflow] tweeting this:
“Talk, Blog, Syndicate, SEO, Tweet, and build a solid product. Then look after users and they’ll become evangelists.”
(in response to my query about his marketing strategy)
This later popped up on his blog.
Intrigued, I thought I’d ask him a few questions.
Share the numbers with you guys.
What’s the ROI of turning customers into evangelists?
Julian shares 25% of new sales a month are through referrals.
25% that’s 1 in 4!
In a competitive market like Project Management, referrals are gold.
They have stimulated this through:
“Fanatical support. Fast and reliable on all support requests. We invest time into training account holders. Always have an approachable, friendly manner, unlike many US based cold, slow support teams. Response time – typically instant or less than an hour. “
He also shares that “when customers cancel, we always wish them the best and keep in touch, many come back again later” (Marketing after the fact?)
By looking after their users, they’ve had customers changing projects or jobs and getting the new team to use it.
Great huh? Nice sweet spot. Something to strive for.
If you’re already here, what can you do better?
Provide your customers with tools to help them spread the word,
If your customers are already evangelists, give them the tools to help them evangelise.
This is on the tip of everyone’s tongue at the moment.
How do you turn your customers into fans?
Fans will rave about you. Tell their friends. Sell your product for you.
There is no perfect mix, but some questions I would be asking myself are:
– Who are the key influencers whom use my product?
– How can i excite them about my product?
– Am i excited about my product? Why?
– Are you the best? or the worst? Either way. Pick a spot at each extreme.
– Am i selling the sizzle? do customers know what the sizzle is?
– Have i provided a platform or catalyst for customers to become fans?
– Have i provided tools for my customers to become fans (blogger kits, graphics, competitions)
– Is my product actually making their life better? am i helping them?