To Drive Followers Being Loyal as Fans

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Build fans, not followers

A ton of creators, as well as businesses, are trying to get as many followers as possible on their social media.

As well as marketing results are mostly judged by the number of new followers.

This is a fundamentally wrong approach.

Every business owner knows – getting new clients is hard. It requires time, money, new marketing campaigns, more traffic sources, and only God knows what else.

Thus, there is the reason why you frequently get offers from places where you already bought something, why you pick the same beverages every time you're in 7-Eleven, and why you choose to go to Starbucks for your morning coffee and not McDonald's.

You're a fan of what you're consuming. This is the reason why you keep coming back.

So why are you keep relying exclusively on brand new people to get more revenue? Because your existing consumer base is just buyers or followers, not your fans.

Your fans will buy from you repeatedly, they love your new content and engage with it, and they are happy to get your new offers and information about your new products.

Your followers simply forgot to unsubscribe from your newsletter or social media account after (hopefully) buying from you once.

To get those loyal fans, you need to study these two concepts: branding and client retention.

It is crucial for every business out there, be you small drop shipping store or model on OnlyFans.

Before you go studying these two concepts, here are some tips to get started:

• Build your business identity. And it's not just your logo or face. Every piece of your content must be in the same, uniquely yours, style: from Instagram posts to text on your website. Very few people like to spend time on it, but it's crucial to stand out. Example: you can see the expensiveness and quality of Apple products, as well as their consistent design in every piece of their product.

• Communicate with your audience. Everybody likes to keep in touch with their favorite brand. Answer your Direct Messages (DM)s and comments on social media, do polls and surveys, and ask your audience questions. This will separate you from hundreds (if not thousands) of quiet businesses out there. Example: Mojang, creators of Minecraft, are frequently creating polls on what to add to the new version of their game.

• Keep in touch with your existing clients. By offering people who already bought from you exclusive deals, guides on how to use your product, and making them happier after they already bought from you will turn them into returning customers. Example: BookingCom gives you different levels based on how much you stayed in one of their flats, offering you better deals and making you repeated customer.

• Be an expert. No matter what you do, show your audience that you are the best deal for them. Educating your prospects will show your competence in your field, building trust and strong relationships with them. Example: Red Bull often sponsors sports events, showing people what true talents drink while they are performing.

Once again, in order to turn your followers into fans, you should study branding and client retention techniques.
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Merco
agreed 100%. I learned this as an exec in a different service industry in the 90's. Create raving fans, the purchase is never the end of the relationship- it is the beginning of your captive relationship. Identify your most passionate buyers and motivate them to serve as your viral marketing team generating user-generated content that can be used across profiles and sites to drive word of mouth advertising and influencer recommendations.

These days, more significant influencers have lost a lot of their trust. 82% of consumers believe a stranger over brand messaging. A couple of companies that do this well are Starbucks and Apple. Apple is the most customer-centric company in the world. Their products are not that much higher in quality than other systems, but every other piece of their business, from the swoosh noise the box, makes when opening ti to how the employees function in apple stores, is perfectly choreographed down to the slightest nuance. The value and trust that overflows from this complete experience have created massive legions of diehard fans arguing with you about quality and security to protect Apple's reputation even when they have zero clue of the facts. When an update comes out, legions of buyers line up and shell out money many cannot afford without even realizing many times the updates are not worth the added expense while at times the updates have flowed so quickly the kinks were not sufficiently worked out yet. brilliant.

Starbucks is another. They have successfully motivated so much user content that is unmanageable. Last year a potential bombshell dropped because in one section of the news, they were reporting that Starbucks was asking employees worldwide to take pay cuts because of the state of the economy plus to help the company. In contrast, in another section, it was reported that Starbucks execs had received record payouts and bonuses. Starbucks had to do little damage control. The sheer volume of user-generated content posted on their behalf every day worldwide quickly buried the story with mountains of content.

Great Post Op!
Nnoven
I 100% agree with the thesis of this post.

A lot of people confuse fans with followers the same way marketers confuse website traffic with traction.

At the end of the day, whatever metric you use must lead to some sort of conversion.

Fans are more likely to become emotionally invested in what you're doing.

This doesn't just translate to a growing number of sales as your fan base expands, it goes much deeper than that.

Because when you have dedicated fans, they're more likely to spread the word about your brand.

That's right, they can become brand evangelists.

This is why it's really important to make fans know that you care about them.

And a lot of this has to deal with a sense of belonging.

You know you have a fan when they use special terms for the things that you do.

Now, of course, you may not be doing anything all that different from your competitors, but if you put a catchy name or a term for thing for things you do or processes that you have or product features, these are mental "differentiators" your fans can hang on to and make themselves look good in front of their friends or their influence circle because they know these terms.

It makes them stand out.

But in reality, you've just put a label on a feature, system, product or service that your competitors are already doing and not making a big deal about.

You also have to focus on building a mailing list that cultivates a sense of purpose for fans.

Basically, you have to let them know that they're not just fans for no good reason or they're just fans because they liked the product.

There must be something more.

And this is where speaking in terms of your value statements go a long way.

I look at this really as a form of mass hypnosis.

Because we live in a weird juncture in history where technology has made us the most connected generation ever while at the same time, people are feeling more lonely than ever.

So you can use this reality to make your brand stand out.

That by being a fan, they're part of something bigger than themselves and that their values are reflected in your values.

If any of this sounds familiar, it should.

A lot of this was inspired by Steven Jobs' cultivation of the Cult of Macintosh.

It is precisely that cult following, made up of emotionally-invested fans, that transformed Apple from an also-ran in the computer hardware wars of the late 80s into the powerhouse that it is today.

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