MackCollier.com

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Toolbox Saturday: The Editorial Calendar Plugin

Welcome to the first edition of Toolbox Saturday! Every Saturday I will talk about a tool or technique you can use to make your blogging, content creation or social media efforts just a little more effective and efficient.

When I decided to ‘relaunch’ my blog, I wanted a plugin that would help me visualize the posts I have running for the rest of the week, and month.  Basically, I was hoping to find a plugin that would show me all the upcoming posts that were due to publish, on a calendar.

Luckily, that’s exactly what I found with the Editorial Calendar plugin.  Here’s a screenshot of what it looks like for this blog in September:

At a glance, I can tell what my editorial calendar looks like.  I can see the first week is ready to go, and the remaining weeks still have work to do.  Also, I love how it lets me get a list on the right side of all the unscheduled post drafts I have ready to go.  Over the last 11 years of blogging here, I have started a lot of posts that never made it past the ‘draft’ stage. This gave me a way to see what all those drafts are.  Now granted. some of the older drafts covered topics and information that may have been relevant 5-10 years ago, but no longer was.  So those were scrapped, but I also found many great ideas that had been buried for years in my drafts section.

I’ve heard so many bloggers, the vast majority really, say that they have plenty of ideas for posts, they just don’t have the time to write. I have the opposite problem; I struggle to come up with ideas for content.  Once I figure out an idea for a post, the actual writing of the post takes no time at all. So anything that can help with the content creation process, I want to know more about it! I also assume that a lot of you, whether you are a blogger for your business or a content manager for your company, you have more time to pick up tips and tricks on the weekend. That’s why I wanted to run Toolbox Saturdays on the weekend, so more of you would have time to implement these tools and tips on your own blogs to help take your blogging efforts to the next level.

Hope everyone has a great weekend, see you on Monday!

 

PS: My buddy Andy Crestodina at Orbit Media asked me to pass along this link to take his blogger survey.  He’s been doing it the last few years now and it’s always interesting seeing the results.  I’ll share the results from this survey in a later post when they are ready!

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What Happens When Your CEO Wants to Talk Politics on Social Media?

“Very bad things.” answered every content manager who has ever had to deal with their CEO wanting to do this. Politics are divisive enough most days, but especially now in an election year.

But the boss comes to you, wants you to set them up a ‘blog’ so they can get some stuff off their chest.

You will advise them this is a bad idea, they will immediately alienate half the customer base, etc. But the boss is determined  “This election is too important to stay slient!” they might say.

Sigh. So if you decide to move ahead with the boss’ idea of having a blog to talk politics, focus on talking about the values that are consistent with your brand, and avoid hot-button topics such individual candidates. The realty is, as soon as you mention one of the two candidates running for president, most people have an immediate and visceral reaction. So if your CEO truly wants their message to be heard, encourage them to write about the values of the candidate they support moreso than the candidate himself.

Let me give you an example of why this is so important.  College students in their late teens and early 20s have historically been more liberal in their political thinking. This is across the board. As they age, they tend to become more moderate, and eventually more conservative in their politics. Not true for everyone of course, but for the group, it holds.

So most college students view themselves as thinking more as a liberal. Several years ago, a group of pollsters went to college campuses and asked students what they thought of some of then President Obama’s policies. The students overwhelmingly favored the policies. Then the pollsters started asking students what they thought of those same policies, but didn’t explain that they were coming from the President. Pollsters found that when students didn’t know the policy was coming from Obama, they were less favorable toward it. In another example, in 2016, pollsters talked to college students about what they thought about Bernie Sander’s policies, but for each policy, the students were told that it was actually Donald Trump’s policy.  The students overwhelmingly disapproved of the policy when they thought it was coming from Trump, and were shocked when they learned it was actually coming from Sanders.

The point in these studies is that many Americans, especially in an election year, have very emotional reactions for any ideas that they believe are tied to a particular candidate. But if you disconnect those ideas from either candidate, people ‘calm down’ and are more likely to listen to the idea. As long as they don’t think the idea is tied to the candidate that they can’t stand!

So if your CEO is determined to write about politics, encourage them to NOT write about the candidates, and instead write about the values and policies of the candidate they support. Ask them to think about why they support that candidate, what beliefs they agree with, and also ask them how those values beliefs tie into your company’s core values and beliefs.

Point out to your CEO that he or she wants the readers to LISTEN to their ideas. And as soon as the CEO introduces the candidate they support into the equation, half the audience will immediately tune out. And since the CEO’s audience will ideally be the company’s customers, that could easily result in lost business.

Focus on the values and policies of the candidate, not the candidate himself. Highlight the values and policies that tie to the core values of your company.

That’s how your CEO can effectively walk the tightrope of blogging about politics.

 

PS: As we head into Labor Day weekend, I want to wish everyone a safe and happy few days off. And since Labor Day is the unofficial end of Summer I wanted to share this instrumental from FM-84 which just oozes the vibe of being a teenager during the Summer circa 1985.  Have a great weekend!

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Here’s What Every Perfect Product Review Has

Think about what would be the perfect review for your product. Think about the elements it would include, what the customer would highlight.  I bet you have in mind a list of features you want the customer to mention in their review, right? Maybe you want the customer to point out that your product is reliable, right? Also add some general statements about how awesome and trustworthy your brand is, perhaps? Put all this together and you would have the perfect review for your product, right? The perfect mixture of highlighting all the right features, while also pointing to the reliability of your brand.

I can assure you that none of that comes close to defining the perfect product review.

When many companies think about what defines a great product review, they focus on what they want the customer to say about the PRODUCT. They have a list of all the features and attributes they want the customer to mention, maybe a couple of gushing compliments about the brand in general.

Instead, the perfect product review is one where the customer talks about THEMSELVES. But…they talk about themselves in the context of how your product made them BETTER at something.

Here’s a snippet from one of my favorite reviews for my book, Think Like a Rock Star:

“Second, more than any other I’ve read, the book inspired me to take action. These are practical ideas that you can implement right away, not well-meaning tips to put in your idea file, never to be seen again. I hadn’t even finished reading chapter one, and I already implemented one of his ideas.”

See the difference? This review isn’t talking about me or the book, it’s talking about how reading the book prompted a positive change in behavior FOR THE READER. This is what I want to see as a customer reading reviews, I want to know how the product IMPROVED the life of the customer that wrote the review. Because if it helped the customer who wrote the review, that makes me believe it can help me as well.

The perfect product review is one where the customer talks about themselves positively. The customer talks about how your product made a positive change in their lives.

 

Which review for an SUV do you think is better?

“This is the best car I’ve ever owned.” – Positive about the car.

“Driving this car made me feel safer.” – Positive about how the customer felt driving the car.

 

Which review for dog food do you think is better?

“It was a great deal, easy to serve portions, and the price was right.” – Positive about the dog food.

“I noticed that my dog was more active and seemed happier as soon as he started eating this.” – Positive about the change in behavior of the owner’s dog.

 

Which review for a camera do you think is better?

“This camera comes with all the bells and whistles you need to take great pictures.” – Positive about the camera

“This camera made me a better photographer.” – Positive about how the camera changed the behavior of the customer

 

If you think about it, we don’t buy products, we buy the change in our lives that happens when we own those products. When we buy a car, we aren’t buying the object, we are buying what the car allows us to do.  We aren’t buying the laptop, we are buying what the laptop allows us to do. We aren’t buying the mattress, we are buying a good night’s sleep.

Think about how your marketing helps influence the reviews your products receive. The features you highlight in your marketing are often the ones customers highlight in their reviews. What if your marketing helped customers understand how their lives would change as a result of owning your product? Customers would buy your product based on the promise of the change or changes it would make in their lives. Then if your product met the customer’s expectations, that would be shared in their product reviews.

Sell the benefit of your product, more than the product itself.

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Marketing and Movies: Ford vs Ferrari

A few days ago I noticed a marketer instructed her followers on Twitter to treat their customers as potential ‘mouthpieces’ for their brand. While I cringed at the idea of companies viewing their customers as simply being a ‘mouthpiece’ for the brand, the reality is that such a notion will resonate with a lot of companies. Many companies do view its customers as nothing more than promotional channels. This is an incredibly short-sighted view, and it fails to acknowledge the true value of your customers. And it doesn’t create the relationship that lets their talents and abilities shine the brightest.

This lesson was at the front of my mind as I recently watched the movie Ford vs Ferrari. In the late 1950s, Ford decided that it needed to do a better job of appealing to younger car owners. The marketing department (headed by future Chrysler CEO Lee IIacoca), decided that the way to reach young car buyers was via racing, more specifically, by having Ford win the 24 Hours of Le Mans, one of the most prestigious auto races in the world. At the time, Ferrari was dominating Le Mans, and Ford approached Ferrari with an offer to buy the automaker, which greatly insulted Ferrari. In the process of refusing the offer, Enzo Ferrari greatly insulted Ford CEO Henry Ford II, which compelled Ford to go all-in on winning the race at Le Mans.

Ferrari had dominated Le Mans because racing was the heartbeat of the brand.  Motorsports and producing impeccable racing cars was at the heart of Ferrari’s culture. This wasn’t the case at Ford. So Ford, not having the love of motorsports and racing that Ferrari did, approached its entry into Le Mans as a business move, moreso than as a move motivated by a love of racing. Ford hired former Le Mans winner Carroll Shelby to create a car and team that could win Le Mans. But Ford tried to impose its culture on the effort, telling Shelby that he cannot have Ken Miles drive for the team, since Ford wanted a brand spokesperson moreso than the best driver to be behind the wheel at Le Mans. The result was a disasterous finish for Ford at its first attempt at Le Mans, which almost resulted in Ford firing Shelby.

Shelby kept his job, and continued working with Ken Miles to build a car that could win Le Mans for Ford. When Le Mans approached the following year, Ford continued to insist that Miles not drive the car, contending he would not be the proper spokesman for the Ford brand. The ongoing negotiations between Shelby and Ford led to this emotional scene from the movie:

Ford was making a mistake with its entry into Le Mans that many companies make today when they approach better connecting with their customers. Many companies approach this as a business proposition, but they fail to realize that it’s a people proposition. Your company cannot inspire its customers to take action on behalf of your brand if your brand is attempting to view your customers simply as potential sales. Forging better and stronger connections with your customers has to be ingrained in your brand. You have to have a culture that seeks out and pushes to forge deeper connections with your customers. Not simply because you want more sales, but also because you honestly care about the people that buy your brand’s product and services.

Ford went on to let Miles race at Daytona, which he won. He then went on to race at Le Mans, and led the Ford racing team to a 1-2-3 finish at Le Mans. Ford would go on to win 4 straight Le Mans, all driven by cars build by Shelby and Miles. Ford won at Le Mans by learning to trust the drivers who understood the sport of racing on a level which the brand did not. Likewise, if your brand wants to build better relationships with its customers, you will also have to trust those customers and listen to what they have to say.

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Why I Turned Off Comments

The short answer is that I want to focus more on my writing for the time being. The longer answer is that conversations about and around blog posts are incredibly fractured, and have been for about a decade. One of the great things about blogging from 2005-2010 was the amazing conversations that could happen in the comments section of a post. Blog comments are typically more in-depth and fleshed out, than comments you see on social media, which tend to be more like soundbytes. Before social media sites like Facebook and Twitter went mainstream, blogs were where the commenting action was at. And great comments led to more great comments, and before you knew it, there was a long discussion happening in the comments section that ended up being more valuable than the post itself. In fact, in the early blogging days I always had the goal of writing a post that led to a discussion in the comments section that was more interesting than the post itself.

I’ll write about this more next week, but I think in many ways, social media has hurt our ability to communicate more than it has helped.  And I think that’s readily apparent when you look at the comment section of most blogs. The volume of comments is down sharply across the board. Yet the funny thing is, spam comments keep chugging right along.  So if you are a blogger, you begin to realize that a lot of your comment moderation time is now spent just dealing with spam, whereas a few years ago, it was quite easy to lose a couple of hours a day responding to wonderful comments on your blog. Many prominent bloggers have already dropped comments for this reason alone.

Another reason why I’ve decided to turn off comments is because when I decided to recommit to blogging, one of the promises I made to myself was that I would give myself permission to write about more topics that I want to write about.  It won’t all pertain to marketing, business or anything related, as I talked about yesterday. I quite honestly want the freedom to write about what I want to write about without having to worry about some person who has never read this blog before commenting and saying I am an idiot simply for taking a stance they don’t like. Once I’ve been blogging again for a few weeks, I may decide to reopen comments, we’ll see how it goes.

But I do want to hear from you, and my email is always open, and you can always find me on Twitter.  Although I will admit, I am spending less time there. Again, more on that here in one week.

 

BONUS:  I’ll be joining my good friend Kelly Hungerford tomorrow at #SEMrushChat on Twitter to discuss matching your content creation to your marketing funnel.  Hope to see you there!

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Monday’s Marketing Minute: The Relaunch

So starting today, you will see a LOT more activity here. One of the things I have always struggled with when it comes to content creation is the content calendar. Figuring out what to write about and when to write it. I think I’ve finally hit on a content creation system I can use and replicate.

Starting today, there will 6 new posts a week.  Yes, I said SIX! And the content will be arranged similar to how a newspaper is organized into sections, or how a TV’s primetime schedule is organized.  Here’s what you can expect:

Monday – Monday’s Marketing Minute. A post with a few of the top marketing, content. customer service and digital stories that caught my eye within the last few days.

Tuesday – On Tuesdays I will have an ‘opinion’ post, similar to the Editorial section of a newspaper.

Wednesday – Marketing & Movies. This series is going to be SO much fun! Every Wednesday I take one of my favorite movies and talk about a great marketing or business example from the movie.

Thursday – Marketing Educational/Thought Leadership posts. These will cover a marketing topic, often related to digital, customer experience, brand loyalty, etc.

Friday – Friday Free-For-All. I’ve given myself permission to blog about ANY topic I want on Fridays. It could be marketing, it could be Egyptian archaeology, it could be astronomy. But I’d suspect business and marketing topics will be discussed more often than not.

Saturday – Since this is the weekend, posts on Saturday will focus on tools, how to get better at blogging or some other digital tool or application.  Much like how PBS, for instance, always runs programs devoted to home improvement, travel, cooking or crafting on the weekends.

I’m really excited about getting back to writing regularly and focusing on blogging, which is my first digital love and one I’ve been wanting to get back to for a long time.  I hope you’ll enjoy the copious amounts of content coming here.  On with the show!

 

So one of the biggest changes we’ve all experienced in regards to covid in 2020 is shifting our personal spending from offline to online. Yet while eCommerce sales are setting records in the US, eMarketer has found that digital display ad spending for retailers won’t increase that much. Why do you think this is?  My first guess would be that retailers are restricting ad budgets across the board in response to overall lost sales as a result of covid. Let’s hope for a strong economic rebound later this year and in 2021.

 

 

We talk a lot about building great brand ambassador programs here, so I loved Goldie Chan’s article on B2B Ambassador programs because she asked several influencers with experience in this area to share what they have learned.  Plus it was exciting to see friends like Kerry Gorgone and Lee Odden featured! As a fellow member of Adobe’s Insiders Program, I can agree with Lee and Kerry on how well-structured the program is.

 

 

Joe Rogan is an interesting guy that often makes some really good points about business and politics on his podcast The Joe Rogan Experience. I thought this quote about Twitter was spot-on: “There is no empathy in these conversations and that’s a big part of the problem [with Twitter].”  He thinks Twitter won’t be around much longer, and I agree with him.  I don’t think we will have a Twitter in 2025.

 

I love this tweet from former Alabama/Oklahoma standout QB Jalen Hurts:

Companies are always wondering how they create and cultivate more fans. 90% of it is simply taking the time to acknowledge the ones you already have.

 

Finally, congratulations to my blogging friend, Helen Rittersporn on recently blogging for 2,000 straight days! Helen is a #Blogchat alum and has in the past sent me special postcards to mark her blogging anniversaries.  Here’s the ones she sent for her 2000th straight post:

You can learn more about Helen at her blog Anchored Scraps, which is devoted to ‘old-style correspondence through handwritten letters between kindred souls’. Lovely, thanks again Helen, I’m going to try to channel some of your blogging dedication in getting my blog back off the ground!

See y’all tomorrow!

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Want to Create a Brand Ambassador Program? Here’s 10 Things to Remember When You Do

Brand Ambassador Programs, Social Media

Your family owns 5 bakeries across the northern part of your state. The bakeries have developed a reputation for creating delicious cakes and pastries, speedy deliveries, and exceptional customer service. Which has resulted in a lot of happy customers!

You manage the social media presences for the five bakeries. You are monitoring the Facebook page for your bakeries today, and as usual you have several new comments from customers. These comments are almost always positive, and today’s mentions are consistent with a typical day:

Sarah: “The birthday cake we bought for my son’s 10th birthday party was delicious! It made the party, I had three moms come up later and ask for the recipe, and I was tempted to claim I made it, but gave them your address in the end (ha!). So expect Tina, Jess and Kym to show up soon!”

Tom: “You guys saved our Thanksgiving! As always, we were too ambitious in our dinner-planning and just didn’t have time in the end to bake the pumpkin and pecan pies we needed to finish off desert. You guys came through at the last-minute for us, even delivering on the day before Thanksgiving! As an added bonus, our out-of-town relatives loved both pies and said they would be stopping by as they leave town in a few days to take another home with them!”

Amber: “Have been a happy customer for the last 5 years, your double chocolate cakes and blueberry streusel muffins are my favorites, they always make our meals special. Are you planning on opening a location in Lancaster? All my friends have heard about how delicious your cakes and muffins are, so you have a ready customer base if you do!”

 

In reading these comments, a light bulb goes off: These customers have taken ownership of the sales, customer service, marketing and promotion processes for your bakeries. Without guidance, these customers have taken it upon themselves to help grow your business.

But what if you could give these customers guidance in how to better promote your business and grow your customer base? What if you had a way to work directly with these customers to give them the tools they need and WANT to help share why they love your business with their friends, family, and other customers?

That’s where a Brand Ambassador Program comes in. Over the last few years, companies have begun to realize the benefits of having a way to connect directly with their most passionate customers to drive business growth.  While customers as a whole don’t trust brands, they do trust other customers.  Especially passionate customers that love their favorite brands.  While a marketing message from a brand will likely be ignored, a passionate recommendation from a fellow customer will be taken far more seriously.

This has a lot of companies researching how to create a successful brand ambassador program, and how to work with brand ambassadors. Let’s start with some definitions:

What is a Brand Ambassador? A brand ambassador is a person who works to promote and represent a brand in its marketplace. Brand ambassadors are often current customers who were already advocating for brands before they started working with them, but some brand ambassadors are chosen because they have a large following or are viewed as influencers. Brand ambassadors have a working relationship with the brands they represent, and are given instruction on how to interact with customers in the marketplace, based on the business goals for that brand.

What is a Brand Ambassador Program? A brand ambassador program is a business program that organizes brand ambassadors and creates an ongoing, working relationship between the brand and its ambassadors. A brand ambassador program is used to manage the ongoing, working relationship between the brand and its ambassadors, and provide ongoing training and instruction for its ambassadors, as well as support. Most brand ambassador programs work closely with other areas of the business, such as marketing, sales, customer service, and product design.

So if your company is considering launching a brand ambassador program to connect with your brand advocates and ambassadors, here’s 10 things to remember:

1 – Spread the word internally as well as externally.  Getting internal buy-in is just as important, if not moreso, than getting customers excited about your efforts.  If your brand advocacy program doesn’t have INTERNAL advocates pushing it along, its chances of success are going to be greatly reduced.  Launching a brand ambassador program takes time and energy.  Immediate ROI will be very hard to prove, it’s a long-term process.  Which is why it pays to have a team of people that are pushing for patience.

2 – Research, research, research.  You’ll have to invest a lot of time in discovering WHO your brand advocates are.  You might think you know who they are, but there’s rarely a ‘one-size-fits-all’ view.  You’ll also have to monitor ALL conversations with your customers.  Not just online conversations, not just offline ones either.  Look at both.  Also, make special note of the customers that go the extra mile to connect with you, the ones that write you letters, even if they sound negative.  Companies often confuse passion for the brand with negativity aimed at the brand.

Whenever I talk to companies who are curious about launching a brand ambassador program, one of the first questions is “How do we find our brand ambassadors?” The good news is, potential brand ambassadors will often find you! Customers who are good candidates to be ambassadors for your brand will often proactively reach out to your company. They will email you with feedback on your brand, they will respond to you on social media, they will call your customer service department with feedback.  Ideally, you can select enough qualified ambassadors for your brand by simply cataloging the customers who are already connecting with your brand proactively.

3 – Start small, grow big.  You don’t have to have a million members in your brand ambassador program.  In fact, I’d rather have 10 truly passionate brand advocates than 10,000 members that are merely ‘meh’ toward the brand.  If you start small and select those that are truly passionate about your brand and its vision, the growth will come organically as these passionate people will help you identify others just like them.

Additionally, it simply makes good business sense to start small with your brand ambassador program, especially if this is your company’s first attempt at such a program. Whenever you take on any new initiative like this, especially when working directly with your customers, there will be mistakes made. This is why I advise my clients that if possible, start with a small group, nail down the process, then you can expand the scope of the program after you’ve worked the kinks out. In other words, start small, nail the process, then grow.

Here’s an example of how this could work. Let’s say your company has fitness centers across the United States, your company has 425 centers and operates in 23 states, but you have the most locations in the Chicago, Los Angeles and Atlanta markets. Instead of rolling out a comprehensive, nationwide brand ambassador program with 500 members, it might make more business and logistical sense to launch a 10-person brand ambassador program for just the Chicago market. After spending the first year perfecting the program and process for the Chicago market, in the second year you could launch brand ambassador programs for the Los Angeles and Atlanta markets. After nailing down the processes for these markets, your company can then roll out a comprehensive, and nationwide, brand ambassador program.

4 – Make membership exclusive.  This ties into the previous point, but you don’t want ALL your customers to be members of your brand ambassador program.  You want to give them hurdles to jump, obstacles to overcome.  In other words, you want to weed out the customers that aren’t committed to the brand, or the program.  The true advocates for your brand will already be doing much if not all of what you would require of them as members of the program.  It also pays to cap membership, and to give the existing members a huge say in who the future members are.

5 – Connect with your advocates and create ways for them to connect with each other.  Your advocates are special people, you don’t want them on an island, you want them connected.  Create a central ‘homebase’ for the current members of your program, but also stay connected to other advocates that aren’t yet members.  And make your existing ambassadors aware of these advocates, and have them ‘vet’ them for possible membership in your formal ambassador program.

6 – Pay your ambassadors.  This is one of the biggest misconceptions about brand ambassadors.  They DO want to be compensated but most do NOT want to be given money.  Sure, we all love money, but for a true brand advocate they usually want other things.  Like access, empowerment, and acknowledgement.  A few years ago when I worked with Dell on its #DellCAP events, the customers weren’t paid to come (travel was covered), but they were given access.  For example, they got to tour Dell’s Social Media Listening Center, then they got to spend 30 minutes talking to CEO Michael Dell.  That’s pretty heady stuff for a Dell advocate.  When they go back home, their friend might brag about having the latest and greatest Dell laptop, while they can respond with ‘Oh yeah, well Dell invited me to their world headquarters and I got to chat with Michael Dell himself!’  That’s a great example of rewarding your advocates.

Here’s another example: I once worked with a software company to design a brand ambassador program for its users. The majority of the users of this software were small business owners. After surveying its users, the software company discovered that these small business owners were desperate for social media and content marketing advice. So we created a series of webinars just for members of the brand ambassador program that would have a different expert deliver a webinar on a different marketing topic to brand ambassadors. This benefit had nothing to do with the software company, it was completely focused on what would be valuable to brand ambassadors. If you’re brainstorming ideas for possible benefits you could give your brand ambassadors, check out this exhaustive list of benefits that Harley-Davidson offers members of its HOG group.

7 – Give your advocates direct access to the brand.  The members of your brand ambassador program should be given direct contact with multiple key executives within the brand.  In fact, I would suggest making 1 or more of the ‘top’ members of your brand ambassador program part of the team that’s responsible for reporting on the progress of the program to the C-Suite.  The idea here is to make sure that the voice of your brand’s biggest defenders and advocates is always heard at the company, from the top down.

8 – Create a feedback loop between the brand ambassadors, and the brand.  I outlined the process for this loop in this post.  You need to have a way to let your ambassadors have direct access to the brand, as mentioned above.  But at the same time, the brand needs to respond to the brand ambassadors and give them feedback on their feedback.  Additionally, the brand needs to take the feedback from its ambassadors and distribute that feedback internally and not just silo it among the employees that are working directly on the brand ambassador program.

9 – Give your ambassadors the tools to create something amazing.  Again, you want to start small and grow organically.  And you want that growth to be fueled by your existing advocates.  You want to embrace and empower your existing advocates, thus the creation of the brand ambassador program.  But you also want your existing ambassadors to have the tools to embrace and empower other advocates that aren’t yet members.  And tying back to the earlier points about giving ambassadors direct access to the brand, when your existing ambassadors find other advocates, they can immediately bring them to the brand’s attention.

10 – Transfer ownership of the program from the brand, to its ambassadors.  When you create a brand ambassador program, you need to realize that long-term, this will belong to your advocates.  You’ll always be there, and you’ll always have a voice, but the idea is that you want your most passionate customers to eventually take over this program.  Maybe you’ll start out with a ‘board’ over the program made up of 5 key brand executives, and 5 brand ambassadors.  But over time, as your ambassadors become familiar with the program and its function and goals, you need to let them have control.  Again, you don’t want the voice of your company to dominate this effort, you want the voice of your most passionate customers to have control, because those customers are going to be connecting with other customers.

 

 

But perhaps the most important thing to remember when creating a brand ambassador program is who you will be working with:

Every single day you’ll be working with customers that love you. Customers that love your brand as if it were their own, and who will work with you every day to see it grow and prosper. Let’s be honest, it’s pretty awesome to work every day with people that love you and believe in you. That’s exactly what happens when you create and launch a brand ambassador program.

 

BONUS: When you are ready to pitch your idea for a brand ambassador program to the C-Suite, make a plan that details exactly how the program will benefit the brand, and exactly how it will benefit the ambassadors who participate. Carefully and clearly spell out all the KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) that will be measured and tracked, as well as an explanation of why it is important to do so. Also, give a thorough timeline of the roll-out of the brand ambassador program, for at least the first 6 months of the program, 12 months is better. Assume that there will be a healthy amount of skepticism from upper management about the success of a brand ambassador program (since your brand has likely never launched one), so the eventual signoff by the CEO or CMO will greatly depend on how well you address these concerns head on.

So there’s some ideas to consider when you get ready to create and launch an official brand ambassador program.  This won’t be easy, and it will take a lot of time, but if you are committed to connecting with your most passionate customers and willing to empower them, the results will make program a huge success.  If you need help getting started, let’s explore how we can work together to create an ambassador program for your brand.

 

DOUBLE BONUS: Want to see a great example of an employee brand ambassador program?

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How Twitch Streamers Are Taking Repurposing Content to the Next Level

Repurposing content means to get multiple uses out of one piece of content. For instance, it could mean writing a long blog post, then repurposing that blog post into a white paper, or a podcast episode, or an infographic. Repurposing content is especially important for companies with a smaller content team, where every piece of content needs to achieve maximum results.

For the last couple years, I’ve been watching how streamers on Twitch are building their communities. It’s been fascinating to watch these streamers leverage smart marketing tactics to create and build engagement around their streams. In fact, they really aren’t calling themselves ‘streamers’ anymore, they are now ‘content creators’. Whatever you call them, they are smart, and there’s a lot you can learn about how they are building their channels and brands, that you can apply to your own company’s content strategy.

For example, I recently started watching one streamer, excuse me…content creator, called NickMercs on Twitch. Basically, here’s what Nick does; He plays video games on Twitch most every day for about 8-10 hours a day.  So he has 8-10 hours a day of content he has created. He then takes that content, and distills it down to about 15-20 mins of the ‘best’ content (think of it as a highlight reel), then creates a new video from that content, and posts it on YouTube. Typically, the videos he posts on YouTube get 300,000-400,000 views in the first 24 hours!

This is a wonderful example of the power of repurposing content. Nick is able to monetize his Twitch content, then he takes that content and repurposes it as a shorter video for YouTube, and he can make ad revenue off it as well. So in essence, he’s found a way to monetize the same content, twice.

Now I can already hear many of you asking “That’s great, but you’re talking video games on Twitch and YouTube. How does that relate to my business and my content?”

You’re right, the odds are your business can’t create a video a day for YouTube that gets a few hundred thousand views. But what you can do is learn from what’s working for Nickmercs, and apply it to your own content creation efforts.

Nick is doing two things with his content that your business can and should replicate:

1 – He’s creating content for his audience where they are. The primary age group for Twitch viewers is around 18-24 years old and mostly male. This same audience that watches Twitch channels will often consume similar content on YouTube. So by taking his Twitch content and repurposing it into shorter YouTube videos, he’s getting a chance to reach a similar audience, but on a different platform. This is a smart content play, because if the people that watch his videos on YouTube enjoy them, he has a great chance to convert them into viewers of his Twitch channel.

You can do the same thing for your content. Whatever industry or space your content serves, there’s bound to be at least 2-3 main sites where your audience goes to get its content from. Think about how you could take your content and use it in multiple ways to reach a similar audience on different platforms. For instance, let’s say you’ve identified that your audience wants to consume content from blogs, and Twitter. You could post informative content on your blog, then turn around and have a Twitter chat around the same topic on Twitter. The end result is that one form of content helps promote and push people toward the other form of content.

2 – He’s customizing the content for each platform. On Twitch, Nick’s streams can last for several hours. But most people won’t watch an 8-hour stream on YouTube, in fact it may not even be possible to republish the Twitch stream on YouTube due to Twitch’s TOS. So what Nick does is, he changes the content from Twitch to make it more in line with what the YouTube audience wants.  He takes an 8 hour stream, and cherry-picks the ‘highlights’ or best plays, and condenses it down to a 20-min video, and posts that on YouTube. This results in content that’s better suited for YouTube, plus the content itself promotes Nick and the content he creates on Twitch. He is able to not only monetize the videos on YouTube, but he uses them to drive the YouTube audience back to his Twitch stream, and hopefully convert them to viewers or subscribers there.

Now if you think about what Nick did here, he basically took long-form content (his Twitch stream), and condensed it down and shared the ‘highlights’ as a YouTube video. So he got two very effective pieces of content from one. I like this idea of taking ‘highlights’ from your content and using that as new content or to promote other content. Think about the applications; You could take a series of blog posts about the same topic and condense them into a shorter white paper, and offer that as a freebie to newsletter subscribers. Speaking of your newsletter, you could publish an issue where you give pull quotes or highlights from multiple blog posts as a way to incite subscribers to read your blog. You could use those same pull quotes to promote the posts when you share them on social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter.

The end result for Nick is two standalone pieces of content that he can very effectively monetize, but that also work well together as one serves as promotion for the other. When you are looking at your own content, think about how you could take your long-form content and break it down into smaller pieces of new content, focuses on your ‘highlights’ or best content, and how could that content be used to build an audience for your business, but also push that audience back to your long-form content.

Now, speaking of pushing back to long-form content. There is one thing about Nick’s content strategy that I don’t like. Notice that in this example, the content he is creating and repurposing is going on two platforms that he does not own. I would much rather see the main content be on a platform that Nick owns, like a website, but I do understand that Twitch as a streaming platform is currently a much better alternative than any tech that Nick or another streamer could use on their own site. But the thing I’m always stressing to clients is to own the platforms where your content lives. Too many businesses even in 2020 feel that they don’t need a website as long as they have a brand page on Facebook.

Own your platform, own the experience. Then when the day comes that Facebook and even Twitch goes away, you’ll be ok cause you’ll still have your own platform where you can create all the content you want.

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Dominos Shows You How to Respond to Trolls on Twitter

It seems everything is political during an election year. There was a great reminder of this recently when a ‘political activist’ dug through the old tweets of Dominoes on Twitter and somehow found a tweet from 2012 where Domino’s was thanking a customer for tweeting a compliment to the brand.

So what? This brand did what every brand should do, right? They acknowledged and THANKED a customer for complimenting them. How many times have I talked about how you ‘reward the behavior you want to encourage’? When a customer leaves you a compliment on ANY platform or via ANY channel, you thank them.

So what’s the problem? The problem is, the Domino’s customer in question who left a compliment to the brand in 2012, happens to be the Press Secretary for the Trump Administration in 2020.

That led to the ‘political activist’ tweeting to Domino’s that ‘you just killed your brand’.

Here’s how Domino’s responded:

Isn’t that the perfect response? They respond to the troll, but in a way that also shows how ridiculous their behavior is.

In my book Think Like a Rock Star, the 6th chapter is devoted to handling negative comments aimed at your brand via social media. In that chapter, I talked about how you need to identify the person leaving the negative comment to your brand, as that will dictate in part, how you respond. For instance, are they an actual customer of your brand, or do they appear to be a troll looking to draw attention to themselves and hassle your brand, as appears to be the case in the Dominoes example.

The problem I see many brands make when responding to trolls, is they treat them as if they were customers.  They engage them, they apologize, and they attempt to diffuse the situation as quickly as possible.  Which often has the opposite affect, trolls want and crave attention, and if they feel the brand is placating them, they will typically double-down on their efforts.

If you’re dealing with an upset customer, that upset customer will typically give you MORE details about SPECIFIC transactions with your business. They will often reference doing business with your brand on a particular date, maybe even at a particular retail location. Trolls tend to be very vague in their criticisms, as we see in the Dominoes example.

I do NOT envy social media managers having to manage brand accounts in 2020. It’s a mostly thankless job to begin with, but in today’s highly political environment, your brand may have to deal with people who are not your customers, leaving you negative comments in an attempt to make a larger political point or to simply troll your brand. It can be VERY upsetting to wake up at 6am and see 200 angry tweets toward the brand account you manage.

Just remember to act quickly, but act smartly. Figure out what happened, who is upset, and why they are upset. If the negative comments are coming from actual customers, absolutely address and do all you can to make it right for the customer. And clearly communicate to the customer what steps you are taking.  This communicates to the customer, and everyone following the exchange, that you take their concerns seriously. That also communicates to them and others that you respect your customers.

If you are dealing with an actual troll, in general, the less you respond, the better. Trolls feed off attention, if you attempt to engage and placate them, they will just double-down and troll you even harder.  And others will pile on once they see your brand is responding from a position of weakness. I know it’s hard to remember sometimes, but the Twitter/Social Media mobs get angry fast, and move on to something else just as fast. So many brands make the mistake of attempting to diffuse trolling by apologizing to the trolls or worse, changing behavior based on their demands. This typically has the opposite affect of what the brand intended, as changing behavior because of trolling will often anger your customers, since the change in behavior will often impact them.

Always keep two questions in mind:

1 – Is this negative comment coming from a troll or an actual customer?

2 – Is it more important that we do what’s best for the troll, or for our customers?

 

If you always do what’s best for your customers, your customers will always have your back when you defend them. Keep that in mind.

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Here’s How the Best Customer Loyalty Programs Create Happy Customers

Have you ever heard the saying ‘Money can’t buy you happiness’? It turns out, money CAN buy you happiness, depending on what you buy with it. Science has discovered that money spent on products does give you happiness, but it is short-lived, and decreases over time. For instance, think of how happy you were with your first smartphone purchase. It was likely a revolutionary change in technology from your boring flip-phone! Suddenly, you could browse the internet seamlessly on your phone. And the apps! Also, you could type on a semi-real keyboard, right on the screen of your phone!

It was all so magical, like something out of the movies. Then a few months later, a newer version of your smartphone came out. With new features that your smartphone didn’t have. Suddenly, your smartphone was obsolete. And so was your happiness with the purchase.

If buying products doesn’t give us lasting happiness, then what can we spend money on in order to make us happy?  Again, science has found the answer; If you want to buy happiness, spend your money on experiences. Here’s why this works; Let’s say you and you family have a trip planned to Italy for the Fall of this summer of next year. For all the time up till you leave for that trip, you and your family will plan out all the amazing sights and events you will enjoy while in Italy. Then while on the trip, you and your family will be experiencing Italy and all the wonderful sights and sounds. Then when you come home, and for all the years that follow, you and your family will relive the moments that you created while in Italy. As you and your family retell and relive the trip, your enjoyment of the trip will INCREASE over time. It’s precisely the opposite of when you spend money on products. Whereas your happiness with a product purchase decreases over time, your happiness with experiences such as travel typically increase over time.

So it stands to reason, if you want the members of your customer loyalty program to be happier as members, you should focus your loyalty program on offering members better experiences, as much as you offer products or discounts.

 

What does a customer loyalty program based around experiences look like?

You’re grocery shopping, and it’s time to buy cereal for your kids. They like Apple Circles and Honey Nut Loopies equally, so you typically grab whichever one is on sale.  But not today. Because you just joined the ‘loyalty’ club for Apple Circles, and they sent you a $1.00 off coupon, so today is an Apple Circles day! For most brands that offer a customer loyalty program, this is typically what it looks like. Members sign up, get some coupons, and go on their way.

Unfortunately, simply handing out coupons or giving a price reduction doesn’t build loyalty to the brand, it builds loyalty to the offer. The problem with competing on price is that as soon as another brand offers a cheaper product, you lose business.

But for many products, offering a lower price can actually hurt business. Let’s apply this same ‘coupon’ mentality toward loyalty programs for say…..a luxury brand.  Let’s say you just bought a new Ferrari for $400,000.  Next year when the new models come out, you are personally invited to join Ferrari’s Loyalty Program. Which offer do you think a Ferrari owner would be more interested in:

1 – A 10% discount on new models.

2 – A chance to buy one Ferrari from a limited production run of 50 cars that’s being offered strictly to members of the Ferrari loyalty program. Each of the 50 Ferraris will be signed on the dashboard by Piero Ferrari, son of Ferrari founder Enzo Ferrari. In addition, the owner will be flown to Italy to tour the Ferrari production plant and view his Ferrari as it is being assembled, then join other members of the Ferrari loyalty program for a private dinner at the Ferrari Estate.  The cost is one million.

If you’re buying a Ferrari, a lower price is likely a deterrent to purchasing the vehicle. Given this, Option B, even though it is almost three times as expensive than Option A, would likely be far more popular to Ferrari customers. Also note that with Option B, the experience is what’s so important.  You’re not just buying a Ferrari, you’re buying a Ferrari that only 49 other people in the world will own. In addition, you’ll get to go to Italy and personally watch your vehicle being assembled, then you’ll have dinner with the Ferrari family at their estate. If you have enough money to buy a Ferrari, the added experience of such a trip would be well worth the additional money to you.

But this extreme example also illustrates why it is so important to focus your customer loyalty program on offering a better experience than it is a better price. Let’s go back to the Ferrari example for a minute. Let’s say you wanted Option A, the 10% discount on a new Ferrari. That would likely save you $25k-$40k. A huge amount of money! But would even this massive savings really make you any more loyal to the Ferrari brand? On the other hand, if you took Option B, you would get a trip to Italy to Ferrari’s production plant. You’d get to talk personally to the engineers and craftsmen that were assembling your vehicle for you. Then you’d get to go to the Ferrari Estate and talk personally to the members of the Ferrari family, learning more about them and the brand all along the way.

Option B would give you a much better experience with the Ferrari brand, and as a result, it would do a much better job of making you more loyal to the Ferrari brand. Even if you took the 10% discount off a Ferrari in Option A, that wouldn’t make you more loyal to the Ferrari brand, it would only make you more loyal to the OFFER.  If Lamborghini came out with a loyalty program and offered a 20% discount on new models, well guess what you would do?

But when your brand creates a customer loyalty program based on giving members a better experience, it actually deepens loyalty to the brand. Let’s apply this thinking to our first example of shopping for breakfast cereal:

It’s a week later, and you and a friend are shopping together, and you’re on the cereal aisle. Since you are a member of the Apple Circles loyalty program, you have your $1.00 off coupon for Apple Circles in hand. You grab a box and smile to yourself, knowing that with this coupon, you’ll only be paying $1.86 for this box of Apple Circles. As you go to put the cereal in your buggy, you look over at your friend and notice she is buying a box of cereal that costs $4.57!  What is she thinking?!?  You decide it’s time to educate her.

“Why are you paying so much for that cereal?” You ask. “That’s almost $5, I’m paying less than $2 for mine!”

Your friend leans over and looks at what cereal you bought. “Honey, you couldn’t pay me to buy that stuff”.  “What?!?  Why not?”, you ask. Your friend then takes your box of Apple Circles and starts walking you through the ingredients, and how bad they are for your kids.  Artificial sweetener this, high-fructose corn syrup that, too much sugars, too much carbs, not enough vitamins, etc etc.  You can feel your face dropping as you learn that you were about to feed your children poison in a box.

“Wait a minute!”, you exclaim, “How do you KNOW all this!?!?”

You friend then tells you about her loyalty program. The one she’s involved with didn’t give her a coupon off that $5 cereal, instead, it gave her access to her own nutritional expert as well as a community of dietitians and online resources that educate her on what exactly goes into the foods she and her family eat. She receives education about ingredients and the effects they have on her health, so she can make more informed opinions when grocery shopping.

She points at two ingredients in your Apple Circles. “Just FYI, these have been shown to produce irritability and drowsiness in children under 10”.  On cue, your 9 year-old grabs your pants leg and starts tugging “Mooooommmmmm! We’ve been in here ALL DAY! I want to go home now now NOW!!!!!”  You look down at your watch, you’ve been in this store for 6 minutes. Your friend raises her eyebrows at you in a very “I told you so” way.

By offering a better experience, your friend’s program is able to generate more sales at a higher price-point. The reason why is because your friend’s loyalty program creates an experience for her that actually deepens loyalty toward the brand. Your friend appreciates the fact that her brand is giving her access to educational materials that allow her to better understand how the ingredients found in the foods she buys impacts the health of her family.

Your loyalty program saved you a dollar on a box of cereal.  Your friend’s loyalty program showed her which products to buy in order to have a healthier family. Which approach do you think does a better job of building true brand loyalty?

 

What are some examples of customer loyalty programs built around offering experiences to members?

Those were a couple of hypothetical examples, now let’s look at a couple of real-world examples of customer loyalty programs that offer better experiences for members. The first is Reebok’s Unlocked customer loyalty program, which launched in 2019. Unlocked is a tiered, points-based loyalty program. Meaning as you collect more points, you can move up a tier, and each tier has additional rewards. Starting with level 2, the program offers experiences as rewards, including access to special workouts, online access to personal trainers, access to cooks and recipes, and early access to new products.

Notice that these rewards are experiences, but more importantly, they are experiences that are consistent with the Reebok brand and how its customers would use its products. People that buy Reebok shoes and apparel are likely to be more active and more interested in healthy living and eating. So offering experiences based around activity, exercise, eating and cooking, is a perk that has value for members. Whether its a customer loyalty program, or a brand ambassador program, you should always offer perks that add value to the member. Give members access to advice, materials, even experiences that regular customers do not have. This creates excitement and interest in becoming a member. Which is what you want.

Sephora’s Beauty Insider loyalty program is another that has experiences and events as part of its rewards structure. At introductory levels of the program, perks are centered on shopping discounts, free shipping, etc. But as members accumulate more points, they unlock new benefits such as special events, in-person experiences with brand founders, etc.

Notice too that for both Sephora and Reebok’s loyalty programs, experiences are offered at higher levels, as a premium that members are encouraged to work for. This positioning suggests that in both cases, the brands understand that experiences can create a deeper connection with the brand, and also serve as a way to identify its most passionate customers.

Science tells us that money spent on experiences creates lasting happiness that increases over time. Knowing this, doesn’t it stand to reason that adding relevant experiences to your customer loyalty program will increase member happiness with not only the loyalty program, but with your brand as well?