Online Brand Loyalty and Social Involvement

In the digital sphere it very easy for someone to choose your competitor over you. A simple Google search of your product can yield all sorts of web pages devoted to any number of brands, including yours. There can be company controlled pages, open forums, fan pages, social media chatter, and a brand only has control over a small piece of it. Brand loyalty would seem to be a distant memory. This is where you really need to know the influencers, both inside your industry, your target audience, and your brand itself.

Trust and Reputation

There are those bloggers, commenters, sites and sources that are just trusted in an industry. In advertising I have trust that stories on adage.com are going to be factually correct and I trust many commenters on their site because they are industry professionals and I see their constructive comments all the time as I read articles. Forums also fit into this category sometimes, as they often have very knowledgable commenters that love to share their experience and links.

Hang-Out Spots and Habits

Your customers do more than just think about your brand all the time. They have hobbies, interests and favorite hang-outs online. If you can get your brand message in front of them through these channels (both paid and editorial) you will be able to start conversation about your brand and/or product. Just like we all used to do with magazines in years past, research your target audience’s online habits and go there.

Influencers Drive Brand Loyalty in Others

Lastly, there are those influencers within your brand that bring more people to it. There are people who are huge fans of your products and will tell everyone they know about it whenever they get the chance. Give them that chance, cultivate that loyalty and reward them with something worthwhile.

You can look at your customers by where they are on what I call the Bertasso Curve (pictured below). This was the brainchild of Andrew Bertasso while we were working on a campaigns class in college. Basically, the more involved with your brand a customer is the more loyal they will be, but there is a steep increase at the far end where at a certain point customers become extremely loyal. If you can find those extremely loyal people and engage with them regularly, they will spread every new brand message that you produce and will become an integral part of your distribution network.

This post originally appeared on the Star Moose Blog.