brand advocate marketing playbook

Brand Advocate Marketing Playbook

Rob FuggettaCEO/Founder, Zuberance

Today You Will Learn

• How to create advocacy plan• How often to engage Advocates• How to get advocacy buy-in• 5 advocacy mistakes to avoid• 5 secrets to advocacy success

• Zuberance Founder/CEO• Author, “Brand Advocates:

Turning Enthusiastic Customers into Powerful Marketing Force” (Wiley, 2012)

• Marketing consultant Apple; former CMO, Genuity

About Rob Fuggetta

@robfuggetta

Welcome to the “Age of Advocacy”

92% people trust peer recommendations; only 33% trust ads (Nielsen)

What is Advocacy?

Unpaid (genuine) recommendations

• Company• Brand• Product• Service• Cause• Content• Idea

What is an Advocacy Plan?

• Strategy for achieving advocacy goals and objectives

• Typical plan: one year• Organized by quarter

Achieving Alignment

Marketing & BrandingGoals & Objectives

Advocacy Goals & Objectives

Advocacy Plan: Major Sections

1. Advocacy Situation

2. Advocacy

Goals

3. Advocacy Strategy

4. Advocacy

Tactics

5. Advocacy Timeline

1. Assess Your Advocacy Situation

• Current advocacy level– Net Promoter Score®– Overall tone of WOM

• Positive, negative, neutral

• Current Advocates– How many?– Who they are?– What and how advocating?

®Net Promoter Score is a registered trademark of Satmetrix Systems, Inc., Bain & Company, and Fred Reichheld

2. Set Advocacy Goals

• Where do we want/need more advocacy?– Company– Brand– Product– Service

• Who do we want to get more advocacy from?– Customer segments– Other

3. Define Advocacy Objectives

• # Advocates• # Recommendations• # “Energized Advocates”• # Positive testimonials, reviews• Increase ratings • # Referral leads, clicks, sales

4. Chart Advocacy Strategy

• How are we going to generate more advocacy for our (company, brand, product, etc.)?

• What’s our approach?

Create a Cause

Focus on Benefit

Focus on Emotional Benefit

Focus on What’s New or Hot

Focus on Unique, Compelling Feature

Focus on Key Segment

CIOs

IT Directors

IT Managers

5. Advocacy Tactics

• How are we going to identify Advocates?• How are we going to energize Advocates?• Where do we want to amplify Advocates?• What are we going to measure?

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Identify Advocates

How likely are you to recommend our brand or products to your friends?

“Ultimate Question” for Customer Loyalty:

Zuberance Advocate Funnel

Reviews Stories Answers Offers Referrals

Amplify

# # # # #

eMail Web Social* Usage** Support

# # # # #

POP***

#

Mobile

0

3rd Party Sites

#

Social NWs

#

Brand Website

#

Identify

Energize

Loyalty Group

#

Ten Ways to Energize Advocates

1. Rate and review products and services

2. Create and share testimonials (stories)

3. Answer prospects’ questions

4. Share content and offers

5. Refer prospects to you

6. Promote and/or attend online/offline events

7. Help you launch new products, services

8. Give you feedback

9. Get others to join loyalty club

10.Recruit other Advocates

How Often to Engage Advocates

Whenever you have something to share with them that Advocates value (content, news, offers)

Advocates are Different

• Highly engaged• Very loyal• Want you to succeed

Advocates are Frequent Recommenders

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Advocate Program Timeline

Program Jan Feb Mar Apr May June July Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec

Reviews

Stories

Answers

Offers

Referrals

Months

Getting Advocacy Buy-In

1. Involve key stakeholders but stay in control

2. Internal communication and education

3. Provide relevant case studies

4. Provide data about missed advocacy opportunity

5. Focus on “beachhead” where you can demonstrate success quickly

Marketing

E-team

Sales

Support. CX

IT

Key Advocacy Stakeholders

Advocacy Education Tools

Zuberance.com/resources BrandAdvocateBook.com

Zuberance Webinars

5 Advocacy Mistakes to Avoid

1. Paying or providing incentives

2. Setting unreasonable expectations

3. Being “ROI-obsessed”

4. Over-focusing on Advocate reviews

5. Not aligning advocacy with other marketing programs

5 Keys to Advocacy Success

1. Leverage multiple touch points to ID & energize Advocates

2. Give Advocates multiple ways to recommend

3. Connect advocacy to other marketing programs and goals

4. Build relationships with Advocates

5. Make advocacy an ongoing program

• Zuberance.com• Blog.zuberance.com• BrandAdvocateBook.com

Learn More

Move The Needle

 www.onlinemarketinginstitute.org 

Thank You