The Conversation Manager by Steven van Belleghem

Author:Steven van Belleghem [Belleghem, Steven van]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Internet Marketing, Sales & Selling, Marketing, Business Communication, General, E-Commerce, Consumer Behavior, Advertising & Promotion, Business & Economics, Lang:en
Publisher: Kogan Page Publishers
Published: 2012-11-10T11:54:43+00:00

It is not only the ‘experts’ who help to build a brand. The fans also have their role to play. Fans promote your brand spontaneously and help to convince others of its merits. To be a fan of a brand means that your relationship with that brand goes further than the normal bond between customer and supplier. In fact, being a fan can sometimes mean that your feelings go much further, bordering on friendship or even infatuation.141 Some consumers are happy to admit that they feel as if something is missing in their life if they do not have the opportunity to use their favourite brand on a regular basis.142 This form of ‘love’ leads to a very strong commitment towards the brand. In the first instance, this kind of devotion might lead you to think of pop idols or football teams, but almost every type of product category is capable of inspiring this kind of tangible bond. Conversation Managers have great respect for their fans, and they actively cultivate their relationship with them. If fans are the first to receive new information about a brand, they feel appreciated by their ‘friend’, the brand holder, and will quickly proceed to engage others in conversation about the new buzz. For example, the way Universal Studios first informed its fans about the Harry Potter deal before the press is evidence of great fan respect – and this is the kind of respect that pays dividends.

Experts build brands by using their expertise within a particular domain. Fans build brands through their emotional bond with those brands. Both have important and influential profiles for a Conversation Manager. A frequently asked question in this context is: ‘How do I track down these valuable people?’ The answer is very simple: usually, they will find you! There are more of them and they are much closer than you might think. On your website, for example. A recent survey for a car manufacturer revealed that 80 per cent of the visitors to their website were already confirmed fans of the brand.143 So don’t worry, your fans will come to you. And much the same is true of experts: they are interested in what you do. For their different reasons, both categories will track you down.

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