WHAT IS THE DEFINING DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A CUSTOMER AND A FAN?
Hi Everyone! This is Canon Wing with Inspiration To Millions.
Today, we’re going to discuss why infusing your brand with enthusiasm is the secret ingredient to keep your customers coming back for more, and jumpstart your progress!
I’m going to share with you Three Ways to Infuse and Enthuse, so your brand can Come Out Of Nowhere, and be an Inspiration to Millions.
When was the last time you saw an ad publicizing the release date for the new Air Jordans? You don’t see it advertised, because Nike doesn’t need to advertise it; their enthusiastic customers advertise it for Nike, by lining up around the block the night before. These customers have become fans. Maybe you would argue, “They aren’t exactly fans of Nike, though. They’re fans of Michael Jordan.” Okay. It’s fair enough to say the shoes are named after one of the best basketball players of all time…but Michael Jordan has been retired for almost 20 years, and these sneaker fans include millions of millennials. What’s kept Air Jordans on the court so many years after Michael Jordan’s retirement? The answer is Brand Enthusiasm. Over two decades ago, Michael Jordan’s legacy created an enthusiastic brand story around being the best. Today, that story is still alive and well. Why? Because Enthusiasm is contagious.
Ralph Waldo Emerson once observed “Enthusiasm is one of the most powerful engines of success…Nothing great was ever achieved without Enthusiasm.”
With that in mind, let’s take a quick scientific look at Enthusiasm.
MRI Neuroimaging has proven that consumers primarily use emotions when they’re deciding what to buy. In fact, when the area of the brain that produces emotions becomes damaged, that person loses the ability to make any personal decisions at all. They can’t decide what they’d like to eat, wear, watch- they basically stop having opinions.These MRI neural studies centered around determining Why We Buy, have been conducted again and again over the past ten years by Universities worldwide. From Harvard- Oxford to the University of Glasgow, the results are unanimous: The decision to buy is emotional. It’s always Emotional.
Now, there’s a new discovery in brain science that has the scientific community all abuzz: Epigenetics
For a century, scientists believed that the human mind was unchangeable, and entirely at the mercy of our genes; that we all just have to play whatever hand we were dealt at birth. Turns out, that is so not true.
Now we know, the human brain alters its structure, cell count, circuitry, chemistry…you name it, all as a direct result of everything we do, experience, think and believe. Here’s the secret branding power in this discovery: Further research revealed Enthusiasm as the key emotion that triggers the most new neural activity. No other emotion cuts away from the beaten pathways of the brain to forge new neural connections more dramatically than Enthusiasm.
It’s now a scientific fact that no other emotion has the power to literally change a person’s mind more effectively than Enthusiasm.
Let’s infuse your brand with the super catchy emotion of Enthusiasm today!
Watch to episode to learn:
THE 3 WAYS TO INFUSE AND ENTHUSE YOUR IDEAL INDIVIDUALS!
1. Clear Values
2. Customer Appreciation
3. Creative Connections
The first, and most vital is Clear Values.
A brand has the ability to take our pursuits, our purpose, our passions, and make them bigger than ourselves. A brand has the ability to reach out to more people and connect with them on a personal level than any one person with a dynamite idea or stellar product could. These are the far-reaching positive ripples of branding power.
But remember, as an entrepreneur or a brand manager, you’re still the one who creates the first ripple. You decide what goes into the sea of consumers. You’re the initiating energy, the source.
The ingredients you infuse into your brand will determine the effect your brand has on others. Does that sound like a lot of responsibility? It is! And as with all great responsibility, tremendous privilege awaits those who enthusiastically infuse their brand with clear and unwavering values.
Now we know, the decision to buy is ALWAYS an emotional decision. No one is ever just exchanging money for goods and services. The exchange is emotional. It’s energetic. There’s a promise involved, a trust. Exchanging Enthusiasm will generate more Enthusiasm. Enthusiasm is catchy!
When you create your brand’s core values, so they are clearly defined and consistently represented, your customer’s trust is free to flourish into fandom.
Fans are defined by their Enthusiasm!
The roaring crowd, the cheering from the stands, the head-banging mosh pit, the line that goes all the way around the block at midnight…all are infused with contagious, reverberating, Enthusiasm.
Build trust with Clear Values, and make Enthusiasm your main ingredient, and you’ve got the winning recipe to transform customers into fans for life.
This is Brand Loyalty, and no matter what business you’re in, Brand Loyalty is your business plan!
The next way to Infuse and Enthuse is Customer Appreciation.
Whenever famous athletes, actors and musicians accept an award, they almost always thank the fans either first or last. They say “Without you guys, I wouldn’t be here.”
We’ve heard that line a thousand times…because it’s true.
Without fans, there’s no game.
Sports fans that support their hometown teams are fiercely loyal. Even when their teams have a rough season, the hometown fans remain loyal and supportive. These diehard fans stay loyal, not because their team never loses a game, but because of what their team represents: Their Hometown.
Hometown loyalty isn’t easily shaken, because it is reinforced with the uniting principle of sharing the same core values.
When you build your brand like a hometown, you’re uniting a community that shares the same values. Rewarding that loyalty solidifies your community.
Appreciation infuses loyalty, and loyalty always deserves to be rewarded.
Remember no matter what business you’re in, Brand Loyalty is your business plan.
Some ways that you can infuse loyalty into your brand community include: exclusive promotions, exciting giveaways, free access to special content, free or discounted upgrades, brand holidays, customer recognition holidays…You can gamify the user experience with an identity ascension track like audible does for its users – are you at the Master level on audible yet? That’s 500 hours of audio books. My business partner is at master level and don’t tell him but, I’m secretly trying to catch up.
Enthusiasm is so catchy!
Infuse your brand with special perks for your loyal customers, and watch their Enthusiasm soar!
A Customer + Enthusiasm & Loyalty = A Fan.
Finally, we have Creative Connections.
Former SNL cast member and host of The Late Show, Jimmy Fallon, has been called ‘the most enthusiastic person in showbiz”. And while Jimmy is undoubtedly talented, a great deal of his success is widely attributed to his Enthusiasm.
Enthusiasm is an energetic power.
His closest friends have attested that Jimmy never seems to tire of interacting with his fans. He never shies away from stepping out in public, because he feels good about giving his fans the opportunity to be acknowledged and appreciated by him.
He exchanges Enthusiasm with his fans, and his fan base continues to grow, one person at a time. Your brand can do the same. Jimmy must know the secret to life… sharing enthusiasm never drains you, it only feeds you positive energy.
Ellen Degeneres is another great example of a notoriously enthusiastic television personality. She has been touted with having the most enthusiastic audience of any talk show host in the history of talk shows. Considering that line-up includes huge names such as Oprah, David Letterman, and Johnny Carson- having the most enthusiastic audience is quite an accomplishment.
Ellen has a DJ on set for every live taping who takes audience requests, while Ellen herself hosts mini dance parties during every commercial break. She plays with her fans, and personally interacts with them as though she had invited them to a party in her own home. By the time the cameras are rolling again, her fans are electrified from the Enthusiasm generated by making a creative connection with Ellen herself.
Enthusiasm is indeed catchy!
What electrifies your audience? Get involved with the community your brand is creating. Interact in fun and playful ways that infuse delight, and connect with your brand’s community. The thing about fans is you can never have just one. Unite your brand’s community like a hometown, and you have yourself a fanbase.
Some ways of connecting your brand’s community is sharing content that isn’t always related to the products or services you provide. Choose content for no other purpose than to bring a smile to someone’s face. Share a laugh, and connect as a community. Start conversations between your social media followers by infusing fun and interesting questions. Encourage conversation. Your brand community already has your brand in common, and when your brand has clear values- they are likely to share many of the same interests! Engage with them and they will begin to exchange Enthusiasm with one another. This will give your brand a fiercely loyal hometeam advantage.
Identify an area in your brand that could benefit from an infusion of Enthusiasm today, and run it through The Three Ways to Infuse and Enthuse. You could initiate a competition to get them enthused about your latest product. You could start up a twitter debate on a controversial topic that tangentially relates to your brand. You could award long term customers with free upgrades.
Unite and Delight your Brand Community, and before you know it, they will flourish into fandom!
Thank you so much for joining in our talk on how The Secret Power of Enthusiasm can transform your customers into true blue, diehard fans of your brand. Remember, you can buy a person’s time but not their focus. You can buy a person’s presence, but not their enthusiasm. This can only be earned.
Above all, Enthusiasm and fandom are both just two more faces of love, so always remember the golden rule to Love What You Do and Love How You Do It!