A few weeks ago I attended a presentation by marketing maven, Jackie Huba. It was another gorgeous summer evening on the rooftop of the Ecotrust building here in Portland. A sudden light drizzle later that evening, did catch all of us off-guard. However, it did not in the least dampen the spirit of the audience as Huba continued to captivate our attention with her engaging story; a pop diva who relentlessly sought to achieve her dreams, making her one of the best-selling music artists of all times.
Huba has been studying Lady Gaga for the past 4 years and is inspired by her intuitive customer strategies and messaging methods on social media. Lady Gaga has built an incredibly large fan base worldwide, in just four short years, with 55 million Facebook fans and 33 million Twitter followers, and the number of her loyal supporters keeps growing exponentially.
Huba shared with us how businesses can learn from Lady Gaga’s savvy strategies to become a model loyalty marketer.
Focus on Your One Percenters: It is a known fact that it is easier and cheaper to retain current customers than to acquire new ones. Gaga focuses on her core advocates, the superfans that will become evangelists to bring in new followers.
Lead with Values: A company can create identity bonds with their customers, where they admire and identify with the brand’s values, attitudes, and ideals. Customers form an emotional attachment based on these shared values.
Build a Community: Companies can engage their group of supporters to create a collective experience that will help build and strengthen a community.
Give Fans a Name: Creating a name for the loyal customers, assigns then an identity that is based on distinct behaviors and personal characteristics. It gives the customers a sense of belonging. Gaga calls her fans her “Little Monsters.”
Embrace Shared Symbols: Symbols are a medium through which meaning is expressed. Symbols belonging to a particular group make the group and its members easily recognizable. This helps build connections between the group members.
Make them feel like Rock Stars: When the company treats brand fanatics like Rock Stars, they patronize the company. As the customers feel special, they have a stronger emotional connection with the brand.
Generate something to talk about: The power to create a buzz on social media is immense and messages can go viral very quickly. A two-way communication can be established with the customers, to create a real world relationship as well as an opportunity to listen to them.
At the end of the talk, each one of the attendees walked away with a free signed copy of Huba’s newly released book, “Monster Loyalty: How Lady Gaga turns Followers into Fanatics.” With the book in tow, there is no doubt that we will be the best word of mouth marketing for it!
“I believe that everyone can do what I’m doing. Everyone can access the parts of themselves that are great. I’m just a girl from New York City who decided to do this, after all. Rule the world! What’s life worth living if you don’t rule it?” -- Lady Gaga