Engaging the Community
Sometimes called "experiential marketing", "event marketing," "on-ground marketing," "live marketing," or "participation marketing, "community engagement marketing is a strategy that encourages and invites the community to take part in the evolution of a brand. When the marketer gets consumers actively involved in the creation of marketing programs for a brand, consumers develop a deep and lasting relationship to the brand.
Tomi T. Ahonen and Alan Moore are credited with inventing the term "community engagement marketing" in their 2005 volume, Communities Dominate Brands: Business and marketing challenges for the 21st century. The book represents an early recognition of the emergence of social media and digitally connected communities as a force in building brands. It provides practical guidance about moving from "interruptive advertising" to "interactive engagement marketing and community-based communications. The book highlights the growing power of community generators like blogging, virtual environments (like forums), and mobile phone based "swarming," It describes a new generation of consumers they call "Generation C" (for community).
In his address to the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA) Forum in New York City in 2013, Ahonen presented some striking and clear examples of community engagement marketing, some of which predated the formal invention of the concept.
Macy's Department Store incorporates entertainment into its retail branding with the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York. The parade has become a national institution with syndicated television coverage.
Annheuser-Busch, the world's largest beer brewery (as of 2013) incorporates a mobile phone app with games (like a game about proper beer pouring, or sports trivia) and sports commentary into its brand construction.
Home Depot incorporates mobile apps with onscreen measurement tools for measuring bolt sizes, augmented reality virtual furniture tester that uses the phone's camera to place virtual furniture on consumer's decks, and direct chats with home depot advisors.
UPS incorporates apps to allow consumers to inform the deliverer where the final destination of a package should be when the consumer is away from home.
Techniques of consumer engagement have been well developed by marketers over the years. The method focusses on mobile communication, getting consumers involved with brands through the use of mobile phones and social media. In establishing their engagement campaigns, marketers keep several important assumptions in mind.
The campaign has to be seen as a grass-roots effort, person-to-person. Social media are perceived to be personal, not entity to person, but person-to-person.
The company sponsoring the engagement campaign has to actually ask the consumer to participate. Participation can not be assumed.
People trust word-of-mouth peer-to-peer recommendations more than advertising. A Nielson Global Trust in Advertising Survey found that only 14 percent of consumers trust advertising, but 78 percent trust consumer recommendations.
When a consumer sees others engaged with a brand the temptation for him or her to be engaged themselves increases. Customer's friends are the business' next best prospects.
The first step in establishing a community engagement program is to make sure the company's own executives and staff buy into the concept. Engagement usually means organizational change in a from-the-top advertising-based operation. The method means having conversations with consumers, providing added value to them, and learning from customers.
Start at the top with an executive buy-in.
Allocate the time needed to dialogue with customers. It takes time to earn trust and become part of a community.
Take on projects in which the company has an authentic interest. The company has to care about the community engagement that they organize.
Allocate the human resources with training, know-how, and commitment to run a successful program. These staff members will be trusted with the most important company resources, reputation and consumers.
Create a repeatable methodology for engagement. The methods should include a content calendar, a crisis management framework, a map of roles and responsibilities.
Invest in technology including email marketing, blogging, and social media interaction software. The software should include quantitative measurement, shares, likes, comment, and views metrics.
SAGE is a Sydney based agency specialised in developing mobile apps on iOS, Android and Windows phones. Please contact us for more information.