Finding Your Evangelists

Zaz Lamarr had an excellent experience shopping at Zappos, so she recounted her experience in a blog post, ending with: IF YOU BUY SHOES ONLINE, GET THEM AT ZAPPOS. One hundred and seventy nine people commented on her post. The story was picked up by a very popular blogger (Seth Godin), and ended up becoming a minor Blogosphere sensation. Zaz became a Zappos evangelist and, through her blog, she reaches out to all her friends and, through them, their friends.

You can be sure that right now someone is talking about YOUR product, YOUR service and YOUR brand. Just like Zaz.

So what is evangelism?

Evangelism comes from the Greek word that means “bringing the good news.” Evangelists embrace your product, and as a result, share their enthusiasm with others.

Today evangelism matters more than ever because of the way people are connected through communication platforms like Myspace, Facebook, Twitter, WordPress, etc.

Many marketers wrongly believe only brands like Apple and Nike have evangelists but the truth is that all brands have evangelists. Wal-Mart might not be a sexy brand, but it has more evangelists than most retailers combined. So whether you sell unique peanut butter (pbloco.com) or shaving products (theartofshaving.com) there are people who love you deeply – they just need to be found.

Why should you care?

– Because they care about you

– An endorsement by an evangelist goes further than PR

– Evangelists also buy more and buy often!

– Evangelists work for you for free. When I noticed an error on OXO’s site (a consumer products manufacturer) I immediately sent an e-mail to their webmaster. Would your customers do that?

Finding Them

It turns out broad behavioral attributes of evangelists are quite predictable. Evangelists are top percentile users who…

… click from your emails to product pages

… open your e-mails

… e-mail you with ideas and suggestions

… forward most of your e-mails to the most friends

… gush about you on blogs.

When it comes to evangelists, its not the type of conversation but the fact you are speaking to them that matters, so feel free to speak to them in a way that is relevant to your brand. Here is our starter kit:

• Send an e-mail acknowledging their value. Recognition is the only real reward an evangelist is seeking. – Send them surveys about your site, product, catalog or store and act on their feedback.
• Give them an e-mail address where they can directly speak with you. Also, when a customer does write in pick up the phone and call them. OXO called me and I was thrilled.
• When you make changes—policies, Web site, product launches—reach out and speak to your evangelists first and ask for their feedback.
• There are over 106 million active blogs so go to a blog aggregating free service like Technorati.com and enter your brand name on the search box to see what people are saying about you (there are also a number of online tools that help track this*). If people are praising you, thank them, if people are upset try to convert them into fans.

Evangelism is still just a trendy word and only a few retailers have an active strategy, but if you harness the power of your customer voice you’ll be ensuring the relevance of your brand long after the buzz dies out.

Rishi Rawat is in charge of customer acquisition strategy at Elevation, an Internet marketing and technology consulting firm.

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