Here’s a riddle for you: What do referral programs, message boards, Instagram polls, customer stories, and ambassador programs all have in common?
It’s community.
Each example is a piece of marketing that puts the customer at it’s center. And each involves a dialogue with, and a real relationship with the customer to actually nail it. I can think of several times I participated with programs like these — they left me feeling like a person, not just a number. I felt loyalty. I felt love! Who wouldn’t want to hear that from their customer?
In my own explorations on the topic, I couldn’t think of a better person to talk to than Emily Hollender. Emily’s behind the brands of companies you know and love, like The Wing, Rent the Runway, The Sill, Modern Animal, and Tia, each known for their passionate customer communities. These days, Emily spends her time as a fractional brand and community builder for startups (yes, you can hire her on HG).
She helped me get past hand wave-y definitions of “brand” and “community,” and down something concrete. She also helped me get past the idea that the only way to build community is by starting a Slack channel — raise you’re hand if you’re officially in too many Slack groups 🙋♀️
Maybe more pressing, as Emily names in the third drop, advertising budgets don’t go as far as they used to — and with budgets tightening this year, it’s likely you have less money to spend on them. Ads might deliver fast hits, but they’re not a moat, not defensibly yours. I can’t think of a better time to invest in community as part of your marketing stack.
Emily’s the exact person I’d want representing my brand to my customers — gentle, thoughtful, curious. I know you’ll love learning from her just as I did!
Drop 1. What is “community,” actually? Lessons from The Wing’s fast growth
I loved leaning into community programs like ambassador, referral, influencer, but I also realized that community is a mindset and way of thinking too. It’s building a dialogue with your customer.
At The Wing, for example, we ended up gifting swag to some folks who had requested we come to their city on social. Although it wasn’t scalable, it went a long way in building those customer relationships, and turning them into advocates.
Take it back to your team:
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Community is a mindset. It’s a relationship with your customers. To build community means you’re building product and marketing programs that put a dialogue with your customer at the center.
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Emily gives lots of great examples of ways you can test community programs in small, low budget, scrappy ways, like: create a poll on your Instagram story then share the results, give customers a call to action to work together on a cause, or highlight member or customer stories. See what happens and let us know!
Drop 2. How she used NPS surveys to get close to Rent the Runway’s customers
At the time, I thought, oh my gosh, this is the most administrative thing! But it taught me so much about listening to your customer. It became some of the most important insights in the company on our customer.
This switch happened where we weren’t seeing a customer just as a customer, but as our community.
Take it back to your team:
- Is there a weekly practice where you hear from your customer? How might you start a simple one, like Emily did at Rent the Runway?
Drop 3. Budget and KPIs, and comparing community to paid marketing
Community is going to be a hard sell compared to paid ads. It takes time, resources, and investment to cultivate this community of customers. But, in the long run, it’s a sustainable way you can uniquely own your growth.
… Marketing budgets aren’t as big as they used to be, and you have to be intentional with your dollars. When I think about the trade off between community marketing and paid marketing, I think about the quality of the interactions. When I see an ad on Instagram, it’s one dimensional… If you’re only investing in Meta and TikTok, it’s only going to get you so far, but complementing that with brand and community work? It helps conversion.
Take it back to your team:
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As you start incorporating community into your marketing stack, define what success looks like for you. It might not be revenue or new customer conversion, but other metrics like engagement could be a great indicator for you.
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It takes time to cultivate community programs. After a year of working on college campuses, Emily and her Rent the Runway team only then saw a lift in college student growth, but they stuck around a lot longer than other customers.
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Community programs can evoke real loyalty in your customers. Seeing an ad on Instagram is fast and immediate, but it’s a hollow interaction. Community can be the quality lift you’re looking for.