Our infographic How to Turn Visitors into Brand Ambassadors became a favorite for marketers this week after it was posted to PR Daily and Entrepreneur.com. Special thanks to social media expert, Kevin Allen!
We wanted to go into a bit more detail about how this process of brand ambassador transformation works and how it’s beneficial to look at visitors from multiple angles. You can’t always turn a visitor into an ambassador for your brand, but you can make it difficult for them not to share your brand by offering amazing deals, unique products and incentives.
As one person commented, the infographic makes it seem simple, and we like to think that it is. If you follow these tips and continue to research your audience, your business just may create brand ambassadors out of all your visitors.
We’ll be going through each step in detail of the infographic. Today’s focus is on:
1. Attract
Did you know that apple crops couldn’t exist without bee pollination? In fact, Albert Einstein said that we couldn’t last more than four years if bees disappeared.
In comparison, a business couldn’t last nowadays without customers sharing the brand from one place to the next. It’s viral, word-of-mouth advertising that makes people want to purchase something these days.
However, as much as you might think a business’ success is centered around an amazing website in digital marketing, it’s actually still all about your customer. That’s why customer research is still integral to doing well in business. Without understanding what your customer wants, you can’t attract them to anything.
Attracting a customer is a multi-faceted strategy. You could say it’s as simple as offering a promotion, but where you offer that promotion and how it is presented will decide how effective that promotion is.
There are multiple ways to attract a visitor to your website:
On-Page SEO
It’s no secret that websites must have search engine optimization (SEO). This common SEO phrase means so many things that it’s difficult to determine what the best strategy is for those who are new to the idea.
Basically, you want to make sure that your pages are set up to communicate your message to both search engines and web visitors. Search engines read pages differently. They look for meta descriptions, page titles, anchor text, header tags and keywords to determine how relevant you are to specific queries.
To first be attractive to a visitor, you need to be in high in search. Without SEO, it’s a little bit more difficult for search engines to pick up on what your site is about. Basically, you want to make sure that every page has a crystal clear message. Yes, it’s a little bit like talking to someone with a hearing aid.
Content on your site has to be formatted so that search engines can easily understand what your site is about but also that you are an authority on the subject matter. That’s why if you have an online store that sells high end athletic shoes, you should have content on your site that answers questions about athletic footwear. Looking up queries about sneakers and understanding your customer’s issues related to your products can give you some great ideas for content.
Ideally, you have a blog, article base or frequently asked questions section that contains this necessary content. About 20 pages of content that relate to your customer’s keywords is an ideal starting point for higher rankings in search and attracting more customers to your website. Of course, the more original and informational content you have, the more authority and trust you have with visitors and search engines.
Brand Communication
Social Media, Blogging & Press Releases
This is the crucial step where visitors become brand ambassadors.
A brand ambassador can be anyone who visits your website, sees your products and decides to share your brand by posting online on their own social networks or talking about your brand wherever they go. There are several ways that you can make it easy for visitors to become brand ambassadors.
It’s not enough to publish original content through a blog or article base on your site. You have to build your brand as the foremost authority by sharing it through multiple channels.
If you think about the way you receive information, it’s typically not from one source. You may hear a news story on TV or the radio, but you probably also hear it from a friend on Facebook or through an advertisement that you saw while browsing online. In the digital age, there is no end to the channels that communicate to an audience.
Ideally, you have social channels like Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest already integrated on each page of your website. This means that if a visitor likes something on your site, they can just simply click a link to post it to their Facebook or Twitter feed.
However, you also want to share your best content and promotions through your own social channels. The most popular social channels include:
Facebook (All businesses)
Twitter (All businesses)
Pinterest (Most businesses)
Instagram (Most businesses)
LinkedIn (All businesses)
Polyvore (Retail, furniture, gadgets, etc)
There are also channels that will be more specific to your industry. For example, if you are a new fashion designer looking for publicity, you would want to join forums, message boards, directories and fashion-specific social networks like The Fashion Spot to tap into your audience base.
Your social media strategy to attract followers and fans has to be targeted and researched. If you understand your audience better than anyone, you know exactly what content to deliver to them to get the most likes, retweets, favorites and so forth.
This is essential to spreading your brand’s reach and transforming visitors into brand ambassadors. However, the next part can guarantee that these visitors become lifelong brand ambassadors.
Brand Visibility and Trustworthiness
Imagine your brand as the tallest tree in your industry.
When you bring visitors back to your brand every day, then you have to know that they believe and trust in your products. You must expand your brand’s visibility passionately while also paying attention to what makes your customers more loyal to your brand.
In some cases, that means giving away small things that customers will love. For instance, you may run a contest per week or month that gives away some cool merchandise for free to your fans and followers. This makes more people want to join your loyalty club so that they can also see your product updates, get more information and be the first to know about your giveaways.
However, you can create contests that automatically turn your fans and followers into brand ambassadors. For example, in order to win a prize, you may ask that your fans snap a photo of them using your product in a funny and creative way, then post it with a tag on Facebook or Instagram. Now you are getting hundreds or thousands of real people to visibly promote your products for the cheap price of a gift basket that you’ll give away. You can always create better prizes depending on your advertising budget that will bring in more visibility for your brand.
Your brand visibility also builds better leads. That means wherever your industry is popular, your brand should also be. For example, if you have a site that is dedicated to electronic, gadget or tech reviews, then you should be participating in any forum, blog, popular site or news article that talks about electronics and technology. Whenever you participate, make sure your logo is visible and you place a link without directly promoting anything. You want to provide insight into a topic but not come off as a salesman.
Some sites are built around this idea of self-promotion through helpful advice and education. For example, answering questions on Quora about electronic products that are liked by members of Quora will give you more authority and recognition that leads back to your brand.
This builds integrity for your visitors as well as they can see your brand is associated with the top sites for electronics every time that you are linked, commented or shared. Affiliate marketing is another way to get noticed and bring visitors back to your site as well as remarketing campaigns.
Attract Visitors Every Day
In conclusion, attracting visitors is a process in itself that has multiple moving parts. By using on-page SEO, social media, targeted content and brand loyalty strategies, you build your traffic and also provide an incentive for visitors to become brand ambassadors.
Stay tuned for the next installment, an in-depth look at engaging with your visitors so they become better brand ambassadors.
