This is a guest post from Spike Jones — Group Director of Engagement at WCG and co-author of the book Brains on Fire: Igniting Powerful, Sustainable Word of Mouth Movements. See the original post this is adapted from and more like it on his blog.
As a brand, you have a spotlight.
Yes, some are bigger than others. But all of them are bright. Intense. Attention-grabbing. And PR, marketing, branding, social media, word of mouth – all of those tools – have built it.
And the beauty of that spotlight is that you can shine it on anything you want.
Most of the time we shine it on ourselves as a brand.
Rightly so, eh? After all, we built the damn thing. And it took a lot of time, money and effort to do so. Our latest sale. Promotions. Thought-leadership. Innovations. Messaging, messaging, messaging.
But what if we spun that sucker around one day and started shining it on our audience?
What if we made them feel like the rock stars? What if we gave them all the attention and they could hear the roar of the supportive crowd? Maybe it’s a group of them. Maybe you ask them to step into the spotlight one-by-one. There are numerous possibilities. But they all have to do with sharing the stage and stepping into the background. At least for a while. So it’s not “LOOK! It’s a sale on product X!!” Instead, it’s “LOOK! This guys is awesome. And we KNOW him!!!”
Think about it this way: when a celebrity establishes a non-profit, they are essentially using their spotlight to highlight something that’s important to them. They’ve spent a lot of time working on their own brand and now they have the opportunity to say, “Hey everybody, I know you’re looking at me, and so now look at this, because it means something to me.”
Why can’t we do that as brands? We can show the world that customers — especially people that already love us — are important to us. That those people mean something to us.
Just a thought.
About Spike Jones
Spike Jones is a results-proven communications professional, specializing in digital and offline word of mouth marketing. With more than 15 years of experience, the career path goes something like this: Baylor University; a decade at Brains on Fire; SVP of the Customer Experience team at Fleishman-Hillard; Group Director, Engagement at WCG; and now SVP, Managing Director SW Region at Edelman Digital. Spike is also a co-author of the book Brains on Fire: Igniting Powerful, Sustainable, Word of Mouth Movements.
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