Jon Dale

Using a social media framework to grow your tribe

It takes two things to have tribe: a shared interest and a way to communicate.

When you gather people together with a shared passion and give them the tools to communicate - amazing things will happen. People are incredibly inventive and you'll be surprised and delighted by what occurs when you just give people a way to connect.

The tendency is to focus on leveraging the tribe to make it grow. But I've found that giving the tribe ways to turn their shared interests into passionate goals and providing them the tools to tighten their communications are the most effective ways to strengthen the tribe.

The following framework has been very helpful to me when working with clients on a social media strategy to help them build and grow their tribe.

(My original inspiration for this framework came from Chris Brogan's post here. Chris is a rock star and if you don't read his blog already, you should.)

I describe a social media framework as having four main components. A listening station, passports, embassies and a home base.

Listening Station
The listening station is where everything starts. First you have to know what is being said about you throughout the web. A well equipped professional listening station will include tools from companies like Radian6 and Scoutlabs. The truth is you can get pretty much everything you need with free tools like PeopleBrowsr or Tweetdeck and Google Alerts.

Example: Currently, I have google alerts letting me know every time someone posts something about me online and I use PeopleBrowsr to for real time monitoring for mentions on twitter, YouTube and facebook.

Passports
Passports are profiles you'll want to have so that you can easily take part in conversations that you may pick up on with your listening station. You want to have passports in place for all the major social networking sites, even if you don't think you're going to engage in all of them. You want to make sure that if a conversation starts that you would want to be part of, you already have your profile in place. Later, we'll talk about how your fans can use their passports to help spread the word about your tribe. And sometimes you'll decide to turn passports into embassies.

Example:  Even though Seth doesn't use twitter actively, he does control @sethgodin.

Embassies
Embassies are microsites on  social networks where you are actively engaged. Just like a country does business in embassies located in other countries, you will fully engage in conversations in your embassies on other networks. The most obvious examples of an embassy is a Facebook fan page. Increasingly my clients are setting up full fledged embassies on Twitter as well. Your interactions in your embassy will be split between actively engaging people and gently nudging them towards your home base.

Example: AT&T engages actively with customers, answering questions and providing support on their facebook fan page.

Home Base
Your home base is where your true fans gather. For some people like Seth and myself, this is a blog. But many of my clients are taking this to the next step and have a full featured community for their fans to engage in.

Example: Dan Miller's fans connect with Dan and each other at 48 Days.

The free prize
Once you've got a tight tribe you'll find that with very little encouragement the members will take their own passports and go out and become evangelists sharing your message with their sphere of influence.

Example: Justin (someone I don’t know personally, but would like to consider a member of my tribe) sent a post of mine to his friend Maureen (another person I do not know, yet a potential future tribe member).  Maureen then posted a link to my blog on her blog/home base: maureencrisp.blogspot.com

Added bonus of the social media framework

Having this framework in place makes it much easier to know what to do when a new social network appears.

(Disclosure: PeopleBrowsr and Dan Miller are my clients)

The revolution will not be televised

Tonight, while CNN.com told its visitors about the end of analog TV, they've quietly confirmed their own irrelevance by failing to report on another revolution...the one in Iran. 

Meanwhile on twitter, YouTube and Flickr, the revolution is being reported, not by the media, but by the people involved.  And the world is watching it unfold, tweet by tweet, picture by picture, video by video.

Seems Gil Scott-Heron was right when he said, "The revolution will not be televised"...little did he know it would be on twitter.

 

Photo Credit

How to save the publishing industry

Traditionally, what a book publisher brings to the table is two sets of relationships.

1. Relationships with the people who buy books...the middle men (not the readers).
2. Relationships with the people who review books...the editor of the Times book review section.

There's a problem with this. Books are now being bought directly by the readers, increasingly online from sites like Amazon. The readers are increasingly being influenced by a different type of reviewer. This reviewer doesn't write for the Times, she writes for herself, and her blog audience.

There's a huge opportunity here. The question is who will figure it out first? The authors or the publishers.

We all agree, that successful authors have nascent tribes. The opportunity lies in connecting authors with their audience.

Authors make the bulk of their income from their advance.  If a publisher wants a successful author they offer them a larger advance than their current publisher and there's a decent chance the author will walk.

But, what if the publishers actively helped their authors build tribes online? They'd be doing the authors a huge service and no author could afford to leave their publisher, because they'd be walking away from their tribe.

If the publishers don't help the authors do this, the authors will start doing it themselves.  And once they've developed their own tribe, what do they need the publisher for? I believe that publishers are in the perfect position to do this, because authors are used to the publisher brokering these relationships and most authors have no idea where to start.

At this point, the publishers by and large don't get this (with the notable exception of Hachette). A couple of months ago I received a referral from a publicist at a large NY publishing house who wanted me to help one of her authors build his tribe (on the author's dime). What most publishers still haven't thought through is that they should be the ones building the communities (so they own the tribe).

If publishers helped their authors build and serve their tribes they just might save the publishing industry.

The starfish, the spider and the orchestra

Ori Brafman and Rod Beckstrom, in their book The Starfish and the Spider, make a compelling argument for the power of leaderless organizations. They point to examples like Al Quieda and Alcoholics Anonymous to illustrate how much can be accomplished when a network is left to its own devices without a centralized command structure.

Today I had the opportunity to sit in an orchestra. It was an incredible experience. At one point the conductor left the stage and asked the orchestra to play a piece without him. Each group of musicians responded to those around them and the result was beautiful. Was it better with a conductor. Perhaps. But I was amazed at how well the orchestra played without one. The point is they didn't need him up there to make great music, but he was able to bring out the best in them.

That's what a great leader is like.

Could this be the future of advertising?

A few days ago, Chris Brogan posted a video on his blog featuring his daughter and a bag he'd received from one of my favorite companies, the "They'll fight over it when you're dead" bag makers, Saddleback Leather Company.

How much more effective is this video than any banner ad or commercial they could buy?

The key here is that Saddleback Leather has a great product and an even better story. It's the kind of story that Chris loves. And more importantly, it's the kind of story that Chris' readers love. And Chris has a huge permission asset that doesn't mind being told about products that Chris loves.

Perhaps this is the future of advertising. The self selected endorsement.

P.S. I've got a Saddleback Leather bag as well, it was a gift from a client...it's amazing and it smells as good as Chris says it does.

Questioning assumptions

A few of us in the SAMBA program have spent the last week stumped by a puzzle created by thinkFun. The puzzle is brilliantly designed to force you to look at it a certain way, to make a set of assumptions. We spent hours following what appeared to be the rules. But, only by questioning those rules and challenging your core assumptions are you able to solve the puzzle.

Many assumed that people wouldn't buy shoes online. You had to go to a shoe store because that was the only place to try shoes on. Tony Hsieh questioned those assumptions, added free shipping both ways and a one year money back guarantee. It changed the way people looked at buying shoes and Zappos was born.

By questioning our basic assumptions and changing the way we look at a problem we can often uncover incredible opportunities.

What to do if you don't want to compete on price

How would you like to have raving fans, who'll drive hundreds of miles to your stores to pay higher prices than your competitors charge?

REI has stores like that and I love to buy from them. They have great gear and knowledgeable staff (who actually use the gear). But they don't always have the lowest prices. In spite of that I go out of my way to buy from them rather than their competition.

Why?

Here's why:

That's right. A 100% satisfaction guarantee, no questions asked, for as long as you own the product.

I have a friend who went into an REI store with a tent he'd purchased over a decade ago. He wanted to order a replacement pole for one that he'd lost. They told him they couldn't get one exactly the right size. So they gave him a brand new (and better) tent.

Did they lose money on that transaction? Absolutely. But, they understand the lifetime value of a customer. And they understand that outdoor lovers talk.

The cost of a tent was a small price to pay for the number of people who've heard that story since it happened. REI's customers think they'd be crazy to take the risk of buying from someone else.

What's the story your customers are telling themselves?

Giving your customers an "us"

A few days ago, I wrote about how we don't make our decisions alone...we make them as part of a tribe. We're highly influenced by those around us.

What some really smart companies (or their customers) have figured out, is you can give people an "us" to be part of.

Does Apple sell a better personal computer? Yes, but you're also becoming part of something larger when you buy a Mac. You're joining a movement (and Apple sells the tickets).

The same is true for a Jeep or a Harley Davidson.

And your local church or synagogue.

And a Ted Dekker novel.

Do your customers have something to be part of?

I vs. us

For generations marketers have used polling to figure out why people buy.

There's a problem with this. Polls often assume we make our decisions alone.

But we don't make our decisions alone. We make them together. We live our lives in a glass polling booth, where almost every buying decision is influenced by the decisions of those around us.

And we like it that way. We like being part of something bigger than ourselves.

When you're trying to figure out how to sell me something. Don't just think about me, think about us.

For generations marketers have used polling to figure out why people buy.

There's a problem with this. Polls often assume we make our decisions alone.

But we don't make our decisions alone. We make them together. We live our lives in a glass polling booth, where almost every buying decision is influenced by the decisions of those around us.

And we like it that way. We like being part of something bigger than ourselves.

When you're trying to figure out how to sell me something. Don't just think about me, think about us.

Service or hospitality?

"It's absolutely irresponsible for anyone in a high touch business not to know who their customer is today."
- Danny Meyer, CEO of Union Square Hospitality Group

I recently heard Danny Meyers, a successful NYC restaurateur, say that the difference between service and hospitality is like the difference between an off the rack suit and a custom made suit. He described how his restaurants have been able to use technology solutions like OpenTable to know who their customers are and when they'll be dining. His team then uses that information to do more than just provide service, they custom design a hospitality experience for their guests.

I believe that Danny's advice is relevant far beyond the traditionally "high touch" businesses. Whether you're an auto-mechanic, an author, a hotelier, a clothing company, or a coffee shop...the technology you need is readily available to connect you directly with your end customer so you can provide a customized "hospitality" experience. If you don't, one of your competitors will...and then you lose.

Just providing service isn't enough...if you want to be remarkable you have to provide an experience.

It looks like we're all in the hospitality business now.