(NOTE: This is the third article in my series focused on The 12th Marketing Fundamental You Need to Succeed in 2022: You need to uncover and empower your raving fans and customer evangelists.)
Every company or business wants raving fans.
In vain, they search for some trick to create them out of thin air.
Or they wait around for them to magically appear.
But how many companies and businesses ever consider doing something to cultivate raving fans out of the current customers they already have?
Because, whether you realize it or not, if you don’t cultivate the current and potential raving fans that exist within your own customer base, they’re not going to just magically appear.
In fact, worst case scenario, you might turn around one day only to realize that you lost them.
That reminds me of a story I came across about a man who mishandled something he treasured…
The Lost Treasure and the Desperate Search
Back in 2006, a woman named Betty Goldstein of Staten Island, New York was briefly hospitalized.
Worried about his wife, and not thinking clearly, her husband, Ron, decided to wrap her 3.5-carat diamond ring in a napkin for safekeeping.
But with all of the stress of his wife being in the hospital, in an unthinking moment of forgetfulness, 63-year-old Ron threw the napkin in the trash.
As soon as he realized what he did, he ran outside. But to his horror, it was too late.
The garbage truck was already way down the street.
In a panic, Ron called the local sanitation department.
They immediately contacted the driver and instructed Ron to head to the transfer station in Elizabeth, N.J.
When he got to the transfer station, he told the truck driver, Carlo Tanutco, what happened. And he also told Carlo that he thought the diamond was in a yellow kitchen trash bag that he had put inside of a larger black collection bag.
Armed with that information, Carlo and the other garbage workers joined Ron as they searched through mounds of nasty and stinking garbage hoping to find the lost treasure.
Believe it or not, after an hour of digging and looking into strangers’ trash bags – in sweltering heat, Ron’s garbage was somehow found.
And guess what? The ring was somehow still inside the napkin.
Goldstein later told a reporter, “It was meant to be found. It was like God giving me another shot.”
SIDE NOTE: Ron and his wife were so thankful for Carlo’s help in searching for the ring they invited him to their home to say thank you.
Moral of the Story:
If you don’t want to end up feeling the same regret that Ron did, you need to determine, right now, that you and your team will stop mishandling the current and potential raving fans that are already under your care.
The 2 Steps Needed to Uncover Your Raving Fans and Increase Your Customer Loyalty
To find the raving fans within your current customer base and increase customer loyalty, you need to do two things:
- Determine who/where the raving fans are in the midst of your customer base.
- Then you need to learn how to cultivate similar customers who, with some encouragement, might become raving fans.
Keep reading and I’ll explain how you and your team can do this.
How to Unearth the Raving Fans Buried in Your Customer Base
Do remember how Ron and Carlo found his lost treasure?
They started with a description and clues that they had. (It was inside a yellow bag inside of a larger black bag.)
If you start with the clues that raving customers leave behind, you’ll have a much easier time finding them.
So what are the clues that raving fans leave behind?
There are two main clues that they leave behind:
- Frequency Clues – Raving fans don’t just buy once. They buy over and over again.
- Monetary Clues – Raving fans not only buy repeatedly, but some of them also spend a lot with your company or business.
Armed with those two clues, you need to look through your customer base and see where (or to who) these clues lead you.
Once you discover them, you will have a list of raving fans and/or potential raving fans.
But it’s what you do next that will make all the difference in whether you keep or lose these treasured customers, or whether you leverage them or they remain a lost treasure.
3 Ways to Cultivate and Empower Your Raving Fans
So what can you do to keep them and leverage these treasured customers?
Let me give you three simple ways you can do this…
1. Thank Them
We all loved to be appreciated and thanked for the things we do for others, right? Well, your current raving fans and your potential raving fans love it too.
So thank them individually, one-on-one, for purchasing regularly from you and/or for spending large amounts with your company or business. Tell them you’ve noticed and tell them how valuable they are to you.
But don’t just thank them individually. Shine the spotlight on them and acknowledge them in front of the rest of your customers. (It would probably be best to get their permission first.)
By doing this you’re doing three powerful things:
- Making these valuable customers feel truly appreciated and encouraging them to continue to be (or become) raving fans
- Encouraging the same action in your other customers
- Giving your raving fans a reason to rave about you to others
If you stop there, you’ll already be doing more than most companies and businesses do. And you’ll be seeing results like you never have before.
But there are two more things that you can do.
2. Ask Them
The second thing you can do is ask your raving fans and potential raving fans to leave reviews and/or share about their experience with others.
You can do this in a P.S. in your message thanking them.
Or you can do this whenever someone contacts your company or business to tell you how happy they are with their purchase.
But you don’t have to just focus on raving and potential raving fans.
You can also send a message to all of your customers.
Simply ask them, if they love your product or service, to please leave a review on review sites and/or tell others about your company or business.
When or if they actually give you reviews, or share about your company or business with others, don’t forget the first thing I just showed you: thank them for doing this!
If you do these things, you’ll be surprised at what a difference they make.
(*When you do, can you do me a favor? Come back and let me know how this helped your business. And please tell others about this article and this site.)
But there’s still one last thing you can do to cultivate and empower your raving fans.
3. Reward Them
Not only does thanking people and asking them for help actually encourage them to take action, but so does rewarding them.
That means that the final thing you should do is to start rewarding your top customers. How?
- Reward customers who purchase regularly from you.
- Reward customers who spend the most with you.
- Reward customers who bring the most customers to your company or business
Be creative with the rewards and make sure that the rewards you give are legally allowed in your industry, but make sure to do it and do it generously.
Because these customers are worth investing in. And when you invest in them, you’ll reap dividends.
Well, there you go.
I’ve revealed two clues to uncover who your current raving fans are, and I’ve revealed to you three ways to cultivate new raving fans and empower your current customers to become fans.
If you will just implement these things in your business, you’ll begin experiencing the benefits of having raving fans and customer evangelists.
The best part? You’ll do this while your competitors are still sitting around waiting and hoping for them to magically appear.
Stay tuned for my next tip on how to get the most out of the 12th marketing fundamental.
Get Emailed Whenever a New Article Goes Live
Did you enjoy this article? Then don’t miss when the next one goes live.
Sign-up below and you will be emailed whenever a new article is posted.
(That means that you will usually be emailed multiple times a week.)
