First off, let’s get this out of the way: brand evangelism is an advanced form of marketing that essentially makes your happy customers into volunteer marketers and even salespeople.
How?
Through word of mouth (or the modernized version of that), one of the oldest forms of marketing there is.
Of course, having your customers spread the word on how great your brand is will be easier said than done. Two examples of simplifying this process come in the form of two very different brands who take very similar approaches to promote themselves, especially on Instagram.
Sharpie
Let’s be fair, like mobile devices these days, we all own a sharpie. Whether or not we know where that sharpie is…well that’s a different story. The brand is so commonplace at home and in the office, most people often use the informal “sharpie” to describe a highlighter or marker. Of course, you don’t stay on the top by being complacent.
Sharpie uses their Instagram account to not only display their product but what their customers do with that product in through practical usage. Involving a customer, and in this case adding incentive for them, through your social media accounts can lead to some pretty heavy brand evangelism. Artists want nothing more than to display their work to a large audience and Sharpie allows that while promoting their own products as well. It’s a win-win on both ends.
Pabst Blue Ribbon
Everyone, in one medium or another, has some sort of brand loyalty even if they can’t explain why. Celebrating that can often come with the territory. What PBR does with its loyal followers takes that a little farther. Sure, they could probably run a very solid Instagram campaign of users submitting photos of them enjoying or displaying their product in fun and aesthetically pleasing settings. But, in addition to that, Pabst encourages its customers to think out of the ordinary.
Instagram followers submit inventive tattoos with PBR branding, pop-culture infused drawings with the logo and even creative models and set pieces made out of empty cans and boxes all through the use of hashtags. The occasional dog or cat photo with the branding is included, too. All in fun, all in a sense of community and all to the benefit of PBR and the brand as a whole.
Brand Recognition
Now, I know what you’re thinking: these two examples are brands that have been well-established decades before the internet was even a thought. So what?
The execution has changed but the idea is still the same. Little-known brands can use Instagram (and really any other avenue they wish) to leverage some sort of incentive in return for brand evangelism. Once you get a steady flow, the incentive can essentially just be featured. But for now, you can offer a discount, a free product to a random submission or anything you can think of to get your brand, your business, your website or anything you can possibly think of out there in front of the eyes of the masses, all with very little effort.
