Targeting Passionistas As Customers

We all know that it is much more costly to gain a new customer than it is to gain repeat business from an existing customer. Therefore it makes much business sense to try our very best to retain our customers, keep them loyal to our brand (be it digital or physical products) and hope that they are Passionistas.

“Passionistas” are consumers who are passionate about certain issues more than the average consumer, and hence are willing to create and share content regarding their passions and the brands related with them.

So How Do We Target Passionistas?

Because Passionistas are more concerned and interested in the related issues or products, they are exposed to more information pertaining to your product category or industry. They are probably subscribed to various newsletters related to your industry and have bookmarked “go-to” websites that they frequent on a daily to weekly basis. Hence it is essential that you build back links from these “Authority” websites through text advertisements or banner advertisements so as to elevate the perception and branding of your online business.

It is obvious that “Authority” websites gain more recognition as venues of trusted information. To build a long term sustainable online business, it is advised that you add valuable content to your website on a constant basis. You can do that either by creating a blog or expanding the content pages within your website. In general portal based websites are more trusted compared to “sales page” websites that just seem out to make a quick buck. If the work involved is too intensive, the least you can do is to build a “portal” looking website that seems to be brimming full of information for the curious Passionista.

Example:
Centerpointe.com

Every link that they have is packed full of information and there is no lack of valuable information. They even kind of have a “sales page” webpage that is disguised in different formatting. While the conversion ratios (yet to be tested) might be lower than the typical sales page website, it is obvious that they are building a sustainable long term online business through brand building instead gunning for big short-term profits.

Creating Customer Evangelists

Hence it is no surprise that these “Passionistas” once converted, become “A” list customers for your business. This makes it much easier to nurture and convert them into customer evangelists for your business. Customer evangelists believe so strongly in a particular product or service that they freely try to convince others to buy and use it. The customers become voluntary advocates, actively spreading the word on behalf of your business.

In the book, Creating Customer Evangelists: How Loyal Customers Become a Volunteer Sales Force, Ben McConnell and Jackie Huba outline six steps to creating customer evangelists:

1. Customer plus-delta (Continuously gather customer feedback)
2. Napsterize knowledge (Freely share your knowledge)
3. Build the buzz (Create intelligent word-of-mouth networks)
4. Create community (Encourage communities of customers to meet and share)
5. Make bite-size chunks (Devise specialized, smaller offerings to get customers to bite)
6. Create a cause (Focus on making the world, or your industry, better)

I hope that you have found this 2 prong marketing strategy approach of securing and targeting Passionistas as your customers and converting them into customer evangelists useful for building a sustainable online business.

Read more about Passionistas’ at ‘Passionista’ Consumers Help Brands Harness Digital Media

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