• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Social Media Examiner

Your Guide to the Social Media Jungle

  • 🔥 Free Newsletter
  • ⭐ FREE Web3 Course
  • 🗓️ Our Events
    • Social Media Marketing World (Mar 13-15)
    • Other Industry Events
  • 💡 Society
  • ⚙️ Tools
  • 🎙️ Podcasts
    • Social Media Marketing Podcast
    • Social Media Marketing Talk Show
    • Web3 Business Podcast
    • Our YouTube Channel
  • 🎯 Partner With Us
    • Podcast Sponsorship
    • Email Sponsorship
      • Email Newsletter
      • Dedicated Email Blast
    • Event Sponsorship
      • Social Media Marketing World
    • Tools Sponsorship
  • 👋 About Us
    • Our Story
    • Articles
      • Web3
      • Instagram Marketing
      • Facebook Marketing
      • YouTube Marketing
      • LinkedIn Marketing
      • TikTok Marketing
      • Expert Interviews
  • Search
  • Social Media Marketing World10th annual. Biggest industry event. Sale ends soon!IMPROVE YOUR MARKETING

    How to Turn Fans Into Brand Champions

    by Anne Ackroyd / August 2, 2018

    social media how toIs your visibility on social media falling?

    Wondering how your biggest fans can help?

    In this article, you'll discover how to turn engaged fans and followers into brand champions.

    How to Turn Fans Into Brand Champions by Anne Ackroyd on Social Media Examiner.
    How to Turn Fans Into Brand Champions by Anne Ackroyd on Social Media Examiner.

    Why Brand Champions Matter to Social Visibility

    As marketers prepare to feel the full effects of evolving social media algorithms, relationships are the new reach. More than ever, a core group of highly engaged fans is more valuable than millions of disengaged followers, and they can have a huge impact on your marketing efforts.

    Social media engagement has a snowball effect. When one person interacts with your post, that person is telling the algorithm your content is valuable. As more people engage with the post, endorsing its value, the algorithm will deliver it to more news feeds. That engagement also will increase the likelihood that other people will be inclined to interact with your post.

    By effectively mobilizing your brand champions, you can turn that engagement snowball into an avalanche.

    For instance, Wendy's retweets posts from fans and adds entertaining personal captions to maximize the engagement snowball effect and build devoted brand champions. As Wendy's content gets more retweets, more users are likely to see and engage with it.

    Wendy's retweets posts from fans and adds entertaining personal captions.

    While brand champions are a powerful ally across all social media platforms, they're particularly important to Facebook marketers. Earlier this year, Facebook updated its news feed algorithm to give more weight to content from friends and family, leaving less room for public posts.

    Rather than passive engagement, the new algorithm prioritizes “meaningful interactions between people.” The change, which affects all of the platforms Facebook owns, isn't designed to exclude publishers from the news feed, but rather to incentivize content that inspires personal connections and conversations.

    To stay relevant in light of the new algorithm, mobilize your brand champions to generate these meaningful interactions across your social media platforms.

    #1: Find Potential Brand Champions

    We all have those fans: the follower who comments on every Facebook post, and the employee who tweets about every product launch. These are your brand champions, the people who are most enthusiastic about what your business offers and deeply invested in its success. How do you zero in on those people? Look to social first.

    It may seem obvious, but always respond to your fans. It's the best way to develop a human voice for your brand and make your audience feel valued. To illustrate, MoonPie has developed a quirky voice on Twitter and is known for getting into witty back-and-forths with its followers.

    The Conference You've Been Waiting For

    As a small business marketer, you can probably only pick one or two events to attend each year. Get back into the game with an unbeatable conference experience and expert training at Social Media Marketing World in sunny San Diego, California—from your friends at Social Media Examiner.

    🔥🔥 As a valued reader, you can save $300 if you act now! Sale Ends Tuesday!

    CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE

     MoonPie has developed a quirky voice on Twitter and gets into witty conversations with followers.

    As you consistently engage on social media, evaluate your social media audience to identify your most engaged fans. With a little encouragement, a follower who has interacted with multiple posts has the potential to become a brand champion.

    You can use SocialRank to identify your most engaged Twitter and Instagram followers. It's a free tool that allows you to sort your audience into categories like “most valuable” (followers with the most clout) and “most engaged” (followers who interact with your content most frequently).

    SocialRank also offers a paid version that allows you to compare your audience to other brands. The price point for the paid version, Market Intel, varies depending on the size of your business.

     SocialRank will help identify your most engaged Twitter and Instagram followers.

    Once you've identified your biggest fans, reward them for their enthusiasm by using your platform to put them in the spotlight. Depending on your industry and the size of your business, your brand champions may come from your family and friends, or a large base of employees and customers.

    Be creative when evaluating the interests of your brand's inner circle and customize your approach based on which sector your brand champion comes from.

    Strengthen Potential Brand Champion Relationships With a Social Shoutout

    A little recognition on social media can turn a lukewarm follower into a brand fanatic. Once you've used a tool like SocialRank to identify your most shoutout-worthy fans, you can show your appreciation by featuring them on your page. Just be sure to have permission when sharing user-generated content.

    Here are a few examples of brands that recognize their fans on social media.

    Apple launched its official Instagram account last year to showcase iPhone photography exclusively. The company invited iPhone users to submit photos and videos using the hashtag #ShotoniPhone. The account features the best submissions, including quotes and voiceovers by the photographers, as well as the photographers' Instagram handles.

    Apple's Instagram account features fan photos that users' submit with the #shotbyiphone hashtag.

    It's a great way to showcase the product, while lending the weight of Apple's platform to some of the brand's biggest fans.

    Thomas & Friends shares photos submitted by parents of children using Thomas & Friends merchandise. In addition to being great content that feels authentic and human, it's a meaningful way to recognize fans who are highly engaged with the brand on social media.

    Thomas & Friends shares photos submitted by parents of children using the brand's merchandise.

    The automotive brand MINI ran a social media competition around the hashtag #FitsInMyMINI. They invited MINI owners to submit photos of surprising things they were able to fit in the famously small cars. The prize? MINI shared the best photos on its Instagram account. The prospect of recognition is often more than enough motivation to inspire participation.

    Tools Resource Guide

    Looking for something to make your life easier?

    Discover the tools we recommend to drive engagement, save you time, and boost sales across your entire marketing funnel or business.

    Whether you need help planning content, organizing social posts, or developing your strategy, you’ll find something for every situation.

    FIND YOUR NEXT FAVORITE TOOL

    This user photo won MINI's #FitsInMyMINI monthly photo challenge.

    ALTThis user photo won MINI's #FitsInMyMINI monthly photo challenge.

    Holidays provide an opportunity to recognize your employee champions and devoted social media fans. Is a core group of your customer base comprised of teachers? Give them a shoutout during Teacher Appreciation Week. Want to promote your company's positive work culture? Highlight employee friendships on Best Friends Day.

    The National Day Calendar is a resource for random niche holidays that align with your marketing goals.

    The National Day Calendar is a resource for random niche holidays that align with your marketing goals.

    Pro Tip: Message individuals directly when they're featured in a social media campaign. Encourage them to engage with the post. Make sure to include a direct link to the content to make it as easy as possible for the featured brand champion to access and share it. Here's an example message:

    “Thanks so much for participating in our social media campaign! I shared your photo and quote on our Facebook page. I encourage you to like and share the post. This will help us reach more people.”

    #2: Recruit Brand Champions

    When engaging your brand's inner circle, communication is key. Your brand champions typically won't be marketing experts, so you'll want to provide clear direction and help them understand the impact of their efforts.

    To inspire meaningful, sustainable engagement, consider having some variation of the following conversation:

    “By liking one of our social media posts, you're telling [the platform's] algorithm that our content is valuable. Because you're interested in the content, the algorithm decides that other people might like it, too. As our content gets more engagement, it becomes more valuable, and the algorithm will show it to more people.”

    If you're reaching out to employees, you might communicate this message via email or during informal conversations around the water cooler. If you don't have in-person access or personal contact information for your brand champions, consider delivering the message via a direct social media message.

    Once you've convinced these devoted fans that what they're doing is important, provide them with the tools and strategies they need to do it effectively.

    #3: Make It Easy for Brand Champions to Help You

    To engage with your content, your fans first have to find it. Unfortunately, you can't rely on social media algorithms to deliver every post to their news feeds. Here are a few creative ways to ensure your biggest fans have easy access to your content.

    Encourage Devoted Fans to Choose “See First” on Your Facebook Page

    If your brand's content is among the first posts they see in their news feeds, they're more likely to engage.

    To ensure they'll see your page's content first, they need to visit your page, click the Following button, and change the setting from Default to See First.

     Ensure that brand champions see your page's content first in their Facebook news feed.

    Create Exclusive Communities for Your Most Engaged Fans

    Give your most devoted fans behind-the-scenes access to your best content.

    The Instant Pot Community on Facebook has more than a million members and a very active discussion board. Users post recipes and request advice from other members, and the brand advertises new products and sales.

    The Instant Pot Community on Facebook has more than a million members and a very active discussion board.

    To join the group, potential members have to answer a few questions to confirm they're product users. The group feels exclusive and most of the content is user-generated and useful.

    To join the Instant Pot Community group, potential members have to answer a few questions to confirm they're product users.

    Other options for communities include private Pinterest boards and LinkedIn groups.

    Include Links to Social Campaigns in Your Email Newsletter

    Constant Contact is a popular tool for generating email newsletters. The user-friendly platform makes it easy to include links to your most important social media campaigns. Pricing varies depending on the features you want and the size of your contact list, but it's only $20 per month for a basic plan with fewer than 500 contacts.

    Constant Contact lets you include links to your most important social media campaigns.

    #4: Gamify Participation to Formally Recognize Top Brand Champions

    Gamification (applying elements of gameplay to your social media content) is another way to recognize and engage your most enthusiastic fans. Incorporating contests, points, leaderboards, and prizes invokes the intrinsic motivation derived from competition and inspires meaningful participation from your followers.

    What's the point of being in the lead if no one knows you're winning? Use leaderboards to give your audience real-time updates on your social media competitions and keep participants motivated.

    rise.global is a great tool for creating leaderboards and scorecards. The basic version is free for 0-100 users. To access additional features, the monthly cost ranges from $10.80 to $59.49.

    rise.global is a great tool for creating leaderboards and scorecards for brand champions.

    To recognize Twitter engagement, identify users based on their Twitter handles. Give users a score based on how many times they've engaged with your content.

    Share your rise.global leaderboard across your social media platforms, especially in your exclusive communities.

    Then share the leaderboard across your social media platforms, especially in your exclusive communities.

    Click here to learn more about how to create a brand ambassador program.

    What do you think? Is your business actively using brand champions? What tips can you offer? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

    Get Your FREE Course: Web3 for Beginners

    Web 3 for Beginners

    Curious about Web3, but don't know where to start or who to trust?

    Introducing Web3 for Beginners, a course taught by Michael Stelzner, the founder of Social Media Examiner.

    Learn the basics of Web3 and apply it to your business with this FREE comprehensive course.


    CLICK HERE TO GET FREE ACCESS

    Tags: Social Media Strategy

    About the authorAnne Ackroyd

    Anne Ackroyd is an innovative social media marketer who is passionate about building brand champions and digital communities. She has presented at national conferences and managed award-winning social media pages.
    Other posts by Anne Ackroyd »

    Get Social Media Examiner’s Future Articles in Your Inbox!

    Get our latest articles delivered to your email inbox and get the FREE Social Media Marketing Industry Report (39 pages, 50+ charts)!

    Industry Report Cover

    Worth Exploring:

    Facebook

    Marketing Help Explore More →

    Instagram

    Marketing Help Explore More →

    YouTube

    Marketing Help Explore More →

    Linkedin

    Marketing Help Explore More →

    Web3

    Marketing Help Explore More →

    Social Media Marketing Industry Report

    Get Free Report →

    Social Marketing Trends

    The data you've been missing!

    Need a new plan? Find out how thousands of marketers plan to change their social marketing activities in our 14th annual Social Media Marketing Industry Report. This 39-page report reveals what marketers have planned for their organic social activities, video marketing, social ads, and more. Get this free report now and never miss another great article from Social Media Examiner.

    Enter your email to get
    our free report:


    Footer

    Your Guide to the Social Media Jungle
    Copyright © 2023 Social Media Examiner®
    All Rights Reserved. Terms of Use | Privacy Policy.

    Helpful Links

    • About us
    • Our content via email
    • Our podcasts
    • Our YouTube channel
    • Our live show
    • Our industry report
    • Sponsorship opportunities
    • RSS
    • Accessibility