When you people talk about brand community, it’s easy to imagine a huge and dedicated fan club that formed naturally around the love of a product or company. But in almost all cases, the reality is much different. In fact, almost all brands with loyal followings work hard to earn the trust and devotion of their fans. It’s not easy. But the good news is that almost all brands can achieve it. They just need to know how.

What is a brand community?

A brand community generally refers to a group of people who share an interest in a brand and its products. Sometimes they will connect with one another. But often their only connection is with the brand itself. You can think of brand community members as a fan base or ambassadors that will recommend and promote what you do. They engage with your brand, and are consistently interested in your new releases and updates.

How to build a brand community

No matter how loyal your followers are to your brand, it’s important to remember: you’re a business, and they’re human. This means their needs and the things that make them tick should be a priority in your marketing strategy. If you’re too focused on pushing sales, it will make you harder to relate to on a human level.

To start building this kind of loyalty and engagement, consider your existing followers, subscribers, customers. And anyone else that vocally advocates for what you do. At first, this might even be your own family, friends, and team members. But once they start sharing what you do within their own communities and throughout their social networks, you’ll find your following starts to grow.

Consider how you can keep your community engaged, and make sure this is included in your marketing and outreach strategy. You might use loyalty points, discounts, gamification, or other benefits that can be offered to your most loyal fans to keep them advocating for you. Almost like micro influencers.

How to make your brand community work

You’ll probably find that your brand community does require some internal oversight. This is because not all communities run harmoniously together – some encounter high school tactics like shunning new members or those who don’t adhere to the status quo. Others need moderators to ensure that community guidelines – or general social rules – aren’t broken. In short, it’s important to keep the peace amongst your fans.

When creating a strategy for managing the community, consider the following points: 

  • You can never fully control how your brand’s community will behave. They might not always have positive things to say.
  • You can leverage your brand community to hit business targets like product testing, promotion, and customer insights.
  • Your brand community will be some of the most honest and dedicated voices. Listen to what they say about what you do and can be used to shape your marketing and business plans.
  • Your followers should be rewarded for their loyalty, or they might not stick around.

In terms of promoting your brand, consider launching affiliate programmes where your fans can benefit financially or through discounts or freebies if they promote your product. Find ways to include your community in your advertising campaigns. And if you have any already-well-known members of your community, be sure to communicate with them about how you can both benefit from their existing followers.

Tracking the success of your brand community

Any brand with a strong community behind them will tell you, many of their business successes are down to their most loyal followers. But like your social media or your sales goals, you should loosely plan what you want to achieve from your community before you start to grow it. What are your goals? Do you want to raise awareness? Are you looking for trustworthy voices to help promote sales? Do you want to harness their content to use in your own marketing? Will you be putting your community to work as affiliates, influencers, and advertisers?

So, once you’ve ironed out the purpose of your brand’s community, don’t forget to lay out what you will do to thank and reward them when they help you hit your targets. Ready to get your brand community flourishing? Speak to our team of experts about the importance of great branding for businesses in all industries, and how we can create a bespoke plan for you.