How to Cultivate Brand Advocacy From Both Employees and Influencers

Fans of the Future

In our hectic world of mass communication, there are so many messages spinning around us. To cut down on the noise, we all have a few key people that we can tap into for particular types of advice. Everyone listens to someone, right?
Narrowing in on the people that would organically endorse your brand is the key to succeeding in the future of marketing, and Stacey DePolo has made her living on helping brands do just that. She’s a strong believer in creating authentic and mutually beneficial relationships with influencers as well as supporting engaged employees to become advocates themselves.
GoDaddy is one of the world’s largest platforms dedicated to independent and small ventures. With more than 63 million domain names under management, it’s the place people come to attract customers, build a professional website, and manage their work.

In This Episode

• Why taking the time to understand fans of your brand really does pay off
• How to identify influencers that have an organic tie to your brand
• Why you don’t need a celebrity with a million followers to make a real impact
• How to support and allow your employees to speak positively of your brand
• Why metrics are still an integral part of the marketing machine

Quotes From This Episode

“The first piece starts with finding those people who are genuinely interested.” —@sdepolo
“Metrics need to be there in order for us to measure our success. That’s one of the things that excites me about marketing. But not everything can be measured.” —@sdepolo
“I think that when I have met someone in person as opposed to just online, it really takes the relationship to a different level.” —@sdepolo

“The first piece starts with finding those people who are genuinely interested. It’s one thing to get an employee to start cranking out brand-promoted posts on their social feeds and we did that and that worked. But to find someone who truly has interest in building their own influence, they have to have a passion for something that they want to develop themselves.” —@sdepolo

“We give our employees a free reign to go out and say things.” —@sdepolo
“I don’t care if the person is influential. In fact, the more influential they are, the more suspect that type of content might be at that moment in the sales cycle.” —@sdepolo
“I saw the future, and I said one day there are going to be companies that hire people like me to find out what makes their customers tick and what kind of values they share to build a tribe around that culture, not just internally but with their customer base. I have never looked back.” —@sdepolo

Resources

• In the News: The Elements of Great Influencer Marketing Campaigns
• Stacey DePolo Twitter: @sdepolo
• staceydepolo.com
• WordPress
• Homebrew Website Club
• “Hug Your Haters” by Jay Baer

Would You Rather

Would you rather have no taste buds or be colorblind?
Wow. That’s an easy choice, colorblind. That’s just because I am such a foodie. I cannot imagine living without taste buds.
Would you rather experience the beginning of planet Earth or the end of planet Earth?
Oh, easily the beginning. Coming from a background in ecology, I definitely would love to go back to the primordial soup. Look it up if you don’t know what it is.
Would you rather have a dog with a cat’s personality or a cat without a dog’s personality?
These are easy ones compared to some of your other guests. I’m allergic to cats. So I’ll have to go with a dog with a cat’s personality.