One of our interns only finished university last summer and knows a few of the students who have been demonstrating about the Government’s proposed fee changes. She was talking to us about the use of Twitter, Facebook and other platforms and the way that demonstrators were using them to not only make their protests more effective but also to try and avoid the police at certain areas (such as this protest list map on Google).
This interested me because its a good example of digital communication bringing together a large disparate group of people with a common cause and harnessing their time, energy and skills. All of the people contributing and taking part have offered their services for no direct or even obvious reward. By working together they are able to build something much greater than the sum of their individual parts, but there is no guarantee that their efforts will effect any change or even get noticed.
The student protests in London
There are other good examples of this behaviour – both the open source software movement and Wikipedia spring to mind – but it’s interesting to follow one which owes so much to social media communities and their increasing connection to mobile devices.
Few brands (except perhaps for Apple) could ever hope to get that much support from their customers. However, it is possible for your brand to harness a fraction of the goodwill and effort that individuals are willing to spend online, promoting, building and sharing the things they really care about. You wouldn’t just have consumers and purchasers at the end of your chain, but instead you would have actual advocates and enthusiasts who freely choose to recommend your brand and talk about it to other individuals.
At Neoco we work hard to identify who the key influencers and players from specific audience clusters, so we can find the best people to engage with for the maximum results and reach. We invest in long-term relationships with these individuals, encouraging open dialogue and mutual benefit.
Tags Brand Advocacy brand engagement Open Source protests Wikipedia