Marketing to the Social Web: How Digital Customer Communities Build Your Business

Chapter 10. Step Six: Promote Your Community to the World (Get ’Em Talking and Clicking)

Because there are a bazillion websites on the Internet, how do you get people to visit yours? What if you invited a community and nobody came? Clearly, you have to promote your community just as you have to promote a new product or a new service. Compelling content is only the beginning. You have to use the social media to get people talking so they’ll come to your community and get involved. Yes, you can use traditional advertising and direct marketing, but these efforts should be focused on sending people to your digital community to be informed, entertained, and heard.

Suppose, as an example, you were in charge of Gap’s marketing; how would you promote your community to the world? The principles of promoting your community apply to both consumer and business-to-business markets (and small and large business alike), but the Gap is a familiar name, so I’ll use it to illustrate a few ideas.

Mind the Gap

First, a bit of background. The Gap’s target market is 18- to 30-year-old women and men. The company has other brands, as you know: its Old Navy brand targets 10- to 20-year-olds; Banana Republic targets 28- to 40-year-olds. Different brands target different audiences, so how could the Gap—just that brand—reach and influence its specific audience?

If I were the head of Gap’s marketing and wanted to reach my market in a new, effective way, I would first identify the online communities in which my ...