Social is an important and growing channel for businesses and marketers. Like customers generally though, some of our social fans are much more important than others.
No surprises so far and this phenomenon is why Tim Ferris has his 80-20 rule when it comes to investment in CRM. It also underpins Nicholas Lovell's pricing model concept of The Curve.
However, new research and technology is finding then this phenomenon is even more acute than we previously thought. Forget Parretto's twenty percent, data from social media tech startup, GetSocial, suggest that tiny percentages of social fans drive massive business outcomes. These are your social super fans!
The outsized effects of social super fans
The table below shows the power of social super fans, recorded by GetSocial across websites in four industry sectors.
Site type |
% social super fans |
% new users driven by social super fans |
Political blog |
4.8 |
64.35 |
Football site |
7.6 |
63.32 |
News |
10.18 |
17.82 |
Ecommerce |
0.46 |
0.28 |
It seems some sectors are more positively affected by social super fans than others, with ecommerce showing a much reduced impact. However, business owners and marketers in many sectors need to take serious note of the news here. On a call with me, GetSocial CEO, João Romão, excitedly exclaimed that: 'I should commission a huge painting of this data story on the walls of our office'.
More precisely identifying social super fans
Business owners and marketers today are being empowered by new technology, allowing them to better identify and communicate better with social super fans.
Having tables in social media apps - such as Social Bakers, Quintly, etc - showing details of our top fans on Facebook and Twitter, and their activity, is useful but we can now reach beyond this. Communications to clients in social platforms can be suboptimal. Private conversations in Facebook or Twitter might not be ideal channels for brands. Posting on walls or in feeds might not be suitable either.
We need ways to open new communications channels with this hard core of social super fans. The likes of GetSocial and fellow social media tech firm, AddShoppers, enable us to collect secondary contact details from our super fans, such as email address. This enriches CRM data and opens the door to new communication opportunities.
Crucially, these developments empower marketers to make extra strategic use of the email channel to super fans, giving them more attention and love.
The risks of not loving your social super fans
Knowing the effect of social super fans on our business, we should also be aware of the implications of not serving them well enough. By failing to listen to their needs effectively enough we risk poor content and product planning. We should also listen closely to social super fan opinions when it comes to user experiences generally. A hotbed of social super fans might be the hardest bit of a business to create, with the richest levels of client insight to offer.
We annoy and lose social super fans at our peril.
Activating social super fans even more powerfully
Yes, there are down sides to losing social super fans, but thinking positively, new data and CRM opportunities offer us cool ways to activate them further.
Why not involve your social super fans in your content planning and publishing schedule? Are there opportunities to leverage super fan generated content? News sites are already innovating in this space. Can we also more effectively harness social super fans, to involve them in product evolution? Could new features, improvements and even potential pivots, be better planned with insights from our social super fans?
Thinking even more crazy, could social super fans be more actively involved in strategic business decision-making?
When to partner, when to sell, when to close, or even IPO, are all key considerations for business owners.
The energy in this constituency of super fans might be linked to business energy and growth. If your social super fans are cooling (or not growing), is this an indicator of when to sell? If you're thinking of selling, but your super fans are excitable and growing, is it too early to exit?
Social super fans feel highly invested in your business; they're the community and beating heart of your brand. New social media tech can now help you make them feel like even greater stakeholders.
By working more closely with social super fans, marketers can more effectively transmit their energy and evangelism into brand reach and business growth. Leveraging social super fans is becoming a key competitive battlefield.