4 Tips for Creating Brand Loyalty Through Your Site

Building a following of enthusiastic and loyal followers is the dream of every brand.  You want people to believe in what you are invested in providing, and you want them to personally identify with your core values so they become brand advocates.  You have a compelling story to tell, and you feel a deep conviction that you can change people’s lives for the better through whatever product or service you offer.  Congratulations, you have what it takes to create a cult brand!

While you’re tirelessly working to move your brand up the mountain to enjoy that rarified air of genuine brand loyalty, you need to realize the power and importance of setting up a website that is completely up to the task of communicating who your brand is and how it is different from the competition.

If we use the illustration of an arduous mountain climb, think of your website as basecamp.  It’s the place that houses all your support equipment, resources, and experts that will help your brand climb beyond the noise of a saturated marketplace.  Everyone has a website, but that’s not a box you just check and move on.  Your website is the core of your Integrated Marketing System (IMS).  It’s the place you are consistently and aggressively attempting to drive traffic to create a personal connection with your customers.

So, what makes a website stand out and build cult brand excitement?  Well, there are a LOT of things that may be unique to you and your brand belief system.  However, here are a few key tips to check to ensure your brand is properly equipped to summit your mountain goals. 

Tip 1: Ready for Landing!

Your homepage page, or landing page, is your one chance to show your difference.  Don’t assume that someone is going to hunt deep into your “About” page to learn what you’re really about.  That first screen is what you earn with all your social media, SEO, SEM, digital advertising efforts.  You better make it count!  Everything about that landing page should be seen as just that, a landing.  Make it as exciting, welcoming, and unique to your brand personality as it possibly can be. 

This is a great place to offer a short video that’s about your brand promise and position right at the very top.  This should NOT be a sales pitch about how great your product/service is.  This is your opportunity to humanize your company face, the brand.  Use video to create a connection that you can sustain as the person moves on to learn more about you.

Everything about your website is a set of stages to move the brand up the mountain.  Think of your homepage as that critical first stage.  You want to build confidence and give clear information on what routes the user may take to move their interest in your brand forward.

Tip 2: Authority Starts with Author

Every good cult brand has a specific and well-defined area of expertise that they want to own within the market.  Whether it’s scientific, economic, social, or even philosophical, your brand position should be unique and relevant.  The best way to gain an established brand position is to be an authority.  Be the thought-leader on your subject matter and create well-crafted intelligence about your subject from your brand voice and perspective.

A well developed brand blog is an incredibly powerful tool to establish your authority and expertise with your followers.  It takes an investment, but there is no other platform that gives you more opportunity to do the deep development work for your brand position.  Your blog should be on-point and easy to navigate for users.  A well-established content plan should have you publishing 500 to 1000 words on a relevant subject matter every single week.  Having an agency partner that can help you outline a content calendar and synopsis for articles is key.  Then they can take the brand belief system and create great content that consistently sounds like it’s coming from you.

How many people actually read your blog articles?  The number will start to surprise you as you evaluate your analytics.  The more unique and compelling your content is, the more people will be consuming and sharing it with others.  By the way, if no one else is reading your content there is still one important reader that is sure to take in every word and use it (almost exclusively) to create a definition for your brand when they talk about you with others.  That would be search engines.  Your unique content is one of the biggest drivers for how your brand and company will be indexed by every search engine on the planet.  Make sure it’s accurate and relevant to your goals!

Tip 3: Connect Your Communities

It has been jarring how many times we see brands that don’t integrate their social media communities directly within their websites.  You need to create a fluid hand-off from your short, smart, and engaging social media content to the larger story you can provide on your website.  This is the space where you get to completely control the narrative and expand on the concepts you introduced in your social media posts.  Take full advantage of having followers on your home turf.

Having a well-designed IMS website also gives you a much broader range of brand content and resources that your social media team can mine for stories to share with your communities.  Make sure you are regularly evaluating visitor behavior from your social media platforms and planning to expand the content and resources they are gravitating towards on your website.  If you build it, they will come.  If they come, you can inspire them to believe.

Tip 4: What is your CTA?

How intentional is your website to create a call to action (CTA)?  Sure, you want to influence a purchase or create a path to users contacting you for more information.  Beyond that, though, what are your CTAs to build loyal followers?  Are you building in strategies and routes to inspire your visitors to do the things we talked about at the beginning of this article?  Are you sharing your environmental, corporate culture, or social advocacy story with them in a way that provides them an invitation to become directly involved? 

Remember, people are invested in and loyal to things that matter to them where they are.  They already have a well-defined worldview and set of guiding principles.  If you want to create a cult brand community, you have to be able to empower those that share your beliefs to become effective in impacting the things you care about and vice versa.  Share your brand promise as a call to action and make it easy for people to become involved in being part of the solution or growth. 

As we stated earlier, your website is your basecamp.  Having it be well planned and fully stocked with the equipment and resources you need to reach your goal will define how quickly, and how effectively, you get to stand at the pinnacle of your vision and view everything that you aspire to be.  If you’re ready to set camp, we’re ready to build something amazing with you for those that want to follow.  Contact Creative Energy today, and let’s get moving.