5 Tips from Marsteller's Andrew Nibley

The only real difference between an "influential" and an "e-fluential" is technology. "Where an influential might influence two other people to purchase a product or service, an e-fluential influences, on average, 14 other people," says Andrew Nibley, Chairman and CEO of Marsteller.

Here are Andrew's tips on making those e-fluentials work for you:

Tip #1. Identify your own e-fluentials
Every company has a certain amount of emails coming from customers -- and every email that arrives represents a customer with the ability to have an impact on your business. If you bought a CRM tool and aren't using it, start now. If not, find a way to track and mine incoming email.

Tip #2. Categorize your customers
Look at customers who have contacted you. Divide them into e-fluentials who are happy with your products and services and those who are not.

Tip #3. Keep the happy ones happy
Make sure that the e-fluentials who love you get your latest, greatest products before those products are launched to the public. People love to talk about the things they love, so give them something to talk about. Doing so also keeps a line of communication open, an important element in creating brand advocates.

Tip #4. Turn negative e-fluentials around
Find out what the unhappy e-fluentials are upset about. Then fix the problem. If you can change their view of your company and/or your product by solving their problem, you've got an advocate who will go to everyone in their social network and brag about how they got you to improve your products and services.

Tip #5. Re-engage the negative e-fluentials
Once you've turned a negative e-fluential into an advocate, give them the same treatment that you give the ones who love you. Lavish them with new products before they hit the market, so they continue to have reasons to talk about you on their networks.

More about Andrew:

Web site

Blog

Read Andrew's shared WOM vs. Ads presentation (PDF download)