How to Engage with a Social Media Evangelist is about enlisting a Social Media person to your campaign. There are only five people who consider themselves one.
For me, I am more of an Evangelist for Relationships..they are our most precious asset in our personal and business life.
Everyday evangelists are spreading the word to others about something that has made a difference in their lives. In order to enlist an Evangelist to your cause you need to establish a relationship with them by building a rapport, give them some Love and ask them to help you.
Where do you find them?
You’ll find these people in your communities, in your social networking, in places like LinkedIn Groups, Twitter, ask a connector, ask your friends to help you find them.
They are great conversationalists and connectors.
“A conversationalist is a person who is good at engaging in conversation.
Connector (social), people with wide social circles. They are the “hubs” of the human social network and …they know lots of people.”
Mike Gannotti describes what a Social Media Evangelist is.
“Above all else the social media evangelist is someone with passion about what they are doing. So much of the activity that takes place in social media is dependent on sincerity. Those who engage in the activities spelled out here who do so merely from an execution standpoint will sniffed out readily as insincere and exposed to the broader community doing more harm than good. In forming empathetic connections with an audience the evangelist MUST be doing so out of a genuine desire to connect with, and be helpful to, the audience. This is perhaps from an audience perception standpoint, one of the great differentiators between social media evangelism and traditional marketing. Ultimately the desired outcomes may look similar but the intent and methods to get there are much different.”
What kind of Evangelists are there? *Sorry I forgot to give credit to the WOMMA Association for the following Categories.
Buzz Marketing: Using high-profile entertainment or news to get people to talk about your brand.
Viral Marketing: Creating entertaining or informative messages that are designed to be passed along in an exponential fashion, often electronically or by email.
Community Marketing: Forming or supporting niche communities that are likely to share interests about the brand (such as user groups, fan clubs, and discussion forums); providing tools, content, and information to support those communities.
Grassroots Marketing: Organizing and motivating volunteers to engage in personal or local outreach.
Evangelist Marketing: Cultivating evangelists, advocates, or volunteers who are encour- aged to take a leadership role in actively spreading the word on your behalf.
Product Seeding: Placing the right product into the right hands at the right time, providing information or samples to influential individuals.
Influencer Marketing: Identifying key communities and opinion leaders who are likely to talk about products and have the ability to influence the opinions of others.
Cause Marketing: Supporting social causes to earn respect and support from people who feel strongly about the cause.
Conversation Creation: Interesting or fun advertising, emails, catch phrases, entertain- ment, or promotions designed to start word of mouth activity.
Brand Blogging: Creating blogs and participating in the blogosphere, in the spirit of open, transparent communications; sharing information of value that the blog community may talk about.
Referral Programs: Creating tools that enable satisfied customers to refer their friends. Read more about referrals
This ought to give you some thought in how to engage with someone who is a Social Media Evangelist.. become one for yourself.
In the meantime, Love & Happiness!