To watch Derek’s impassioned endorsement of email on YouTube still warms my heart. We must remember—and help all our colleagues understand—that just because a channel is old by Internet standards doesn’t mean it’s not valuable. Just ask Derek and his email SUBSCRIBERS.
This is not to say that you can’t evolve your communications with SUBSCRIBERS over time, but you must explain the changes when you do so, and always, always, give them the opportunity to opt-out of future communications. This is a legal requirement in email and SMS SUBSCRIBER channels. In other SUBSCRIBER channels, it’s simply understood that consumers can delete your app or unsubscribe from a podcast at will. As with all of your JOINER audiences, the decision to stay or go is the consumer’s alone.
To summarize, SUBSCRIBERS want content from your company that is:
Convenient
Useful
Delivered through the channel they choose
Consistent with expectations set at time of subscription (or after)
This is markedly different than what your FANS want.
FANS
We use the term fan so frequently these days that it’s easy to forget that the word that really didn’t originate until the late nineteenth century. Take a look at this definition:
fan: “devotee,” 1889, American English, originally of baseball enthusiasts, probably a shortening of fanatic, but may be influenced by the fancy, a collective term for followers of a certain hobby or sport (especially boxing); see fancy. There is an isolated use from 1682, but the modern word is likely a late 19c. formation. Fan club attested by 1930.6
If you’ve ever been to a football match of any kind—be it soccer, rugby, Aussie, Canadian, or American rules—you know that FAN is short for fanatic and little else. From the body paint to the vuvuzelas to the waving banners to the obscene chants to the words shaved into (or out of) chest hair, FANS often embody what Charles Mackay so rightly called “the madness of crowds.”7 There’s just something about rooting your team on to victory that brings insanity to the surface and leaves common sense waiting at the door.
What FANS Want
This essence of fandom is emotion. Whereas SUBSCRIBERS want convenience, FANS want to express and share their passion for something they enjoy. They form emotional bonds with teams, entertainers, and products, and wearing their team colors or buying their favorite brand of shoes is as much an expression of their personal identity as it is their loyalty. FANS aren’t relationships of convenience like SUBSCRIBERS. They have heart-pumping, pulse-racing relationships built on passion—the degree of which is dictated by the quality of their experiences with the person, team, or brand in question.
The rise of “brand FANS” significantly predates the Internet and probably owes much of its growth to the rise of pop culture. We’re all consumers of soda pop, toilet paper, and automobiles; but we’re FANS of Coke (@Coke), Charmin (@Charmin), and the Ford Mustang (@FordMustang). In moving from the generic to the brand-specific, businesses provided consumers with the means to literally wear their loyalty on their faces (Oakley® brand sunglasses—@Oakley), feet (Nike® brand shoes—@Nike), and sleeves (Threadless® brand T-shirts—@Threadless). But before the Internet came along, it was a challenge for brands—other than those in sports and entertainment—to gather their FANS together.
That’s not to say it never happened. Consider:
In 1949, the Pillsbury Bake-Off got its start by whittling thousands of FAN entrants to 100 competitors who used Pillsbury Best Flour to make creations that wowed the judges. The competition now runs every other year with a $1 million prize for the winner.8
In 1976, 33 rabid FANS and collectors of Coca-Cola memorabilia met to form The Coca-Cola Collectors Club, sponsors of the annual “Springtime in Atlanta” convention for worldwide Coke collectors.9
In 1978, FANS of the Mini brand automobile organized the inaugural International Mini Meeting (IMM), a three-day camping event in Germany. Today, the event rotates locations around Europe, with over 10,000 Mini FANS attending IMM 2013 in Italy.10
How FANS Are Acquired
Nowadays, the job of aggregating brand FANS together is made far easier by FAN-focused, online channels like Facebook and Myspace. Facebook is obviously the 800-lb. gorilla of these two, having displaced Myspace years ago as the preeminent, global social media channel.d
If there is one thing you must know about Facebook, however, it is this: Facebook never created a Cleveland Browns FAN. Not one. Browns FANS are created in the same way they have been since their last NFL Championship in 1964—by geography, bloodlines, and experiences. I’m cursed to walk the Earth as a Browns FAN because I hit the trifecta: I was born in Toledo, Ohio (just two hours from Cleveland), my father was a Browns FAN (clearly a form of abuse), and I attended what was one of the greatest games in Browns history (the 23–20 double-overtime playoff victory over the New York Jets on January 4, 1987).e