#1 - Community in a funnel | HelioHype | 💜💛

Hello to you, my Helio! I’m glad to see you shine even brighter ;)Today you’ll get to know more about how community building is used in different situations and “funnels.”

You might wonder what a “funnel” is.Simply put, it’s a term to describe the journey of a person going from being a random stranger to a loyal fan (buyer, whatever) of you, a brand, or anything else. A simplified version of it will sound like:

But I don’t like this one. Let me show you the way I see people’s journey to falling in love with the personal brand of an influencer and a brand.

What do all of those arrows mean?

If we talk about the personal brand, our aim with a community is to get your audience of lurkers to become contributors and supporters. That’s why we give your followers a space to talk. In return, those loyal fans of you influence random strangers and followers, encouraging them to enter a community too. That’s how word-of-mouth works! You’d much rather join someone’s community if your friend talks about it, not because you saw an ad, for example.

If we talk about brands in general, the goal is to make people brand advocates. Those brand advocates would become your main engine for converting one-time buyers into advocates. 

Let me make those two terms clear.

Brand Fans vs Brand Advocates

Brand Advocates: People who are ready to promote the brand by telling their neighbors about it, creating UGC (user-generated content), or just walking on the streets in branded t-shirts.

Brand Fans: Those are just silent brand advocates. They love your product too, but for some insecure reason, they don’t talk about it that much.

Everything seems to be so clear now. But some of you still have one question.

“What should a creator make a community about?”

If you have an audience that you built around a certain skill that you have (a.k.a writing), you should absolutely teach it to them! Most of people will say now: “Create a course!” But I can shout to you all in return: “Don’t forget about a community!” Community and course have a lot more advantages over a course-only approach.

See, this is the power of connecting people together and holding them accountable (so that they can stick to your advice and be satisfied with your course). People were hardwired to value meaningful interactions and networking. After all, that’s what we used to love since the dawn of humankind.

That will be the last picture that I will show you for now. It clearly illustrates how the only thing that hasn’t changed throughout history is our passion for communities.

I hope this short letter made you know more about the significance of communities. If you have any questions, suggestions, or anything else, just reply to this e-mail or write me a DM ;)

I wish you a sunny Sunday!

Bye, Valeria