When Customers Create More Customers: Creating Superfans  ## Document Notes ## Highlights - **Experience Is Your Hardest-To-Copy Differentiator** - Customer experience is the primary differentiator that competitors struggle to copy. - Experience determines whether customers remember, forget, or recommend your brand. Transcript: Brittany Hodak I think experience is the bucket in which everything else sits. So sales, marketing, ops, service, all of it. I always say experience is everything. It's the number one differentiator between your brand and every other brand. It's the hardest thing for your competitors to copy. But everything is experienced. Every part of it from pre-purchase to post-purchase, all of the touch points are giving evidence that people use to shape the way they feel about you and to shape how likely they are to Talk about you or not. Are they gonna say something negative? Are they gonna say something positive? Or more likely, are they gonna just forget about you? ([Time 0:06:20](https://share.snipd.com/snip/b2bc9332-d5a8-4803-8170-36f63a9de92c)) - **Fandom Happens At The Story Overlap** - Superfans form where your brand story and a customer's personal story overlap. - That intersection makes your product personally relevant and hard to replace. Transcript: Brittany Hodak That overlap, that intersection where your thing, whether it's a product or a service, becomes so relevant to their life that they can't ignore it and they don't want to make a different Choice. That is where super fandom happens at that intersection. ([Time 0:11:17](https://share.snipd.com/snip/54a9b51d-6aff-489f-bac5-f7aa9a226aee)) - **Start With A Clear Brand Story** - Define a clear, memorable brand story so prospects understand why to choose you. - Use that story to align your team and avoid competing as a commodity. Transcript: Brittany Hodak So super is an acronym and the S in super is start with your story. Perfect. Michael Stelzner Tell me more. Brittany Hodak So starting with your story is really all about defining how you are unique, how you differentiate yourself from everybody out there doing something either similar to or identical To what you do. Why should I choose you? One of the hardest things to get a handle on is how many prospects you lost before you knew they existed. How many people were told about you and said, meh, and moved on. And so having a story that's compelling enough for people to not want to ignore, and then having a story that's compelling enough for people to want to share once they hear about it or Experience it has to be the foundation, has to be part one, because if you don't know what it is that you're doing to deserve super fans to differentiate yourself, it's going to be nearly Impossible for everyone on your team to be on the same page about how they bring your brand to life. ([Time 0:11:36](https://share.snipd.com/snip/158ac754-9b06-406f-821f-bd03111ddb97)) - **Ask Customers How They Describe You** - Ask your best customers what they'd say about you to capture authentic messaging. - Record and reuse those customer phrases as testimonials and story material. Transcript: Brittany Hodak Yeah, well, one really good place to start is ask your customers. I like that. Not just for testimonials, but you could say to your best customers, hey, if you were gonna tell someone about us, what would you say? And then just listen to what they say because oftentimes like what's the expression? It's hard to read the nutrition label from inside the box. You know, it's helpful to have an outside perspective. And testimonials are another form of stories, right? Like a customer story. But asking a customer, hey, what do you say about us is going to uncover what they think is interesting, what they think is memorable, what they think is important or different. ([Time 0:16:02](https://share.snipd.com/snip/56aa4d34-fdd6-4ac0-9347-67da43463b87)) - **Understand Their Story First** - Map what matters to customers to move from commodity to the perfect solution. - Use empathy to identify their struggles and desired transformations. Transcript: Brittany Hodak So next is you and you is understand their story. So whether it's the customer, whether it's a stakeholder, whether it's an employee, whoever you're talking to, understanding their story. Because as you recall, I said that super fans are created where your story and theirs overlap. So you have to be able to quickly determine what is important to them. What is it that they're struggling with or what's the transformation that they're looking for? What do they need help with? And until you understand that big picture, 30,000 foot view, you're going to have trouble with like a market fit. But zoomed in, you're going to be a commodity. You're going to be seen as a solution, not the perfect solution, because you have to understand what it is that they're looking for. ([Time 0:20:47](https://share.snipd.com/snip/80dd42e9-0c55-404c-b656-716374bf6091)) - **One Question That Sparks Connection** - A Hawaiian cookie shop cashier asked every customer, 'Where are you visiting from?' - That single question let him connect, share stories, and delight travelers. Transcript: Brittany Hodak You know, I was in Hawaii recently and for a speaking event, and I stopped to get some cookies on my last day so that I could bring back here to my boys. And as I was waiting in line, I noticed the gentleman ringing people up was asking everyone the same question, which is where are you visiting from? And I thought it was so fascinating. And so he asked me the question. And you know, I told him that I was visiting from Tennessee. And I said, Hey, I'm just curious, were you guys trained to ask that question? Because I've noticed you asked that and then you had something to say about Japan, you had something to say about Florida, you had something to say about wherever. And he said, you know, I was taught to ask this two or three jobs ago at my very first retail job that I ever had. And I've just never stopped doing it because I think it's so fascinating. And it's so cool for me to think about these cookies that I make here in our shop every day with my colleagues are traveling all around the world. And it's so cool that I get to go home at the end of the day and say, oh, somebody is taking something that I made back to Cape Town or back to Sydney or back to Marrakesh. ([Time 0:23:39](https://share.snipd.com/snip/116faf3e-18aa-43e5-a633-35b8a1f66270)) - **Make Personalization Tech + Touch** - Personalize at scale by combining high-tech data with high-touch interactions. - Make each customer feel like your most important one using contextual signals. Transcript: Brittany Hodak P stands for personalized. And that is where these first two come together. So all of these build on each other. It's very much like steps on a ladder or layers in a pyramid. And once you have clarity on your story and your customer, then P is about how do I make each customer, even if you're doing it at scale, even if you're talking about hundreds of thousands Of people, how do I make them like the most important customer that I have? How do I do things that they are going to think, oh, wow, like this was a little easier than I expected, or this was a little more delightful. And in the book, I talk about the fact that basically, you can boil personalization down into two camps. There's the high tech and the high touch. And what the smart companies do is think about how those overlap and it becomes one plus one equals five. ([Time 0:28:37](https://share.snipd.com/snip/0efa0e27-fb5b-4301-96cb-777c0065da9c)) - **Snoopy Watch Face Feels Personally Yours** - Apple uses situational data to serve contextually relevant Snoopy watch animations. - Those small, timely moments make the product feel personally made for you. Transcript: Brittany Hodak I'm a huge Peanuts fan. I have a ridiculous amount of like licensed Pean I can see three Snoopy things behind me and my reflection just on my shelves. So my favorite accessory that I wear every day is my Snoopy Apple Watch, which if anybody has an Apple Watch and you don't have the Snoopy watch face on it, you are doing it wrong. It is the best. It's so much fun. It's so delightful. I love looking at my wrist every day and seeing cartoons. So there are about 150 different animations that are anywhere from like five to 15 seconds long. And it's just Snoopy and Woodstock doing cute things. Michael Stelzner With the little time hand thing which you're around. Brittany Hodak Yeah with the little time hand and for anybody who's like watching this interview here I'll try to hold it up to the camera. The thing that I love about it is it would be delightful on its own, right? This opportunity to like see their Snoopy. He's like going to work. Like he's probably like about to pack things up because the workday's over. So what Apple does is instead of just serving random ones, Snoopy and Woodstock interact with the hour hand. So like right there, you can see Snoopy. He's getting ready for dinner. He's like making a pizza. He threw the pizza. But what they do is use the situational data that they have to serve up contextually relevant cartoons. So for instance, at night, it's a night cartoon. During the day, it's a day cartoon. If I'm swimming, Snoopy is like swimming or he's scuba diving or he's surfing. If my heart rate is elevated because I'm exercising, Snoopy is exercising. There are so many fun little Easter eggs. And then on holidays, so there are certain ones that will only be served on Valentine's Day, on Easter, on Thanksgiving, on Halloween. And then my favorite, which this one just happened like a few days ago, my birthday. So on my birthday, there's one day a year, December 1st, where I get to see Snoopy and Woodstock birthday themed animations with balloons and cake and confetti and all of the fun things. Now, that is the only example in all of those 150 animations that is actually truly personalized for me. ([Time 0:29:31](https://share.snipd.com/snip/fdfcf9a3-a100-48d1-8e26-ede0e0678ec2)) - **Use Existing Data To Trigger Contextual Content** - Look for unused data you already have and deliver the right content at the right moment. - Build simple integrations to trigger contextual emails or messages around shipping and usage. Transcript: Brittany Hodak Well, I think some lessons are what is the data that you have that maybe you're not using in a creative way? I was just on the phone with a girlfriend a couple of days ago and she told me she'd ordered a hot chocolate maker and she thought it was so cool that the company had been sending her emails Based on the shipping information and then offering her content. One of them was, you know, hey, the post is going to be delivering this today. So we thought you might want to take a couple minutes to watch this unboxing video so you know exactly what's in the box. And then after it got delivered, the next email was, okay, we know you want to get started as soon as possible. So here are a few quick and easy recipes that you can make with the Cocoa Maker. So it wasn't just like, hey, you ordered this, here's a bunch of stuff. It was the right content at the right time based on information that lived presumably in a different system somewhere else. And somebody had built the integration. And the thing that I think is fascinating about this is, and again, it doesn't all have to be high tech. ([Time 0:32:57](https://share.snipd.com/snip/c36fa6fd-5255-4f8c-a6eb-88806098d893)) - **Small Extras Create Lasting Loyalty** - A plumber handed out potty-targets and a roofing crew used magnets to remove nails after installation. - Those small extras created memorable experiences and drove referrals. Transcript: Brittany Hodak Letter E stands for exceed expectations. And this is the one that's the most nuts and bolts customer experience. Like when people think about customer experience, this is sort of that pillar. I talk about what I call intentional experience design, which is a more accessible way to journey map to ask ourselves, what are the moments that matter the most before, during and after That interaction? And how can we exceed our client's expectations? Because we know if we are meeting a customer or client's expectations, again, that might put us in that commodity zone. It might be just as easy to forget about us as it is to become loyal to us because maybe 24 months goes by between the time that the toilet breaks and then, you know, the kid flushes the next Thing down the toilet two years later, which to use that actual example, I was just thinking recently about the fact that plumbers were a category that I never really would have thought I could have like an emotional connection to who I use. It was always just like, who is the home warranty company sending out or who is the first person that answers their phone or who comes up top in the Google search. But a couple of years ago, and probably like the third time that we had somebody come to our house, because one of the boys had flushed something down a toilet, a plumber said, Hey, are You potty training yet with either of the boys? And I said, Yes, we are with my older son. And he said, Do you know about the targets? And I said, No, it's target. And he said, oh, they're the best. This is how we taught my little boys to not be all over the place. And they work so well. And he pulled out a stack of like poker chip sized little paper rings and they had dinosaurs on them. And he said, you just drop one of these in the toilet. And then when the boy aims at it, if he has good aim, the dinosaur sinks. And so it's a game. Like, can you sink the dinosaur? And I thought, not only was that so brilliant, not only was that like a total differentiator, it made life easier. It really did help my boys both first. Like, that's how they both learned how to like not be, you know, super messy. Like, can we sink the dinosaur? And so do you think that his card made its way to the refrigerator and is still there years later? Of course it did. And of course it is. And it's not because he fixed the toilet faster than the last guy who had to come fish to Thomas the tank engine truck out of it. It's because he went above and beyond. He exceeded my expectations. He didn't just do the thing he was there for. He used the information that he had and he made my life better. ([Time 0:36:50](https://share.snipd.com/snip/45a43b81-8541-44ad-b2cc-d3b303997412)) - **Repetition Is How Reputation Is Built** - Repeat intentionally: consistency compounds into reputation and referrals. - Turn everyone into an 'acting chief of experience' with systems and processes. Transcript: Brittany Hodak I can't leave you just with soup. Yes, the R in super stands for repeat. And it's a nod, not just to the fact that you have to consistently do these things over and over again. You can't just exceed expectations once and be like, we did it, we're done. It's about the repetition. So in my book, I get into the systems and the processes that we need to put into place to turn everybody on our team to what I like to call the acting chief of experience. But it's about the fact that consistency compounds. Repetition isn't boring. Repetition is branding. Doing the things that we do again and again and again, committing to the things that we know we need to do to set ourselves apart, to differentiate ourselves is what creates not just an Amazing experience, but a predictably amazing experience. The kind we want to come back for again and again, the kind we want to tell our friends about. I'm sure, Michael, you have had the experience of going to a restaurant for the first time, having just like the greatest meal, thinking that you can't wait to go back and have it again, Going back again two weeks later, and it's okay. And then you've got all this cognitive dissonance of like, oh man, was it supposed to be okay? I just got lucky the first time or was tonight a bad night? If I come back a third time, is it going to be worse? Is it going to be good again? Should I hire something different? And so what do you do? Oftentimes you just go eat somewhere else, right? Because you don't want to, A, set yourself up for failing and having a horrible experience, or B, to continue to second guess yourself after the fact of like, oh, well, it's not going To be consistent. So the R stands for repeat. Elizabeth Arden said repetition makes reputation and reputation makes customers. ([Time 0:43:06](https://share.snipd.com/snip/648bcf6b-7b2a-49ce-88ec-ca27743127db))