Energizing the Groundswell: a must try, if you dare

    What happens when a YouTuber of 18 million followers announces that his favorite food is Chipotle? 

    When the famous YouTuber David Dobrik said multiple times in his massively viewed videos and popular Podcast, he loves a certain kind of burrito from Chipotle. The national restaurant chain sure heard his voice. They offered him a Chipotle Celebrity Card --- a special VIP card that grants unlimited food from Chipotle. 

    Wait, it gets even better. Chipotle partnered with the YouTuber by making his go-to Chipotle order the brand's official National Burrito Day burrito: the Dobrik burrito. Now, everyone can order David's favorite food from their phone app. 

    One year later, on May 5th, which is Mardi Gras, David Dobrik and Chipotle teamed again on TikTok. This time, the YouTuber personally picked 5 winners, who would receive the same celebrity card for unlimited free food.

    If this is not energizing the groundswell, I honestly don't know what else is. I can even hear how Dobrik's fans would be telling each other: "hey, do you know Chipotle made David's favorite a staple? Let's go try it out!" That's one kind of word-of-mouth, right?

    As Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff point out in the book, word of mouth succeeds in marketing because:"It's believable, self-reinforcing, and self-spreading", and "energizing the groundswell means tapping into the power of word of mouth by connecting with, and turning on, your most committed customers," like David Dobrik and his beloved Chipotle burrito. 

    And lucky for Chipotle, one of their most loyal customers has over 18 million followers, and they are more than happy to try a new burrito if it's David's favorite. A tiny push is more than enough to generate public attention.

    Now I've read about listening, talking, and energizing the groundswell. I realized that without the first two steps, energizing seems quite impossible for companies. The Lego Ambassadors program case is a perfect example of doing enough homework and research before tapping into power. 

    First of all, as a relatively small group of consumers, Lego's adult fans are making a big enough contribution to Lego's sales to be noticed by the company. That's listening well. Secondly, the already existing community, LUGNET, is influential and vibrant, but it is not created or owned by Lego. Trying to copy the idea on its own wouldn't be a good idea, so Lego came up with a brand new system to connect itself with the organization. That's talking to the groundswell. But as Li and Bernoff say in the book, "community is about people's need to connect, not your need to control, so if they're already there, respect it." And that's what Lego did. The company share product information with its enthusiasts, acknowledge their passion and achievements, and award people's enthusiasm with Lego bricks! Lego's way of handling the relationship with the LUGNET seems really impressive to me.

    And I have to say, Lego's strategy works so well, I sometimes forget its primary target customers are children.  

    But the question is obvious. If energizing the groundswell is so rewarding, does this strategy work well for every company? The answer is NO. Li and Bernoff believe that a company must have a strong brand or emotional connection with its customers for this strategy to work. Also, if there are many dissatisfied consumers, don't energize them, because the outcome can be unexpected. Plus, before tapping into the power of word of mouth, the management teams need to ask themselves, are we giving too much power to these customers? Do we really want them to be heard by other people? I think this is a real challenge for a brand to face when dealing with the overwhelming groundswell.