Company Ambassadors Drive Reputation, Sales, Innovation and Customer Loyalty in Online Communities

As a fledgling startup introducing search advertising software-as-a-service, Clickable had four live-or-die goals in 2008: build awareness, drive acquisition, loyalty, and advance product innovation. To meet these goals Clickable deployed a team of ambassadors – the Clickable Gurus - to help search marketers in popular online forums, spread the word about Clickable, and return with frontline insights to inform the product and community.

The Gurus are the cornerstone of Clickable’s marketing strategy. Clickable charged the Gurus with patrolling online search-marketing communities like Google AdWords, WebMasterWorld, and Microsoft adCenter. In addition, the Gurus submitted a weekly cutting-edge lesson to the Official Clickable Blog, and answered customer questions in Clickable Forums.

After a year of service and evangelism, the Gurus have made a measurable impact on Clickable’s bottom line: The program drove a 400% increase in new monthly ad spend on the Clickable Platform versus the previous year. This is significant because Clickable’s business model is to charge 5% of total spend managed. The company’s board of directors has committed to indefinite investment and continuation of the program.

The Clickable Gurus have been instrumental in driving Clickable’s reputation, customer acquisition, loyalty, and product innovation.

With the Gurus at the center of Clickable’s community and marketing strategy, the top of Clickable’s sales funnel, monthly visitors to the site, have jumped from less than 5,000 in July 2008 to nearly 100,000 per month as of July 2009. In addition to Clickable’s live chat and 800 customer service number, customers and prospects can get help with their questions from the Gurus in the Clickable Forums.The output of the Gurus within Clickable University, Forums, and Blog has become a critical arm of the product itself, with full integration into the online dashboard experience. Clickable Guru Tony has been invited to join Google’s exclusive innovation community, which is a frontline source of insight about looming developments in the world’s largest search engine. Google is one of Clickable’s most important partners, and frontline industry insights are critical to Clickable’s product and innovation team. The Clickable Gurus were also invited to become regular featured columnists on Search Engine Land, the preeminent trade publication for the search marketing industry.