Five Real-World Ways Businesses Are Marketing to Their Communities

It's every company's dream... having a community of customers who are so devoted to your company that they market to and evangelize among other members of their community—customers who feel a sense of ownership in your company and want to spread your message to others.

Such strong bonds between companies and their communities of customers aren't the norm, and they cannot be developed without great planning and dedication. But for companies that are willing to embrace and empower their communities, the results can be magical.

Here are five companies that have embraced their community of customers as their marketing partners.

1. Fiskars

Fiskars makes scissors that are pretty popular with scrapbookers. So Fiskars decided to go into the scrapbooking community and find members who were using Fiskars scissors in their scrapbooking.

After identifying these community members, it then created the "Fiskateers," a group of brand ambassadors for Fiskars. Then Fiskars set up these four Fiskateers—Stephenie, Holly, Cheryl, and May—with a Web site and their own blog. There, the Fiskateers blog about their crafting and scrapbooking projects, how Fiskars products are helping them complete their projects, and life in general.

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Mack Collier is a social-media consultant and writes for The Viral Garden and MarketingProfs Daily Fix. Reach him via mack.collier@theviralgarden.com and follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/mackcollier.