Need inspiration for your 90s playlist? Go see Pitchfork’s Best Songs of the 1990s. Want a film to watch? Time Out’s Best Movies of All Time can help. Were you wondering who might be harnessing the transformative power of curiosity to solve today’s most pressing problems? The Eames Institute’s Curious 100 is the list for you.
We love to consult a list. We might like to argue who or what is on the list. But there is also reassurance that someone else has made a list, and saved you the effort of doing so.
Top 30s, 100s, and 250s are a trusty staple of the publishing world. They are a device around which to create content, host a live event, generate PR, and win new friends. The List is an intellectual exercise, a chance to rank things based on what matters to you. Their publication can also be an annual event, a date around which to build other marketing activity.
Which makes it surprising the List concept is ignored in Customer Advocacy. Everything in the paragraph above applies.
If you’re worried about ranking customers (and, as a consequence, ranking one of them last) then steer clear of the definitive. Go the GQ route. Instead of Men of the Year, go Customers of the Year. Forbes creates a buzz around exciting names to watch in its 30 Under 30 list. It’s not suggesting these are the only 30 names to watch, just ones that you should keep an eye on.
The List could include customers already in your advocacy program. It could include customers you’d like in your program. Bringing them into the List, and creating a platform to tell their story, might help bring them onboard. You might not agree with Time’s choice of Person of the Year, but you can’t deny it won the magazine exclusive access to interviews and photoshoots.
If nothing else, the process of making a List might remind you of what’s important, of names that are missing, and who you’d like to include next year. It should be #1 on this year’s to-do list.