Kings of engagement: building Facebook Fan base to 89,000+ users in 4 months

When Ben Federman launched 1SaleADay.com back in mid 2007, he focused solely on building his customer base. With a strong customer base and the best pricing for product on the market, Ben decided it was time to engage these customers on a more personal level. That’s when they decided to purposefully engage with their customers on Facebook.

Yes, they share their deals with the fan community but even more emphasis is placed on the relationships and building the strength of the community. According to Ben, their customers know that 1SaleADay.com is the best price for the product and so they come back every single day to see new sales. To further engage the customer, they added a joke of the day, history of the day, word of the day, stat of the day, buzz of the day, and additional deals. By adding these items, 1SaleADay.com was engaging customers at their site and building a community.

The positive feedback the company received helped them easily migrate to their Facebook Fan page with rapid success. Ben attributes this success to the fact that “Each customer’s input is important.” Ben attributes the rapid fan growth due to the level of personal engagement. What they have discovered is that people like their postings on their Fan page.

Unlike traditional companies, 1SaleADay.com engages customers/fans on their Facebook Fan page through conversation. Sometimes it’s weighing in on current events and sometimes it’s an event in the company. For example, when Ben announced he was going on a diet, Eli Federman, Vice President of 1SaleADay and brother to Ben took a picture and they announced it on Facebook. Immediately the comments came in---2000 comments in just 15 minutes. Some comments poked fun at him and some supported him. “It was all fun,” Ben tells me.

Another time they celebrated a birthday within the company and they decided to post the picture and turn it into a contest. The company engaged with the customers by asking the customers to guess his name, age, and position. This engagement eventually led to a contest for the best nickname for that same employee, turns out it was Ryan Meserole, Affiliate Marketing Director. By the way, fans voted on “Big Baby Num Nums” for his company nickname. Eventually every employee will have a customer-voted nickname. This type of engagement is very personal; one of the many reasons why company officials believe their strategy is so successful.

At 1 AM on May 4 Eli posted a poll question to the fans about whether they found Bin Laden’s code name “Geronimo” objectionable. Even at that hour, 1000 votes came in quickly. Their philosophy is that people are constantly bombarded by ads and pitches so 1SaleADay.com engages people within the community to share in other ways. According to Eli, “One way is to engage people in current events even at an ideological level without being too controversial. People appreciate that because they are able to talk about current events instead of being bombarded with the ads.”

With many companies forbidding Facebook time and even blocking Facebook access, 1SaleADay.com fully supports Facebook engagement. When I asked who is allowed to post to ensure that the content is “company approved”, Ben explained that anyone in the company is encouraged to come up with ideas. Those ideas get posted but Ben warns them, “Be prepared for the bombardment of comments.” Naturally, a few people monitor the Facebook content before it goes up. This strategy is how Ryan’s birthday picture came to be on Facebook. Ben adds, “Some status updates are inspirational spur-of-the-moment things,” as in the case of Eli appearing at work in sandals with a suit. Eli was taking a lot of flack so they decided to take a picture and let the customers vote. As predicted, thousands of comments were posted and the sandals were voted out. What better way to engage directly to get know your customers and allow your customers to get to know you personally?

For 1SaleADay, it’s about “Building community and being personal,” says Ben. “I go to work in shorts and a sweater every day. We’re all middle-class Americans here at the company. It’s important to us that our customers see that they are just like us. We want to get to know them on a personal level.” Ben encourages employees to come to work however they want in their own level of comfort. Ben adds, “When customers see that the employees are just like them, they appreciate it and relate to it.”

By emphasizing humor, really engaging, and making status updates applicable to everyone regardless of political persuasion, religion, background, etc. the diversity of content allows for the content to appeal to everyone.

In a previous article I wrote when interviewing Saul Berman, author of Not for Free: Revenue Strategies of a New World,Saul points out what needs to be done to attract customers in today’s business climate. As I think about the success that Ben and Eli have created with the 1SaleADay.com Facebook Fan page, I relate it to the strategies that Saul mentions that many CEOs struggle to accept but are inherent in this younger generation of business leaders. In their mid- to upper-twenties, both men grew up in the social atmosphere. Sharing of information is second nature to them and it’s obviously working out very well for their business. Ben says, “It’s our entire reality.” His only regret was not working on this social media platform two years ago…but two years ago he was focusing on building his customer base.

With 80 employees and growing, 1SaleADay.com is the largest independently owned daily deal site in the world offering customers products at 80-90% off retail prices. Ben told me this morning, “If we don’t have the best price, we don’t list it—PERIOD. Taking care of their customers is critical.” According to Ben, “We want to extend the savings to the customers so it always has to be the best price.”

With a lofty goal of connecting with every Facebook user, Ben and Eli are busy strategizing their next engagement strategy. The brothers disclosed some things that I am unable to announce today but it will involve opening up “everything” to customers and being “even more interactive with customers in the future”, Ben explains. Ben and Eli will be introducing every single employee to their customers—so customers can meet and know who writes the daily jokes, who buys the merchandise, and who packs the boxes for shipping, and more.

The company is currently working on an expansion to Florida to better accommodate customers with “better deals, better items, and better brand names”, says Ben. This streamlining of operations will allow for faster shipping processes and other improvements.

Appreciating the customer is more than talk at 1SaleADay.com where they offer promotions of free items. For Veterans’ Day, the company gave away $19 American flag LED lapel pins. Right now they are working on a promotion to give away silver-plated heart pendants with the words “We love you”. Some companies just tell their customers “thank you”, 1SaleADay.com actually shows its customers their appreciation through these promotions. Acknowledging the success of these campaigns, the company has “amped up the budget for promotional items and campaigns”, according to Ben.

As part of the process of the expansion, the company plans on much customer input to drive decisions for the new space—from picking the color of walls to what furniture to buy. This level of engagement is unprecedented.

What I find most impressive about meeting these executives is their true appreciation for their customers comes through genuinely. Neither mentioned this as attributing to their successful and rapid fan following on Facebook, but when anything is done wholeheartedly, genuine success is achieved. When ulterior motives and campaigns to attract temporary spikes are used, the results are not sustainable because the foundation is weak. 1SaleADay.com utilizes what is not taught in business schools: treat your customers right and engage with them and you will build loyalty—a lesson many business leaders can implement if they choose to do so.

That said, Ben has this shout out for his customers: “BIG THANK YOU to our customers for making this happen. They have taught me everything I know.” Ben admitted that, even though VP Eli graduated law school, Ben doesn’t have the formal education that most CEOs do but he has learned something most of them have forgotten in their climb to the top: that without customers, there’s no company. Ben admits, “Customers teach me. We are limited to 80 minds in the company but with the brain power of 76,000 customers, you can’t go wrong.”

Author's note: In the five days between starting this article and publishing it, the number of 1SaleADay's fans increased from 76,000+ to 89,000.

Bring it home: The lesson in this article should be fairly easy to spot—appreciate your customers naturally and genuinely engage them in conversation. Without them, nothing else matters to your company. Don’t be afraid to engage “personally” with them. Treat them as valued friends—it’s a little more endearing than treating them as valued customers.