Unless you’ve been behind a rock or on a remote tropical island recently, you will have struggled to have gone through a whole day without seeing/hearing some sort of reference to Taylor Swift.
The downunder leg of the juggernaut that is her ‘Eras’ tour saw sell out crowds (her MCG concert crowd of 96,000 is the largest she has played to), scalping, and begging of tickets go to new heights (or is that depths?) and almost unprecedented levels of news coverage – even on the normally unflappable ABC.
What’s fascinating is that almost none of this coverage is about Swift herself, nor her impressive back story, or her supercharged talent and commercial success.
Rather, it’s about her fans, the so-called ‘Swifties’ and that brand of hysteria known as Swiftmania.
Known for their willingness to line up for hours, just for the privilege of dropping close to $1,000 on tour merch (including $120 hoodies and $50 caps), these are the superfans powering the tour that experts project will easily be the most commercially successful concert tour ever.
It’s already the first tour to cross the billion-dollar mark, according to Pollstar’s 2023 year-end charts.
Not only was Swift’s landmark Eras Tour the number one tour both worldwide and in North America, in 2023 but she also brought in $1.04bn with 4.35m tickets sold across 60 tour dates, the concert trade publication found.
2024 is likely to see a repeat of those numbers as she takes her tour around the world, meaning $2 billion is realistic.
(One Sydney academic estimates total merchandise sales for Swift will top $66 million in Sydney alone, with the artist to bank $22 million).
Incredible numbers in any context.
So who are the Swifties? If you said young females, you’d be partly right.
US research by Morning Consult, published in Business Insider, found that ‘Swifties’ skew female, make under $50,000 USD and are suburban millennials. But that skew is only slight, with 48% of her fans being male, and one quarter of her fans making $100,000 or more per year.
55% of her fans report as Democrats, with the balance evenly split between Republicans and independent.
The psychology of Swifties
Various experts, including psychologists have jumped into the fray, trying to explain the ‘science’ behind Swifties.
One such expert – Tasha Seiter – explained to ‘Psychology Today’ that:
“Swift-lovers see their life experience mirrored in her songs. They feel understood and validated, like they aren’t alone in the confusion, the loneliness, or the happiness.”
She goes on to explain how the experience of being validated activates the reward and social connection areas of the brain (the ventral striatum and middle insula), creating a sense of feeling more connected. Swifties connect through the same feelings of being understood and validated:
“Not only do her fans see their own life experience in her songs, they also feel a sense of community with the millions of other believers uniting around the common human experience of growing up, feeling confused, lonely, and free, all at the same time.”
It’s about vibing with your tribe
Of course what we are talking about, in simple terms, is a tribe, and all the positive effects individuals get from tribal membership. This too is backed by science, with one study of 120,000 respondents finding that closeness to one’s community was a strong predictor of personal happiness. Other studies have found that loneliness is as bad for your health as smoking 15 cigarettes a day and worse for your health than obesity, while a sense of belonging reduces risk for depression, dementia, heart disease, and early death.
Heavy stuff.
The tribe is a powerful marketing concept
The concept of the tribe is just as relevant to B2B marketers as it is to understanding Swifties.
In an era of globalisation, big data, and personalisation, companies are re-evaluating the traditional, demographic-based approach to customer segmentation. The image a brand promotes—and how a brand manages hot topic issues—is essential to appearing authentic and genuine to its consumers.
Tribal Marketing – the practice of identifying consumers as a group based on common collective behaviours rather than demographics – is gaining popularity. The objective of tribal marketing is simple: to become part of a community as a brand sharing strong values with its members. The idea is to understand and respond to the identity of a tribe of consumers while offering products, services, or actions that meet their expectations.
For companies looking to use tribal marketing, it becomes critical to understand the tribe and its interests, in order to find the positioning and the communication that will invite action. Brands must engender a strong feeling of recognition and belonging, before being fully integrated into a community.
When using a tribal marketing strategy, it is essential to take care of your approach and your communication. When joining a tribe, a brand must show maturity, transparency, and authenticity. It’s important to focus on creating an emotional connection first and foremost, rather than directly promoting a product, service, or offer.
If advisors are your tribe, Ensombl is the place
Now in its 10th year, the Ensombl platform has grown to around 8,500 users, and around one in three advisors. There is a very strong sense of community among users, underpinned by an ethos of collaboration and the sharing of wisdom, resources, and learned experiences. In this sense, you could say they are very much a tribe.
As with any tribe, newcomers need to gain trust before they will be accepted. That means they need to be seen to give, rather than take, and need to demonstrate that they put the interests of the tribe first, before their own.
It may take time, but the effort can be worth it, as once you are accepted as a trusted, valuable member, it’s much easier to be a part of the tribal conversations.
If you want to talk to time poor-advisors, the approach is simple. Become a member of their tribe, by showing you don’t want to spruik product, you want to solve their problems, make them better as advisors and business owners, and make the profession of advice better.
At Ensombl, this is what we do, and we’d be happy to show you how. With our help, you’ll be “Flying in a dream, stars by the pocketful” (apologies Taylor).
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