The word gets just about as much overuse as sustainability. What exactly does “community” mean? Why is community important for a successful sustainable marketing strategy?
The dry definition goes something like this: “Community is a cohesive social group or entity of human individuals possessing a unity of will and sharing interests, intents, beliefs, resources, preferences, and needs, within the larger society.” The more helpful definition (for sustainable marketing at least) describes what it means to have a sense of community: it’s “a feeling that members have of belonging, a feeling that members matter to one another and to the group, and a shared faith that members’ needs will be met through their commitment to be together.”
Note the key words: feeling, share, faith, group… A sense of community goes beyond minds, it captures hearts; it goes beyond self, it reaches others like us. Marketing sustainably means creating a sense of community around a brand: engaging customers on an emotional level, fostering their togetherness, and helping them connect and share.
See this summary of the psychological sense of community for more on McMillan and Chavis’s Sense of community.
