Eleven years into this business and I’m having the best time – this time as a consumer. So if you read last week’s post or if you follow me on Instagram then you know one detail about me – I’m obsessed with our Peloton tread and bike. And, most specifically, I’m really a big fan of one of the teachers, Olivia Amato.
I was first introduced to Olivia’s classes over the summer when I started using the tread (I’ve only recently gotten up the nerve to try the bike… I actually can’t ride a real bike so there was some natural trepidation). What I love about her classes are that she is no-nonsense. She doesn’t get on the tread and talk about her life. I know little about her from the workouts. She gives me what I want – a really hard workout I don’t think I can finish but she somehow gets me to the end and I feel accomplished.
So, as any consumer of a favorite brand would, I started investigating on social and found out Olivia is very active on Instagram. So let’s just say I’m an all-out fan now. I’m not saying I bought a pair of running shoes solely because she had them, but she has the hot pink Nike Zoom Fly 2s and now so do I. Both my son (partially pictured above) and I talk about her dog Tobi a lot. A LOT. Through Instagram, Olivia has let those of us who feel like we know her – or want to know her – in. Just a little bit. Just enough to feel like we’re part of an inner circle.
So now it’s become a habit. I do my workout, I post on my Insta story and I tag Olivia. And at some point in December, she started responding. I feel like a 13-year-old getting a response from a makeup brand. I’m hooked. I love hearing back from her. I consistently screenshot these messages and send them to my family to prove to them Olivia and I are “friends.”
Ok ok ok. We aren’t actually friends. I can respect the boundary between student and teacher in the screen. The point is…. what this whole saga has shown me is the reason I got into social media engagement is alive and well. Consumers want to get to know people behind the brands. They want to feel like they are part of an elite group of raving fans of a brand. And having that brand – in this case the teacher – write this consumer back makes me feel like I want to keep engaging, I want to keep tagging her, I want to do her her workouts. Basically, I’ve bought in and I want to continue to buy whatever she is selling.
Meanwhile my teenager burst my bubble and told me that’s not really her responding to me… that she probably has someone doing what I do to engage with lunatic 40+ women who just want to be friends with the most fit person they’ve ever known.
Well.. whoever is running it, you’re doing it right. My hope for 2020 is that our team creates and fosters raving fans of all our brands on the same level of fandom as mine is for this.
by 
