Every thusly often I ground on Amazon.com and notice the homepage has changed. Instead of seeing my usual browse history, the latest Kindle, Beaver State some other with kid gloves tailored offers, I retrieve a letter from Jeff Bezos.

A mates of months past, Jeff wrote to me connected a scroll and announced, "Earnest Muggles," in which he explained that the Harry Potter series would nowadays comprise available to me for free in the Kindle Possessor's Loaning Library.

On today's bring down, Jeff's telling me that Amazon Prime is celebrating its 7th day of remembrance and what a winner the program has been. And he's right. It's possibly the best $79 per year I've ever spent. Give up two-twenty-four hours Shipping happening nearly everything I buy, crying streaming of thousands of movies and TV shows, and the ability to take over books on my Kindle.

Only why is Jeff forever lecture Pine Tree State? What's with all these personal appeals from the creator of the world's largest online retail merchant?

Here's why:

In my work with online community owners, I often discuss the three Cs of client retention: placid, community, and character. It's the third that often confuses people. What does character have to do with client holding OR construction brand loyalty?

Character is really about positioning. In their classical book, Positioning, Al Reis and Jack Trout demonstrated that most people bequeath only remember a couple of things about you OR your caller. The takeout is that you can either decide what those few headstone things will be, or let the market decide.

In other words, you need to decide the most important things you want people to associate with you and actively forg to ensure that those are the things that immediately spring to nou when almost people think about you. And that's exactly what Bezos is doing.

Often, when I'm talking about character, I'm oral presentation to masses with unbelievably personality-impelled brands, serving them inject more consistency and congruency into their communication with customers and prospective customers and ultimately helping increase brand loyalty. But even at well-legendary brands like Amazon, or the New York Times, operating theatre Fast Company, it's no different.

Conveyance a brand's character surgery positioning is eve more important. As a thought experimentation, imagine that atomic number 3 a longtime reader of the The Street Journal, you picked up today's replicate to discover the front page riddled with stories of the latest celebrity outrage, the cast of The T-shirt Prop, and the summer's hottest weight-loss supplements. Would new customers start reaching for The Journal? They probably would.

But what near you, someone who reads The Diary for a selfsame ad hoc reason? You, World Health Organization has learned to look a certain character and has number to companion yourself with the brand? You would probably be flying for the hills.

Much like The Journal stays faithful its brand and to its existing client base, Bezos is helping to build a correct of expectations about Amazon by engaging me through character. Helium's victimization a chemical mechanism that allows him to communicate almost personally with millions of users, to perpetually drill home the points that He wants them to always receive at the top of their minds roughly Amazon.

It's one work of authentic communicating, and it's something that we can all learn a lot from.

—Noah Fleming is a strategic marketing advisor specializing in entrepreneurial growth, community edifice, client loyalty, and customer retention. Since 2005 he has worked with ended 500 entrepreneurs and business owners; come him on Twitter @noahfleming.

[Image: Flickr user Ross Pollack]