Goodman School of Business faculty members Michael Armstrong, Maxim Voronov and Wesley Helms co-authored a piece published in The Conversation about ‘evangelist’ customers who actively advocate for companies.

Armstrong and his co-authors write:

Many consumers like the products they buy, but some people go beyond liking. They actively advocate for the companies and concepts behind those products.

Think of Apple Inc. and its trendsetting iPhones, celebrating their ninth anniversary in Canada on July 11. The phones are certainly high-quality. But many consumers, bloggers and media critics have also long raved about the firm itself and its overall design approach. Those “evangelists” don’t work for Apple, but voluntarily endorse it and its entire product line.

By comparison, other cell phone companies rarely inspire such devotion. People might like individual phone models, but don’t connect much to the manufacturer behind them.

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