Dr. Aaron Ahuvia knows a thing or two about superfans. He co-authored the publication that popularized the term “brand love” and is the world’s most widely published and cited academic expert on non-interpersonal love. He’s the author of The Things We Love: How Our Passions Connect Us and Make Us Who We Are. 

Aaron is a professor of marketing at the University of Michigan Dearborn. Aaron researches, teaches, and consults for governments, non-profits, and corporations across the world, including Google, L’Oreal, Samsung, Microsoft, Procter & Gamble, Ford, and many more. 

In this episode, Aaron and I discuss the way our brains process love and how you can apply his scientific research to create superfans for your brand.

Show Notes

2:40 - How does Aaron define ‘brand love’?

3:30 - How is brand love different from interpersonal love?

7:08 - What are the steps to creating brand love?

7:39 - The difference between valuing something and loving it

9:30 - The human brain decides if something is a human or an object at two different times

10:05 - In order to love anything, your unconscious mind has to treat it as if it is a person

10:34 - The three different ways you can get your customers to think of your product or service as a person

12:55 - Brittany connects Aaron’s research on brand love to mascots

16:03 - Why it’s easier for some salespeople to cultivate ‘love’ than others

17:45 - In order to get people to love a brand at an unconscious level, you’ve got to get people to sort your brand into the social world

20:35 - The importance of cultivating brand love with your employees

24:30 - Why mission-driven companies are more likely to have brand love

27:13 - The correlation between religion and brand love

29:47 - How did Aaron coin the term ‘brand love’?

31:38 - What has changed over the last 30+ years since Aaron started studying brand love?

32:50 - What is Aaron a SUPERFAN of?

Get his book: The Things We Love