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It’s a little awkward to admit this but, I never heard of the phrase “Surprise and Delight” until sometime mid-2024. The idea of thoughtfully designing treats, surprises and cool experiences for the communities that you serve-I didn’t know that this was called “Surprise and Delight” in the online content creator space. These are the actions that truly appreciative entrepreneurs develop within their business to help them treat their community members and clientele well. While I did do “nice things” for my community members, I do think that in 2025 I’m focused on designing even better opportunities to spoil my community members in 2025.
Why? Life can be hard.
Working with and collaborating with me should ideally be a joyful, sometimes challenging and impactful experience. Building, growing and monetizing an online brand can be really difficult to do. Creating moments that make people happy should be a key part of your community building. Always treat people well without any expectation. Why? People will always remember how you made them feel.
If you’re needing some inspiration and ideas so that you can begin adding surprise and delight into your brand and community, I’ve brainstormed some ideas for you to try out. In a time when people aren’t authentically connected, doing something that is “thoughtful” can truly change how people experience you and your brand.
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Your Next $1000 (Dollars)
Are you needing inspiration and community to earn your next $1,000 dollars? I’m launching a live challenge that starts in June. It’s free, be encouraged inspired and stay focused as you continue to earn with your online brand as we go into the summer months. Why am I launching this challenge in June? Because summer can often be a slower time of year for many online brand builders-let’s not lose momentum and continue to stay focused. Go to creatorsgettingpaid.com/challenge to get on the waitlist.
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Free Surprise and Delight Ideas
Feel free to use any and all of these ideas to bring happiness to the people you’re building community with right now.
- Offer free mini coaching sessions-Be careful with this one because you don’t want to offer so many free seasons that it overwhelms you or eats up time for paid collaborations.
- Design and share free templates that help people experience a quick win
- Share professional and personal opportunities-This is one of my favorite things to do.
- Develop personal and professional opportunities to uplift your audience members’ brands and personal expertise
- Tell people about scholarships or grants being offered that you think they should apply for.
- Connect community members with media opportunities
- Shout out events to attend or apply to be a speaker/panelist
- Share your favorite content creator’s work in your podcast/website or on social media
- Send a video message “Hi Donelle, How are things going?”
Surprise and Delight Ideas
These Cost Money
- Buy gift cards so that people can “Treat Themselves” to something. Here are some examples of what that could look like. Do encourage the recipient to share what they did with the gift card on social media and tag you on those posts.
- $20 Visa Card-For a Coffee/Tea/Smoothie or some other small treat
- $50-A fun inexpensive experience or challenge the recipient to share what they did with the gift card.
- $100-Splurge on something you normally wouldn’t
- Gift Conference Passes-I’ve spent $700 in conference passes to gift to community members. I’ve figured out how I’ll do this and I’m excited about helping people connect with opportunities for less.
- If you can gift even more to help defray the cost of attending the conference.
- Gift card to pay for a flight
- Fun money/spending money for the recipient
- If you can gift even more to help defray the cost of attending the conference.
- ResortPass Gift Cards-I absolutely love ResortPass and I’m low-key a little addicted to this tool. It allows you to book time at hotels/spas or both and enjoy the facilities. You’re typically going to be able to use these spaces in-between the times when guests haven’t checked in yet.
Time to Add Surprise and Delight
Have fun with this process! Think of yourself as someone’s delightful person who’s excited to share what they love with others. Be someone else’s Fairy Godmother, Big Brother/Sister, Joyful Warrior-be that person for someone else.
You may be the only person who truly understands and supports the work that one of your wonderful audience members are building.
Creators Getting Paid
Don’t forget to join Creators Getting Paid. Creators Getting Paid is a community resource that shares online money making strategies, case studies and more. For $8 a month or an annual payment of $76 you’ll gain access to workshops, case studies, creator conversations, co-working days and more. Go to creatorsgettingpaid.com/newsletter to begin your Creators Getting Paid journey.
