Courage starts with the willingness to put quality over quantity, have real conversations with people, and let them know what an organization is all about. But it doesn't stop there. Customers and employees become advocates when they can connect their passion to the company and shape its message into their own. It takes courage to allow your fans to be your company's voice—for better or worse—and let them co-own a company's success.

And what about that "What if someone says something bad about us?" question? We'll let Jay Gillespie of Fiskars answer that one: "It's okay to hear the bad things, because now you can fix them." And that's as brilliant as it is simple. But it does take courage.

Love is a circular transaction. By becoming fans of your fans, you kick off the process of returning the love. Yes, you heard us correctly; we believe that it's time for brands to become fans of their fans. Consider how much the praise and support and admiration you receive would be amplified if you, the brand, were to recognize those fans—and, in turn, to praise them. This also acknowledges that it's not about you, and that it never was. As you reinforce that fact with your fans and turn that spotlight on them, the more love you'll receive. See? It's cyclical, and cyclical equals sustainable. When this philosophy begins to take root, it won't be long until you'll be famous for the people who love you ... for the way you love them.

Shared ownership must be an intrinsic part of the movement from the very beginning. It's a vital part of everything you've read so far, and everything you'll read in the rest of this book. Finding the passion conversation in others means that you're asking them what they think, which inherently makes them feel valued. And feeling valued is a direct conduit of them buying in and caring about what you're doing, since it's based on their direct input. It's those first conversations in which the seeds of shared ownership are planted.

Even the barrier of entry creates shared ownership, because down the road, you're putting those keys in the ambassadors' hands and letting them answer the door when someone rings the doorbell. And now they're the ones who are inviting whom they deem worthy to join the movement.

But one of the greatest things that shared ownership can do for your movement is protect you. If you're giving ownership in the movement over to your fans, then they are the ones who will come out of the woodwork when you need it the most. They will look out for you in a thousand different ways—and the people who are actually coming to your defense will surprise you most of all. You might expect it to be the loud and the proud who are already spreading the word about you on a regular basis, and while they'll be there for you, the wallflowers will be there as well. They might not be singing your praises to total strangers, but they'll be the ones who provide you support when you need it most. Shared ownership means that your fans' success is your success, and vice versa, in good times and bad.

Go back in time with us for a bit: In early spring 2001, South Carolina's government agencies for tobacco control, health, and prevention (DADOS and DHEC) were getting their feet wet in youth tobacco prevention. Thanks to the massive master settlement agreement that many states received, South Carolina was in the beginning stages of organizing a youth tobacco prevention program.

The job of gathering a ragtag patchwork of adults and teenagers to comprise the related efforts fell to DADOS. On one particular Saturday, the collection of teens, adults, and government agency folks had a single mission: come up with a name for the South Carolina teen anti–tobacco use program. At the end of the day, the adults in charge were delighted with the new name that they had all but forced on the teens: LIFE. The adults left for home, happy with themselves, and the teens left thoroughly uninspired.

Two young women, sisters from Greenville, reached out to their adult advisor, Carol Reeves, a director for a local coalition, the minute they arrived home. Heather and Nikki expressed their frustration that the adults chose a name for the teenagers' program. Reeves took their sentiments to heart and voiced her concern with the other adults in charge. After many conversations, it was decided that the group would go through the exercise again. And this time, they asked us—since we had several employees volunteer for Reeves's coalition—to facilitate a work session to get consensus on a name and a plan for the fledgling youth program.

We jumped at the chance to do so, but only if it was just teenagers. In other words, no adults besides those from Brains on Fire would be in the room. Needless to say, that idea didn't sit well with the adults, but everyone finally agreed, and the meeting was planned.

You would think that getting the adults out of the room would let the kids get down to business, but that wasn't necessarily the case. A few of the teenagers even showed support for the name that had previously been chosen. We faced the conflict head on and got the teens engaged in a conversation to help us figure out the lay of the land.

The opportunity to build something new gave the majority of the teenagers something few had ever tasted: ownership. And watching this was not wasted on us. Seeing their eyes light up and witnessing their engagement would soon become a cornerstone of the movement.

We wish we could say we solved the name issue that very day, but fate had a different story planned. That very night after the session, those same two sisters who were the reason for calling the meeting stayed up all night, determined to put their thoughts into action. Those thoughts led to a passion-inspired message: rage against tobacco-related illnesses, rage against the tobacco industry's manipulation tactics, Rage against the Haze.

They fired off an e-mail to Carol Reeves and us. We remember reading that e-mail and sitting in stunned silence. It was perfect, but would our state's government agencies buy it?

A final work session had been planned, so the girls decided to wait and present their idea at that meeting. Reeves worked behind the scenes to get both government agencies to agree that whatever name the teens agreed on, the state had to back it. Talk about a leap of faith!

As the session was called to order, Heather and Nikki took their turn and presented their idea for the movement's name. I wish you could've seen the eyes of the adults as the name was revealed. It was like a verdict being read in a courtroom. As expected, the views in the room were split. So a vote was taken, and Rage against the Haze was born.

Looking back, it was simple: Allowing the teens—the ones on the movement's front lines daily—to name the program was empowering. It gave them a voice from the very beginning. And it instilled a sense of ownership at the ground level. This would be crucial over the coming years.

The Fiskateer movement was ignited in 2006, and from the first month of its existence, we have received remarkable stories of members coming to the rescue for the brand.

As we've already told you, Fiskars makes more than just orange-handled scissors. At the time the community began, Fiskars also made consumables—paper, stickers, and the like—that crafters use to scrapbook and decorate to their hearts content. These papers come in many different patterns, and some even have glitter and other ornamental elements on them as well.

One of the first reports we received from a Fiskateer in the general community told us about a routine visit she made to her local scrapbooking store to replenish her supplies. She noticed that the merchant had a large display of Fiskars papers near the front of the store by the windows. As she approached the trays that held the paper, she saw that the papers' edges were curling up. She alerted the store clerk, who said she was going to move them to the back of the store so they wouldn't be in the sunlight. Apparently, because of so much glue and other substances on the paper, the sunlight was causing it to curl. While a normal, everyday crafter who didn't feel a sense of ownership in the brand might have not given this another thought, an empowered member of a community—who believes that Fiskars's success is her success—felt compelled to take action. And since she had a direct pipeline into the company, she contacted a lead Fiskateer, who contacted Fiskars engineers—who then literally stopped the presses on the next run of that particular paper, saving Fiskars hundreds of thousands of dollars. That's ownership in action.

Another story of ownership involving the Fiskateers played out like this: There is a certain warning placed on all packaging that has a certain type of plastic in it in the state of California. It basically states that the plastic contained in the product has been linked to health concerns, and that some people, such as pregnant women, shouldn't handle the product. A statewide law requires that the warning be placed on all plastic products—regardless of whether the product has that particular plastic (which Fiskars products do not).

As the story goes, a woman purchased a Fiskars product, got it home, used it—then read the warning on the packaging and proceeded to flip out. And yes, she just happened to be pregnant. She posted on her blog how Fiskars was a terrible company to do such a thing, and that everybody should ban their products. She talked about writing her congressman and taking legal action against the company. She went on other crafting message boards and blogs to say the same thing in an attempt to express her views to as many people as possible.

As all public relations departments would do, Fiskars prepared a statement to clarify everything. But before they could release it to the press, many members of the Fiskateer community found the posts and responded. In fact, they came out of the woodwork, did a little bit of homework—and were able to post follow-up comments on those blogs and message boards that completely defused the situation. That, again, is shared ownership in action.

When Rage against the Haze was ignited, we saw the writing on the wall when it came to budget. Whereas other states tucked their tobacco prevention monies into safe places where they could only be used for what they were intended, South Carolina was a different story. Rage didn't get all the money it was supposed to, and we knew that one day—and one day soon—the money would run out. So, as we have learned to do with every movement, we had to build it like it was going to last forever, and like we'd run out of money tomorrow. And it began with—you guessed it—shared ownership.

In 2003, two years after Rage was founded, the money did indeed dry up. Gone. None. Zip. We do what we can as a company, but we have to earn money to keep the doors open. So while we provided some support, our hands were tied. We gathered our teen leaders together and told them the situation. It wasn't that the South Carolina DHEC or Brains on Fire didn't support them; it was simply a matter of politics and lack of funding.

A lot of things could've happened at that moment, the most significant of which would have been that the teens looked around, felt satisfied with all the progress they had made in two years, and decided to disband the movement. Instead, they looked around, saw how much they had accomplished in the past two years, and decided to push forward. They weren't finished by a long shot. In fact, they were just getting started.

Right then and there, those teenagers took ownership of the movement. It was all theirs, and they ran with it. With very little money, very little support, and a helluva lot of determination, that group actually recruited more people into the movement that year than during the years when we had hundreds of thousands of dollars to spend.

Whose logo? Your logo? See, you're forgetting about shared ownership already; it's not your logo to lose. It doesn't belong to you, and you can't keep it sacred in some brand identity manual that sits on your shelf. So don't worry about people misusing the logo or using the wrong Pantone Matching System colors. It's your fans' logo. It's a badge of honor that they want to wear—so let them.

The IndieBound movement we ignited with the American Booksellers Association is a great example of this. Materials were created to kick off the program, based on "Eat. Sleep. Read." Soon, new content from the independent booksellers—which showed how they put their own spin on the messaging according to their own location and clientele—was showing up on sites like Flickr and YouTube. From banners that said "Snack. Nap. Read." and "Read. Think. Vote." to T-shirts that read "Peace. Love. Books."

Chief Marketing Officer Meg Smith of the ABA explains: "The ownership here has been translated to pride. And the words that the booksellers can use—the IndieBound words that they use to talk to their customers—underneath all that is this incredible sense of pride and excitement and enthusiasm and is a reinvigoration of what they do."

Marketers try to build messages that will spread. But as we discussed earlier, a lot of companies want you to spread their message. When it comes to igniting a movement, it has to be our message.

Love146—an organization whose mission it is to end worldwide child-sex slavery—understood this concept from the beginning. They are more than happy to collaborate with their supporters and give them anything they need to go and tell the story of Love146. And the result is amazing.

The group's founder, Rob Morris, elaborates: "We have kids donating $10, $5. We have a kid that donated $3 that he collected by putting a jar on his desk at school for other kids to contribute. That kid is part of the abolitionist movement."

Do a quick Flickr, blog, or YouTube search, and you'll see how members of the abolitionist movement have made the Love146 story their own. It's shared ownership in action, but it's only because Rob and the rest of the staff at Love146 made a conscious decision to let it happen naturally. They are thrilled that people spread the message however they see fit. It doesn't matter how, as long as it matters to the individual.

Having world-class designers in our midst, we're always curious to see how other creative people react to the idea of cocreating online and off-line tools for a word-of-mouth movement. So when we're out and about sharing our insights with others, the question ultimately arises: "How much of what you present gets actually implemented and produced?"

Creatives ask this question because most traditional shops are used to presenting all these great ideas and fantastic designs ... only to have them get picked apart. For a number of reasons, really. But eventually, unless you have one of those clients who gets it, the concepts and accompanying designs get dumbed down, and what you end up producing looks like everything else out there. It's a constant struggle for a lot of shops.

So what's our response? That the overwhelming majority of our concepts and designs get implemented when we help ignite a word-of-mouth movement. Why? Because it's not coming from a creative team that works in a vacuum. It's being cocreated with the people who will actually use the stuff. (Note that we didn't say "crowd-sourced" here, okay?)

Subjectivity goes out the window when you cocreate, since everything is based on conversations with the customers. We get around the brand police by showing them not what we want, but what the customer wants. It's a cocreated movement, and it comes from courageous insight.

But you have to be ready to accept the truth. Because true participation in people's lives through courageous insight opens up opportunities for deeper connections.

Do you want your ideas and creative concepts to see the light of day? Then don't start with the customer "in mind," but actually with the customer. Anything that comes straight from their mouths is pretty damn hard to refute.

You Have Permission to Change the System

A while back, some of the Brains on Fire crew were in Sydney having lunch with Roger Dennis, an innovation strategist from New Zealand. During this great conversation, Roger revealed something that he uses to encourage and activate advocates: a business card–size tool that has one simple message on it: "You have permission to change the system."

Wow.

Simply giving someone permission opens up a world of possibilities. They don't have to tread lightly or be afraid of repercussions. They don't have to fear the hierarchy; they have been given permission. When you give permission to employees, customers, and advocates, you are giving them a hall pass, a permit, official authorization. And the empowerment that comes along with that is amazing. As the fan cycle states, empowerment leads to evangelism. Evangelism leads to ownership. And ownership means that your fans' success is your success, and your success is your fans' success. That's what we call a win-win.

Such a simple yet powerful concept from Roger. The best part? It's not digital. It's not a Twitter strategy. It's not online social media. It's tangible. It fits in the palm of your hand. And it taps into one of the most basic components of human DNA: appealing to a person's sense of self-worth.

So grant permission—and watch what happens.

"Tell Me, and I'll Forget. Show Me, and I May Not Remember. Involve Me, and I'll Understand."

—Native American Proverb

In other words:

• Tell me: When you do all the talking, it's only a monologue. You're mixed in with all the other brands out there blathering away. People forget you very easily.

• Show me: Sometimes demos work. But again, demos are everywhere, from test-drives to free samples in the mail. Unless you make that demo experience very remarkable, you're not going to be remembered.

• Involve me: People look at things differently when you involve them. Maybe it's because now they have a chance to invest themselves in something. Involvement equals ownership. And as we've seen, ownership is powerful stuff.

So how can you involve customers in your company? Start small and then ask them—and then listen. There are so many companies out there right now that are asking and not listening. If you're doing it the right way, they'll give you ideas for involvement before long that you and your marketing department wouldn't think of in a million years.