promotion Archives • Page 2 of 2 • Identity Developments

February 2, 2010May 18, 2022

Cars vs Greeting Cards: Critique of Social Media Campaigns

I’m really looking forward to tracking the progress of two social media campaigns currently in progress, one complex and one simple.

Smart & Simple
American Greetings has launched a fun and easy Twitter Valentine’s Day campaign that asks followers to tweet a response to 14 daily questions and tag them with #LoveAG. Each day one winner will be chosen to receive $350 in gift cards.

Today’s question: “You’re a Grammy Award winner (like our beloved Taylor Swift) & you’re writing a love song-what’s the chorus?” Horrifying, humiliating, horrendous … but I admit I did submit my own awful chorus. Yesterday was “What does it feel like to fall in love?” Who knows what tomorrow will be, but I’ll be checking in to see.

That’s the entire campaign! Simple, engaging, brilliant! No content creation, no media development, no promotional costs. Just a good idea, $4,900 in gift cards, and the daily discipline and creativity for 14 days to tweet like crazy on the same topic without sounding bored or repetitive.

Could it be better? Even the best campaigns can be better in hindsight. The contest comes from the corporate branch of American Greetings (http://corporate.americangreetings.com, http://twitter.com/amgreetings). The consumer ecards and interactive site has a separate site and Twitter account (http://www.americangreetings.com, http://twitter.com/ag_ecards), which sadly is not participating in its corporate sister’s Valentine’s fun. In addition, I see no mention of the contest on either the corporate or www site, though there are plenty of other Valentine’s promotions. Why not include a homepage link with a fun visual, a blurb in the e-mail newsletter, a press release, shout it across affiliated Twitter profiles and the forgotten Facebook profile? Use the channels the company controls to get more impact for the campaign’s effort.

Going for the Gusto
On the other side of the spectrum, Volkswagen pulls out all the stops for their “Punch Dub” campaign that spans TV advertising, Twitter, Facebook, a YouTube Channel, a Posterous blog and their primary vw.com site. They’ve created a personality (Sluggy Patterson), an online game, video content, and more, all leading up to their spot on the Super Bowl. That’s a whole lot of promotion, friends. It’s sparkly, it’s now, it’s what cool is supposed to be.

The problem is (cringe) I just don’t care. This campaign feels like it’s talking at me, not engaging with me.

OK, so maybe I’m not the target demographic for VW’s Punch Dub. I’m female, I drive a Prius, I live in a rural town in Wisconsin, I probably won’t watch the Super Bowl. Sure, I like crotchety old guys with grizzled senses of humor as much as the next gal. And it’s neato that VW created this character around Slug Bug, a cherished childhood game that admittedly still creeps into my mind as I drive. But I don’t feel compelled to log in today to see what Sluggy has to say on his blog, or video, or tweets.

That said, I’m not exactly American Greetings’ target audience either. I might buy 6 traditional greeting cards a year and I hate ecards. Sorry, AG, I’m a Snapfish photo card girl.

So why does American Greetings’ simple campaign speak to me and VW’s fancy multi-channel campaign not? For me it’s the engaging factor. It’s the invitation to participate in the fun rather than sit at a brand’s feet and wait for it to speak at me. What do you think?

Originally posted on Web PieRat.

January 27, 2010May 18, 2022

Chickens, Eggs & Link Building: Visibility Requires Links, which Require Visibility

Finally, the chicken and egg dilemma solved on a t-shirt

Being the new kid on the web is hard. You need links to boost a site’s visibility, but it’s awfully hard to get links naturally without visibility in the search results. Sites can’t link to you if they don’t know you exist, right? It’s a little like the classic chicken & egg causality dilemma. But not really since if you don’t have a site you wouldn’t care about links anyway. Whatever.

The point is, link acquisition is hard work. Researching topically relevant sites and crafting the right approach for each takes time and creativity. Cutting corners leads to poorer conversion to links at best, and outright spam at worst.

BK’s Subservient Chicken

On the surface, link bait seems like an easier way to build links. After all, you just have to think of something totally cool that could go viral. “Subservient chicken? Ha, I coulda thought of that.” OK, fine, dreaming up a great idea is a good start, but what about content creation and promotion. The “If you build it, he will come” theory only worked when the interwebs were very, very small. And not really then, either. Let’s assume the audience actually gets to the bait. Once they devour it, cross your fingers that it will cause enough of a reaction to convert to links.

Frankly, if link building was easy, everyone would do it. It would be easy to spam. Which means that it wouldn’t remain valuable for long in the search engines’ eyes. Which also means it would cease to be effective for SEO, and we’d all be talking about something else.

For now, links rule the roost. What’s your go-to link building tactic?

Originally posted on Web PieRat.

November 4, 2009May 18, 2022

Social Promotion: Brands Hide Their Lights under Bushels

Once upon a time Jesus is said to have proclaimed that his followers shouldn’t “hide their light under a bushel.” Actually, I didn’t know Jesus coined the phrase until I looked it up. But 2,000 years later, in the same spirit, I proclaim that you shouldn’t hide your social networks under a bushel.

An incredible number of brands maintain profiles on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and other social networks. Why, oh why wouldn’t they promote participation in those networks on their sites and blogs?

Let’s pick on a couple of big brands:

Old Navy: The only place on their site where they promote their Twitter and Facebook profiles is below the fold on their stores & events page. Why not as a standard part of their template near the e-mail sign up form?

Banana Republic: Old Navy’s big sister similarly hides their social profiles away on the mysteriously named Style Download page. Again, its below the fold, even though they participate in 3 networks (Twitter, Facebook, YouTube). Who would think of looking for Banana Republic on YouTube? If they promoted it, even passively, on their site’s template and as a standard inclusion in their e-mail marketing template think how much more exposure they would gain. The sad part is that in a couple of months they’ll likely decide that this social media thing just doesn’t work, when part of the problem could be their own lack of promotion of these channels.

DSW Shoe Warehouse: They actually have an active Twitter presence, with tweets to the media that cover them, tweets to customers and tweets to other shoe lovers. But not a single mention of their Twitter life on their ecommerce site.

It’s as if some ecommerce sites don’t want to come out of the closet on social media. They want the benefits, sure, but they don’t want to rick losing their shoppers to a medium where customers can’t directly convert. Guess what, when a customer follows your brand on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or another social network, they’re actually volunteering — opting in — to receive your message. These are your brand loyalists. What do you gain by making it harder for them to follow you on the network of their choice?

Social media promotion has upside, folks. When that brand loyalist fans you on Facebook or follows you on Twitter, she’s saying “YES tell me more.” And when you follow up on that request to tell her more with intelligent tweets about your products, charitable initiatives, industry insight into coming trends, product intelligence tidbits, as well as sales and promotions, you’re helping her feel in the know. And she’s going to crow about that to her friends and fans. As your fans and followers spread your brand’s messages to their networks, it widens your brand’s reach for at least that single communication. As others in her network like what your brand has to say they too may opt in to be in the know. And now your brand’s sphere of influence has increased as well.

Let’s look at a couple of brands who do this well:

Kansas City Steak Co: Persistent Twitter & Facebook icons in the left navigation, on every page. They’re a nice size to draw attention but not dominate, and they may even be in the first page view on some screens.

Eastbay: Persistent Twitter and Facebook icons in with the footer with their e-mail sign up on every page. I could wish they were more prominent and perhaps a bit larger, but they’re there on every page at least.

Sure, critics may say something you’d rather they didn’t on your Facebook wall or in a Twitter mention, but a brand’s visible response to that individual in a caring and professional manner reflects well on your brand. Trust me, if they’re going to say bad things on your profile, they’re saying them anyway. Your management just doesn’t know it yet. Owning your brand and promoting it via social media just gives brands the chance to respond and turn something unpleasant at least into a neutral in the eyes of the fans following the brand.

You’re spending the resources to create and maintain social profiles. Claim them loud and proud to get the benefit from them, before upper management decides that social media doesn’t work for your brand.

Image source: Poeticpixel

Originally posted on Web PieRat.