In Wisconsin, cheese has been a big part of their economy for 160 years. Recently, the Wisconsin Milk Marketing Board got together to create a massive new media campaign to strengthen the brand position of Wisconsin cheese.
At the core of this campaign was a mandate they put forth to their story tellers involved, that whatever content was created, it must add true value to people’s lives who visit the sites or receive content generated from this campaign. Yes, we are talking about cheese.
The campaign is composed of 5 interactive websites, liquid content, a number of social channels and social sharing tactics. Each site has a different purpose but all have subtle messaging to help you feel good about how Wisconsin cheese may just be better than some of the finest cheeses from other parts of the world. They are on a similar journey the California wine industry took a few years back and succeeded in, to help people understand and feel that many California wines are as good or better than wines from around the world.
To see the list of the 5 great websites and to read the entire case study, go here.
ShipServ, a B2B e-commerce marketplace for the maritime shipping industry, sells to an industry that is not social media savvy and highly skeptical of, in their minds, an unproven way of doing business. ShipServ’s customer is a shipping supplier. To make money, those suppliers must pay ShipServ to list their offerings on the site.
The Video Campaign
They created a low tech animated video, “ShipServ Pages: The Movie” using Lego characters and even had a hero/star of the movie, Rex, depicting a typical owner operator of a shipping supply shop. Then posted it on their social channels, website and had their sales people send out emails to their leads with a link to the video. The goal was a low pressure approach to educate and entertain prospects and move them to try their online marketplace. Their CMO, John Watton reported that is was, “Highly successful. The innovation is really in how we’ve integrated it with our other social media and content marketing efforts.”
Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) is betting the kitchen on their biggest product launch in years, the Chunky Chicken Pot Pie. In support of the multi-million dollar TV, billboard, and print ad campaign, they started a lower cost social campaign with interactive mobile ads inside the popular Pandora iPhone app. Their target – 16-28 yr olds.
The Campaign
KFC is running mobile banner and audio ads within Pandora’s iPhone app. While you’re listening to your custom Pandora radio station, you are bound to get hungry and as a KFC ad pops up you’ll see the Pot Pie, get a discount coupon, check nutritional facts if you’d like, and then find a location so you can buy some pies.
Read rest of case study here. It includes links to other KFC social media campaigns.
Kotex launched a creative, low cost, well executed advocacy/influencer campaign using Pinterest. Great video below expanding on how they did it and what the results were.
Kotex first looked through thousands of women’s pinboards in search of 50 power users with a large number of engaged followers on Pinterest who could be future Kotex customers. They then studied the 50 women’s boards to get a better understanding of some of the things they are passionate about. After the analysis, they created custom gift boxes for each woman filled with goodies they believed would resonate with them. I would estimate they invested between $50 and $100 per gift box.
Upon receiving the gifts, almost all 50 did as Kotex had hoped. They talked about Kotex online. Kotex then asked the women to reciprocate by opting in to the campaign to share their stories about the cool gifts they got.
At the time of the video below, there had been 2,000 interactions between the 50 women and their friends and almost 695,000 impressions.
A singular focus proves successful. By holding true to their philosophy to only provide content that helps their visitors find more ways to look better and feel better after using their products, Burt’s Bees found the formula for success in converting visitors to paying customers. They are practicing the “dynamic liquid content” methodology Coke has been preaching since late 2011.
Burt’s Bees was founded in 1984. They started by selling beeswax candles and have grown into a global brand making over 150 natural personal care products. Their mission is to “try to make people’s lives better every day–naturally.”
Hair Club, North America’s leading provider of hair restoration solutions for men and women created a mobile website with one purpose, to get mobile phone users to “click-to-call” for more information.
They worked with Google’s new free mobile marketing resource site to identify best practices in mobile marketing, from how to design their site to proper calls to action to move a mobile visitor to call their 800# or visit a nearby store. Their “click-to-call” button goes to a live sales person within seconds. Once a call is made, their close rate goes up exponentially.
Lesson Learned
There is still time to be an early adopter. Even though Hair Club’s mobile site is not visually appealing, it’s their effort to go mobile that paid off. Their competition is slow to act and they come up first on search from a mobile device leading to the clicks and calls. Click here for full case study.
Tod Maffin, President of engageQ digital, is a digital communications strategist, specializing in social media, mobile marketing, and viral marketing. [keynote speeches | bio]
In Wisconsin, cheese has been a big part of their economy for 160 years. Recently, the Wisconsin Milk Marketing Board got together to create a massive new media campaign to strengthen the brand position of Wisconsin cheese.
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Tod Maffin, President of