When a huge brand creates a Facebook fan page that generates an audience of more than 1 million fans, how should those fans be utilized and stimulated? Vitamin Water recently took advantage of their huge community by having them create and vote on a new flavor to be sold in stores. The contest took place on a tab within their fan page called the “Flavorcreator”. The application located on the tab required fans to create a unique flavor combination, name the flavor, write a witty description, and create a bottle design. This is Audience Participation at its finest.
However, as we commonly see on Social Media platforms, even the best contests need to be set free. Holding a contest for fans of Facebook eliminates the avid YouTube browser. This is where it becomes hugely important to Know Your Audience before asking them to participate.
5 Questions Before Asking a Brand’s Audience to Participate in a Social Media Contest
- Can the contest/ campaign be fluent on all social media platforms?
- On which social media platform does the average consumer most often spend their time?
- What is in it for the consumer?
- Will the consumer want to promote their participation on their social media profiles?
- What is the longevity of the campaign?
If all of these questions can easily be answered, it could be possible to allow a fan base of over 1 million people to choose a brand’s new product.
5 Benefits of Consumer Participation
- Consumer approval
- High ROI potential
- Increased awareness potential
- Brand Appreciation
- Increased Fans across Social Media profiles
Vitamin Water flexed their Social Media muscle by knowing exactly what their fan base wanted. The majority of the campaign existed on Facebook, while promotional videos existed on YouTube with celebrity appearances by Steve Nash and 50 Cent. However, voting for the new flavor took place across multiple levels of Social Media platforms. Every tweet, image, blog post, etc. on Twitter, Google Blog Search, FoodGawker, and Flickr were weighted as a form of voting for the winning flavor.
As a result, Vitamin Water was able to achieve popularity and recognition on huge news sites declaring them as the brand taking chances. Whether or not Social Media masses agree with the flavor choice is another question.
14 Comments
“the accolades for taking chances” Nicely said! Any “Win” in Social Media should come with this. Unfortunately many do not. It is definitely refreshing to see brands taking risks!
Great post Stephanie. I think the rewards gained in popularity and recognition, plus the accolades for taking chances, far outweigh any potential negatives related to flavor disagreement. Have to figure not everyone is going to be happy. Plus that's one more bonus to likely keep the discussion going and the brand awareness alive.
"the accolades for taking chances" Nicely said! Any "Win" in Social Media should come with this. Unfortunately many do not. It is definitely refreshing to see brands taking risks!
Great Post. Really liked what you had to say. Could you give us the downsides as well. Nice to be prepared with the reason something might not be a good idea to crowdsource.
What an excellent question! The biggest downside of Customer Participation is not having control over what is discussed. Sometimes Fans are loyal to the competition, or strong minded against the brand. In which case consumers might have negative feedback that obviously or not so obviously should not be deleted.
Other downsides, would include not following through with a campaign or lack of organization. Which both fall on client side. If a campaign doesn't reach the masses as intended, it might receive poor results in which case the campaign will not really amount to huge brand exposure.
If and when managed properly and carefully, there are very little negative points when it comes to allowing consumers participate in Social Media campaigns, after all that is what Social Media is all about !
Enjoyed reading your post Stephanie. It reminded me of the Mountain Dew campaign a few months ago where they did something like this and it proved very successful. These campaigns are not only a great way to have customers talking about the brand, but interacting with it as well. I think this a big reason why Pepsi decided to drop out of the super bowl ads this year. Last year the opportunities of social media were not completely grasped. This year I think will see more use of them. Great post!
Ralph – I completely agree!
I am looking forward to see how much Social Media is integrated into Super Bowl ads this month. If a Super Bowl ad is not a trending topic on Twitter, can we consider it an advertising failure at this point?
I would consider it a failure, and I think it could really change the future of Super Bowl ads. A lot less expensive that's for sure.
I really have to say that this information you have provided is second to none and it is also such good information that I have never found it anywhere else.
Thank you so much
Mark McCulloch
Very interesting stuff. Vitamin Water, no strangers to social media marketing, agrees, so their handing over the keys to their flavor creator lab and tapping into the FB community for flavor innovation. THe best part is the bottle design and well they know it well it is definitely gonna sell.
Well… A good way to get your facebook fans to be a bigger part of your companys succes… I mean… if they voted in favor for lets say "bottle combination C" the company knows that it's what there "fans" want… and "bottle combination A & B" can allways be but on the market later….
Thanks for a good blog post Stefanie!
If you think about it, this is probably how all "customer research" will be carried out in the future.
"the accolades for taking chances" Nicely said! Any "Win" in Social Media should come with this. Unfortunately many do not. It is definitely refreshing to see brands taking risks!
great post ever, this information can helpful to many people, but anyway thanks for sharing ideas, news etc.