Social Media Usage During Conferences: #GetOnIt

Entrance fee? Check.

Dressed to the nines? Check.

Business cards? Check.

Up-to-date LinkedIn profile? Check.

When you’re attending a conference, you’re bound to have the above items checked off. However, have you considered being active on social media during a conference? Not only can actively engaging online in real time help you with your personal branding, but it can also assist you in expanding your network to a more like-minded audience.

Here are some tips to help you rock Twitter or Instagram while you attend your next event:

1. Be nice! Conference tweets are usually filled with words of encouragement, inspiration, and positive vibes. Share your thoughts or opinions on what’s happening around you, keeping the good energy going. Not only will the person you tweeted to probably read what you said, but by utilizing the conference hashtag, organizers and other attendees might see it and comment as well!

2. Get the hashtag right. There’s nothing more awkward than realizing you were using the wrong hashtag all along. Conference hashtags are a convenient way to find all conference-related things in one place.

3. Don’t be afraid to reach out to others who are covering the event on social media. Remember, social media is social for a reason. This is where the conference hashtag will be your best friend—click on it and comment, favourite, and retweet. I challenge you to take online conversation offline. Who knows, maybe that person will become your new BFF (and potentially a professional contact as well).

4. Don’t overdo it. It’s easy to get carried away by tweeting or Instagramming everything taking place at the conference. You’re there to network and listen to great panelists—find that happy medium so what you’re posting is valuable, but not so it takes away from your overall attention to the speakers.

5. Have fun on social media. Not everything you post has to be serious—feel free to showcase other sides of the conference too. Did you get a sweet swag bag? Take a picture and tweet it out to the organizers—show them that you’re appreciative for the free stuff! (Who doesn’t like free stuff, right?).

When you attend a conference next time, make your presence known—not only offline, but online as well. It can make a world of a difference in how you are perceived by the people around you.

Burger King: Igniting the Craze for Shelved Menu Items

There was the McRib. Then there was the Shamrock Shake. Then came the Chicken Fries.

Do you ever wonder why fast food restaurants continuously “bring back” items for a limited time? The reason is simple: quick-service restaurants need to give the everyday consumer reason to get excited and talking about their brand.

Lets take a look at Burger King. A couple days after launching the #ChickenFriesAreBack campaign, the company was garnering approximately 380 tweets a minute, while receiving nearly 150,000 social media mentions in the first 72 hours of the launch. A BuzzFeed list that also occurred that month helped boost awareness, as Burger King’s chicken fries appeared alongside other “extinct” foods (e.g. lime-flavoured Skittles, Planters Cheez Balls). There was even a petition launched on Change.org to bring back the chicken fries. You could say things were getting pretty serious.

This campaign illustrates to other fast food restaurants that traditional media is not the only means to generate buzz for a product. When consumers are informed that a product is being released, brand evangelists and loyalists recognize this and take to social media to spread the word. This amounts to the same, if not more, impressions as compared to traditional methods—and for a fraction of the cost!

Marketing the return of limited time menu items via social media has proven to be a no-brainer for several fast food chains, including Burger King. The CMO of Burger King, Eric Hirschhorn, expresses that the #ChickenFriesAreBack initiative is the company’s most social-focused launch ever—and the efforts are paying off.

The Burger King #ChickenFriesAreBack campaign demonstrates that this type of strategy can serve as a model for other fast food joints to create buzz surrounding their menu items. Which company will be next to follow in Burger King’s footsteps?

Luxury Brands on Social Media—To Be or Not to Be?

Since the inception of Facebook and Twitter, marketers have utilized social media to reach customers. As social continues to become a vital part of companies’ marketing strategies, luxury brands have refrained—favouring to remain exclusive rather then accessible to the masses. However, some elite brands are changing their outlook on social media.

Chanel has been on Twitter since 2011. However, the high-fashion powerhouse only recently began posting photos on its Instagram and already has 2.2 million followers—yes, you read that right. On the other hand, top-tier brands like Apple, Rolex, and Monocle are still hesitant to embrace social media.

In an interview with Andrew Tuck, Editor at Monocle, he states that the company puts 40,000 words every month in the magazine. Tuck explains that his marketing team is reluctant to allow tweets or Instagram photos lesson the exclusive appeal and VIP status of Monocle’s parties and events.

“Social media feels like a little too much exposure. For our brand, it seems just a little bit uncomfortable,” Tuck mentions.

Rick Liebling, head of global marketing at Unmetric, makes a solid argument when he says that twenty-five years ago, movie actors wouldn’t sign on to do a TV show, but now, that’s the space everyone strives to be in. Liebling asserts, “similarly, you are going to see luxury brands accept this change in culture.”

Will McInnes, CMO of Brandwatch, expresses, “These [anti-social] companies are resisting something inevitable.”

In my eyes, luxury and social media aren’t mutually exclusive. Top-grade brands are missing out on a massive opportunity to learn about their customers. In fact, 98% of affluent consumers (with an income of <$250,000) who intend to buy premium products use digital platforms to communicate, with an astounding 71% specifically employing social media.

Social media gives companies customer insight. When companies launch a luxury product, they can track conversation surrounding it by analyzing social media metrics. Burberry’s digital offering alone has helped propel its retail revenue to £528m over the last Christmas quarter, a growth of an astonishing 14 percent!

Luxury brands fear that they are losing prestige and exclusivity by being accessible online. However, as learned from Mercedes Benz, brands can be accessible but reserved, unique, and calculated at the same time. GenerationBenz.com is an invite only forum where few young customers can provide personal feedback on vehicles.

Premium brands should embrace social media to further connect with influencers and generate authentic engagement. Social media is open to everyone. If you are not representing your company on these social communities, somebody else will represent the brand for you.

IHOP’s Twitter Strategy is on Fleek

I think it’s safe to say that when you think of IHOP, you think of pancakes.

I think it’s also safe to say that when you think of pancakes, you don’t think of a teenage hip-hop fan.

That may now change.

A couple weeks ago, IHOP tweeted the following:

“On fleek? What does that even mean?” I remember asking myself. A quick Google search informed me that “on fleek” means “on point.” Thank you once again for having my back, Urban Dictionary.

Wendy’s first used the word “fleek” to describe their food, followed by Taco Bell:

Most recently, IHOP jumped on the bandwagon. By observing IHOP’s Twitter feed, it’s evident that the pancake chain has completely changed it’s voice—one that appears to resonate with the intended younger audience—which can be observed by increased levels of engagement. The number of retweets and favourites are off the chain! (Here’s to hoping “off the chain” becomes the next “on fleek” now).

Digital marketing experts at IHOP, Kirk Thompson and Darrin Kellaris, addressed the “on fleek” tweet by stating its Twitter voice was working since it was authentic.

“There has been a refinement of our Twitter voice. We’ve gotten more specific, more targeted about how we speak,” Thompson said.

It seems to be working. IHOP’s “Pancakes on fleek” received over 25,000 retweets and 18,000 favourites. The refinement of IHOP’s Twitter voice wasn’t random—it was a carefully thought-out strategy Thompson and Kellaris crafted with MRM/McCann, IHOP’s digital agency.

Kellaris recognized that “Twitter for [IHOP] skews younger so it’s important to talk the talk when it comes to that fan base.”

In the past 60 days, IHOP’s Twitter following has grown a staggering 18 percent. It seems as if other fast-food companies have identified the importance of connecting to their intended target market, as even Burger King has come on board honing a younger voice on Twitter:

Is this change in voice for brands “on fleek”? For the time being, engagement levels have spiked, but will the sudden growth be sustainable? Only time will tell how brands will continue to remain relevant in the forever changing landscape of digital marketing.

Neha Varshneya's Blog

Month: November 2014