PSST (2.0 opinions & trends) : contagious ideas blog edited by jérémy DUMONT + Andreea HIRICA POPA

Agencies, brands must retool their approach for real-time age . As the Real-Time Marketing Drumbeat Gets Louder, with Agencies, Brands Signing On

http://www.emarketer.com/Article/Real-Time-Marketing-Drumbeat-Gets-Louder-Agencies-Brands-Sign-On/1009869

To be successful in real-time marketing, marketers and their agencies need to rethink the creative process, according to a new eMarketer report, “Real-Time Marketing: Speeding Up the Creative Process.”

Marketers know that they must speed up the ways they produce content and advertising to capture consumer attention in today’s fragmented media and device landscape. Companies are using what they learn from rapid-response marketing in social media to create efficiencies in their broader marketing organization and to find ways to deploy real-time strategies not only in digital media but in traditional media as well.

Now that images are a primary tool of social media marketing, creative execution—long the domain of ad agencies—is becoming much more important. Reacting and responding in real time is exponentially harder when the demands are far more substantial than a snappy tweet, a pithy remark on Facebook or a simple response to a customer complaint.

In an earlier survey, conducted in 2012 by GolinHarris, consumers expressed more positive feelings about brands after they were exposed to real-time marketing than before the exposure. Nearly half said they would feel more positive, while 46% would be more interested in the brand. Likelihood to recommend, to consider making a purchase and to try or buy all were also significantly higher after exposure to real-time marketing.

As Guy Slattery, executive vice president of marketing at A&E Network, said: “Marketers are realizing that the big moments that happen on social are very fleeting and quick. If you can capitalize on those and be a part of them, that’s really the next level.”

To meet these new demands requires marketers and their agencies to take their partnerships to new levels of flexibility, trust and fearlessness.

“We can now do things far more swiftly and efficiently than we could before,” said Grant Hunter, regional creative director for Asia-Pacific at iris worldwide. “From a creative standpoint we have an arsenal of digital tools that allow us to stay up all night to code and design a microsite or generate amazing video content in a 24- to 48-hour window, or within minutes generate a Photoshop comp and then post it on Facebook.”

Even so, the vast majority of advertising creative is generated the same way it has been for decades: first a strict creative brief, followed by several rounds of presentations and approvals before the piece finally sees the light of day. Not only is this true in traditional media, but also online and even in social media, where the posting strategy of many brands is dictated by a content calendar.

The creative model “needs to evolve to catch up with the new tools,” said Kevin Crociata, marketing director for North American Haircare at Procter & Gamble. “I honestly think a Facebook post could be equivalent to a great print ad of the past.”

How can marketers best embrace real-time creative? Mondelez’s Bonin Bough, vice president of global media and consumer engagement, sums up the mindset: “It’s not necessarily about developing creative in real time. It’s about having a creative approach that allows you to operate in real time.”

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The full report, “Real-Time Marketing: Speeding Up the Creative Process” also answers these key questions:

• How is the push toward real-time marketing affecting the creative process?
• What models are marketers and agencies using to develop successful real-time creative for social media?
• How are marketers using what they learn from real-time social media efforts to streamline other forms of marketing?

This report is available to eMarketer corporate subscription clients only. eMarketer clients, log in and view the report now.

Read more at http://www.emarketer.com/Article/Real-Time-Marketing-Drumbeat-Gets-Louder-Agencies-Brands-Sign-On/1009869#hFORfYegcAZAdrWr.99

A triumph of Aussie branded entertainment. No Leave No Life for Tourism Australia, Southern Star Entertainment

http://www.marketingmag.com.au/case-studies/a-triumph-of-aussie-branded-entertainment-36926/

In December 2008 Tourism Australia, through Roy Morgan Research, had identified that Australians had amassed an incredible 121 million days of unused annual leave entitlements. One in four full-time Australian employees had 25 or more days ‘stockpiled’, which translated to $31 billion in costs sitting on the books of employers. The stockpiling was a big issue not just for the employees looking to maintain a healthy work-life balance, but also for company balance sheets with untaken leave accumulating on their books. This leave stockpiling was also potentially having an impact on domestic tourism with workers amassing leave rather than using it to take short breaks or longer holidays in Australia.

The research suggested that the key group most likely to be stockpiling were males aged 35 to 49, followed by male and female career-orientated 20-somethings and those working toward retirement. They were with organisations both large and small, in public and private sectors, with and without children and had various reasons for not taking leave, including increased pressure in the workplace and changing economic conditions. One key barrier, however, emerged: ‘Taking leave seems like more hassle than it’s worth’. Yet most understood the benefits of taking leave and saw it as positive and a chance to enrich their lives with new experiences.

But Australia was not high on the list as a destination for taking a holiday for various reasons, including ‘It’s always going to be there, so I will visit it later’, and perceptions about overseas destinations offering more attractive holiday packages and greater ‘talkability’.

So the key question facing Tourism Australia was how to encourage all those Australians to unlock some of their leave and, more importantly, use it to take a holiday in Australia. Tourism Australia identified a number of messages that needed to be communicated to Australian employees and employers, and for over nine months worked in collaboration with Southern Star Entertainment, Channel Seven, Carat and SMG Red. Later, OMD and DDB became involved to develop a branded entertainment property entitled ‘No leave no life’.

Objectives

The key objectives of the campaign included:

• raise the relevance and urgency of taking leave in Australia as a short break,
• reduce the number of stockpiled leave days,
• change perceptions to make it easy to take leave,
• develop a platform that had greater consumer engagement than just advertising,
• articulate the ‘No Leave No Life’ message in an entertaining and memorable way,
• engage a younger demographic while maintaining broad base appeal, reaching more than one million Australians,
• deliver marketing effectiveness and value for money deliver results to partners through travel content and promotions, and
• promote domestic holidays as an integral part of the Australian economy.

Strategy

The strategy was to develop a branded entertainment program that appealed to a wide audience, which combined both highly creative content and production values to ensure it would secure a national primetime TV transmission.

Tourism Australia, state tourism organisations and Australian industry were brought together in a branded partnership to amplify the message. To extend the budget and reduce production costs, an airline partner was secured, and the TV content was repurposed for use on multiple platforms and to drive up viewing of videos.

The show was to be used as a catalyst for employer adoption, as a call to action to encourage the taking of leave days, with out-of-home advertising to reach commuters while in their daily travel routines, key city metropolitan press to target business sections, a social media and digital presence, ambient multimedia in office environments and promotional merchandise.

Execution

Each series included seven 30-minute episodes, aired on Channel Seven over December and January at 6:30pm. Series one, in 2009, was presented by Ernie Dingo, series two, in 2010, by James Tobin, and series three, in 2011, by Tim ‘Rosso’ Ross.

The episodes included in-program promotions and weather links, and the station promotional spots were supported by paid media TVCs throughout the three series.

Campaign support:

• Radio: Austereo and Australian Radio Network Mix FM competition, promotion, pop-ups, live reads, m-sites and spots,
• Digital and social: Yahoo!7, YouTube, niche websites, campaign site,(www.noleavenolife.com), Facebook keywords, and travel and lifestyle portals and hubs,
• Print: Fairfax’s Sydney Morning Herald and The Age, travel and trade publications, and the free No Leave No Life magazine,
• Outdoor: Showcase, 24-footers, interiors and cross-track (Sydney), and
• Public relations: targeting national trade, consumer, dailies, business and magazines.

Series three also included a ‘casting call’ promotion to take part in the program, a $50,000 Australian holiday competition with Virgin Australia, office tower TV in 432 office tower locations, and 150,000 overprinted coffee cups in 92 cafés nationally.

Results

Key results for series one:

• delivered a return four times the investment,
• reached an average of 1.15 million viewers per week across five city metro and regional areas,
• timeslot winner with average 33% share across five city metro free-to-air channels,
• placed second in light entertainment series for Saturday nights, summer schedule,
• $1.4 million media value in publicity and PR, with 71 media stories,
• prompted brand recall jumped from 23% to 45% over seven weeks, and
• won gold at the Media Federation Australia Awards 2010.

Series two:

• delivered a four-fold ROI,
• averaged more than 6.5 million viewers over the series,
• timeslot winner with average 29% share, and
• demographic winner for women over 35 years old – 34% average demographics over seven weeks.

Series three:

• delivered a five-fold ROI,
• first run attracted 5.82 million viewers in 2011 on Channel Seven, second run May to June 2012 on Channel Seven Two attracted 522,000 viewers,
• 6.75 million-plus viewers over the series five city metro and regional areas,
• was the timeslot winner with average 30% share including Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve across the five city metro free-to-air channels,
• demographic winner for women over 35 years of age – 35% average demographics over seven weeks,
• ‘casting call’ promotion generated a database of over 5000 entries in under two weeks,
• seven state and territory tourism partners, as well as 60 industry operators partnered the series and contributed over $1 million directly towards the production,
• Virgin Australia and the state and territory partners promoted the series through their own specific channels generating $500,000 of additional media value,
• first ever Australian branded entertainment program to be recommissioned for the third time on primetime TV,
• Virgin Australia holiday promotion delivered over 23,000 entries in four days,
• Yahoo!7, YouTube and the campaign site were the most popular, generating over 32,000 views and over two million unique visits across all the sites, and
• Mix FM launched Tim ‘Rosso’ Ross’ new radio show and a bonus campaign was negotiated including promotion worth $42,000 that reached 739,000 people.

There's no television ad for Coke's new campaign, taglined "The Ahh Effect"; just GIFs, games and viral videos to target the young.

http://www.creativebloq.com/advertising/coke-ditches-tv-4132496

The main button on the umbrella site takes you to different games, GIFs and videos at random

If there's one company known for going all-out for television advertising, it's Coke. So we were shocked to learn that its latest campaign - tagline 'The Ahh Effect' - will be the first to include no TV commercials at all, relying purely on its digital reach, and in particular targeting smartphones.

The games are easy to play in short bursts

In a campaign masterminded by Wieden+Kennedy, the soft drinks giant has bought up 61 URLs containing the word 'ahh', with an increasing number of added 'h's - ahh.com; ahhh.com, ahhhh.com and so on. The umbrella site is www.aah.com, and this URL will be imprinted on the inside of 16oz and 20oz bottles of Coke.

Snackable content

Rather than one centralised video or message, each of the domains will host a variety of 'snackable' content, including online games, animated GIFs and funny videos, in an attempt to appeal to a new teenage market.

Content will come from a range of sources

Content will be overseen by Wieden+Kennedy but some will also come from its media partners including Alloy, Vevo, and Break Media.

Other content will come from creative communities such as Art Center College of Design in Pasadena. And some will be crowdsourced from teenagers themselves.

Focus on mobile

Significantly, each piece of content in the campaign will be optimized for mobile - primarily iOS and Android - and designed to last between a few seconds and a couple of minutes, to capture the short attention span of youngsters.

The bright and cartoony visuals are aimed squarely at youngsters

But nothing has been set in stone; content will be added and removed on a trial and error basis to the 61 'Ahh' sites depending on its popularity.

So will this be a coherent campaign or a inchoate babble of noise? Is the latter what kids these days want anyway? We don't know, but we can't wait to find out!

How Kellogg's uses Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Google+

http://econsultancy.com/uk/blog/62598-how-kellogg-s-uses-facebook-twitter-pinterest-and-google?utm_medium=twitter&utm_source=twitterfeed#

by David Moth 

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For the latest instalment in our series of posts looking at how brands use the four main social networks I have decided to turn the spotlight on Kellogg’s.

The breakfast brand has a massive range of products that appear to be well suited to social marketing, so one would probably assume that they have established a strong presence across Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Google+.

As you’ll see though, that assumption is almost entirely incorrect.

By way of comparison, check out our other posts that took a similar look at brands including Nike, Walmart, Red Bull, Cadbury and McDonalds...

Facebook

As far as I can tell Kellogg’s doesn’t have one main corporate Facebook account, but instead has a wide range of separate pages for each of its products.

It’s common for brands to operate individual pages for different sub-brands and markets, but generally they also have one central account as well so Kellogg’s approach is quite unusual.

It might be linked to the fact that campaigners against the use of genetically modified crops targeted Kellogg’s last year and began leaving loads of anti-GM comments on its Facebook page. As a result, the company might have decided to cut its losses and delete the account rather than face the barrage from protestors.

The product pages include Pop-Tarts, Frosted Flakes, Krave and Nutri-Grain, and all of them are used to churn out marketing messages on an almost daily basis.

If we take the Pop-Tarts page as an example, all of the content is product–related and ties into its current marketing activities.

At the moment this includes frequent cartoons that are actually quite entertaining, alongside images of events it sponsors and standard product photos.

The social team also posts text-only updates such as questions, quotes and links to its Instagram feed.

With 4.7m fans the Pop-Tarts account is one of Kellogg’s most popular Facebook pages and as such it achieves a steady number of interactions on each post, with thousands of ‘likes’ and hundreds of comments.

In comparison, the Frosted Flakes and Krave pages have 777,800 and 855,900 fans and consequently receive very low levels of engagement despite having similar content strategies.

The Kellogg’s pages also have a noteworthy collection of apps between them, which typically need access to all your personal data before you can use them.

This includes a Crazy Good Summer ticketing app on the Pop-Tarts page, a game from Frosted Flakes that gives you the chance to win a $10,000 scholarship, and a rewards app from Nutri-Grain.

In general very few people actually bother to use Facebook apps, so it’s interesting to see that Kellogg’s has persisted with them across its product range.

Kellogg’s has also used its Krave UK page to launch new varieties of the cereal in the past few years. For example in September last year it created a Facebook app to promote the new white chocolate brownie flavour, which required its fans to guess where the products would land when they were fired off a ramp in a trolley.

The campaign also involved Facebook advertising such as marketplace ads and promoted posts. This is similar to campaigns by Cadbury, which frequently uses its social platforms to build up excitement around product launches.

Twitter

I’ve said before on many occasions that when evaluating a brand’s success on social you shouldn’t just look at the number of fans and followers that it has managed to attract, yet it’s worth dwelling on the fact that none of Kellogg’s Twitter feeds has more than a few thousands followers.

This is a remarkably low number compared to all the other brands I’ve looked at, several of which have managed to attract millions of Twitter followers.

Even the Pop-Tarts feed is only followed by 6,100 people while the corresponding Facebook page has almost 5m fans.

In fairness none of the feeds – which also include Special K, Krave, Kellogg’s US and Kellogg’s UK – has tweeted that many times so it could be that they’re new to Twitter.

But it more likely reflects the fact the feeds are generally quite uninteresting.

The Pop-Tarts feed tweets a few marketing messages and responses each day, while Krave mainly retweets people that have mentioned the brand in between quirky product-related tweets.

The Kellogg’s US feed is probably the most dull as its tweet include mentions of spring cleaning and tax returns though it does also respond to occasional customer service queries, as does the UK feed.

 

But although its official feeds aren’t that impressive, Kellogg’s did carry out an interesting Twitter campaign to promote the launch of its new Special K Cracker Crisps.

It set up a pop-up shop in central London that only sold the three new varieties of crisps and instead of paying with cash customers had to pay with a tweet.

A menu in the ‘Tweet Shop’ showed the messages people had to tweet out in order to buy a packet:

• Guilt-free snacking with new, moreish Special K Cracker Crisps. Only 95 calories per bag #tweetshop #spons
• Special K has gone savoury! 3 flavours to try – sea salt and balsamic vinegar, sweet chilli, sour cream and chives #tweetshop #spons
• Love new Special K Cracker Crisps- everything you want from a crisp, nothing you don’t #tweetshop #spons

The hashtag ‘#spons’ is to highlight the fact that it’s a sponsored tweet, thereby avoiding any ASA investigations.

The Tweet Shop’s main purpose was probably PR, but it is still a clever way of rewarding people for talking about your new product.

Pinterest

As far as I can tell Kellogg’s isn’t particularly enamoured by Pinterest as it has only established an account for its Froot Loops brand.

In my opinion this is missing a trick, as Special K is the sort of brand that might find an audience on Pinterest bearing in mind its focus on lifestyle and fitness.

The Froot Loops account appears to be relatively new and all of the pins link to the product’s Tumblr.

All of the pins either include actual Froot Loops or the brand logo and give ideas for crafts and games people can create using the product.

Personally I find it quite uninspiring and don’t really see the point of only pinning images from one source and it seems that Pinterest users agree, as the account has only 228 followers. 

Google+

Kellogg’s doesn’t appear to have any presence on Google+, which is odd as often businesses claim their brand name even if they don’t actually bother to post anything.

Most digital marketers believe that Google+ will become more important over time, potentially becoming a sort of official online identity card for Google’s other products and building even closer ties with search results.

And though a number of other brands that I’ve looked at (such as Walmart and McDonalds) haven’t put any effort into their G+ accounts they have at least established an account on the network, so it does seem strange that Kellogg’s has ignored it entirely.

David Moth is a Senior Reporter at Econsultancy. You can follow him on Twitter or Google+.

Brand Engagement Isn't Just For Consumers Anymore. Brands interact with each other in the media.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/onmarketing/2013/04/17/brand-engagement-isnt-just-for-consumers-anymore/

Every February America tunes in to see what the advertising industry has cooked up since last year’s Big Game.  Consumers vote, agency-types disagree, and pundits seek portents of the future. This year, the coverage was dominated by how “quick-thinking” and “real-time” marketing has become.  The conversation shifted from celebrating creativity to celebrating opportunism.

Ironically, when the Oscars rolled around two weeks later, marketers were already debating whether content planned in advance qualified as “real-time marketing”; others went so far as to suggest RTM had already jumped the shark. Either way, reaction time isn’t everything.

Move up http://i.forbesimg.com t Move down

Advertising's Triple Crown For The Second Screen On Marketing Contributor

Why Watching The Oscars Will Be Different This Year John Ellett Contributor

There’s another way in which America’s marketers are evolving their playbook that has gotten far less attention. Beyond the speed with which brands are reacting, there’s a story in the changing nature of content itself.

We are witnessing an unprecedented willingness to use others’ marketing as a reference point in one’s own communications. And an increasing comfort in not just referencing, but responding to, another’s advertising messages. The era of “brand-on-brand engagement” is now well underway.

It’s not that this sort of thing never happened before. But it’s occurring with increasing frequency and across more categories. Likewise, leveraging borrowed equity from partnerships with aligned marketers is old hat. What we’re experiencing today is more like “stolen equity” where the other brand not only wasn’t asked to participate, they might have their assets used against them.

The simplest version of brands building off another’s communications takes place in social media, particularly Twitter. This sort of repartee can be playful, like Old Spice’s back and forth with Taco Bell, or more chippy, like AMC Theatre’s exchange with Oreo.

Or full-on snarky. A good example was Audi Audi’s shot at Mercedes Benz over the Superbowl blackout. But the content slinging didn’t stop there, as Nissan then mocked Audi over their Super Bowl spot, making it a three-way: Have confidence to make a move at prom, but rather not get punched in the face? You can Date Better With Sentra.

This phenomenon of brands reacting and responding to other brand’s marketing isn’t limited to Twitter, and it gets higher stakes as more resources and more substantive content gets deployed.

Rival condom brands Help Remedies and Sir Richards recently skirmished publicly.  Sir Richard’s sent out a press release and created ecards and Facebook Facebook assets poking fun at an application Help created for prospective users.

Help in turn created a new Facebook header and a public offer to send the Sir Richard spokesperson to a brothel.

Brand-on-brand engagement may reach its apogee in video production. One example is Red Stripe’s weigh-in on Volkswagen’s “Get Happy” campaign. Red Stripe’s video overtly endorsed the Jamaican accented spot – while hitching along on VW’s enormous investment.

A less friendly effort was the latest shot in the Cola wars. Pepsi created their own video using characters from Coke’s Superbowl work, showing them choosing Pepsi over Coke when the cameras stopped rolling.

By the way, this behavior isn’t limited to digital. BMW took on Audi in an out-of-home play in California (both then continued it online).

So what is driving this increase in brand-on-brand engagements?

From a cultural perspective, we are living in a remix-and-recycle society where behaviors like sampling music and mashing up content are seen not as derivative, but creative. We’ve also become a society accustomed to repartee; it’s a retweet, reply, like, share culture we live in. Engaging with others we know, even if only virtually, has never been more normal. And because social and digital channels are inherently interactive, it would be odd not to engage, respond, and build on content in that sphere. As brands think and act more like individuals, they are increasingly less likely to merely broadcast and more likely to converse, even with fellow brands.

On a practical level, it’s enabled by the internet making everything searchable, viewable, and linkable, so people are more likely to know about reference material and easily able find it if they don’t.  Furthermore, many client organizations are structured so that the people managing digital and non-traditional marketing activity may be different than those overseeing above-the-line efforts. Not to mention that many marketers continue to hold different standards for what’s acceptable activation online and offline.

For these reasons and more, it’s a good bet that brand on brand engagement is a marketing technique that’s here to stay.

Audi - Art of the Heist ARG - the best transmedia example ? Case Study.

Audi - Art of the Heist ARG - Case Study par Transmedialab

The Creators Project is a global celebration of art and technology founded by a revolutionary partnership between Intel and VICE

The Creators Project is a global celebration of art and technology.

http://thecreatorsproject.vice.com/about

Founded by a revolutionary partnership between Intel and VICE, The Creators Project celebrates visionary artists across multiple disciplines who are using technology in innovative ways to push the boundaries of creative expression.

We seek to inspire new and emerging artists by showcasing the infinite possibilities presented by the advancement of modern technology. The Creators Project is proud to have showcased more than 500 artists from all around the world.

In 2013, The Creators Project solidifies its position as an unparalleled online arts channel with a slate of original documentaries that offers a look inside the minds of some of today’s most innovative artists in music, film, art and design, fashion and gaming – and introduces artists whose works are inspired and enabled by new technologies.

In addition, The Creators Project features a slate of original artwork commissions, a music video series, featuring household and emerging names, tech-focused tutorials, and deep-reaching collaborations between Intel Labs and high profile artists within the program.

With a growing global distribution network, The Creators Project is quickly becoming the premier arts, technology and culture channel featuring cutting-edge artworks and high quality content sought out by fans and artists alike.

We invite you to get involved. Experience. Inspire. Innovate.

About the partnership

Founded by a revolutionary partnership between Intel and VICE, The Creators Project celebrates visionary artists across multiple disciplines who are using technology in innovative ways to push the boundaries of creative expression.

With The Creators Project, Intel and VICE have built a premier worldwide arts and culture channel.

Launched in 2010, The Creators Project includes daily video and editorial content, an official YouTube Channel, original artwork commissions, and global events. To date, there are more than 500 Creators from around the world. Participating artists include Karen O, M83, Benh Zeitlin, Animal Collective, The xx, Chris Milk, Florence and the Machine, Spike Jonze, Amon Tobin, Matt Pyke, Anthony Wong, Supermarche, United Visual Artists, Sticky Monster Lab, Takeshi Murata, Andrew Huang, Vega Zaishi Wang, Mick Rock, David Bowie and Barney Clay.

Intel is a world leader in computing innovation. The company designs and builds the essential technologies that serve as the foundation for the world’s computing devices. Intel processor technology and the company's steadfast belief in a better future have supported creators of all kinds, in all fields.

VICE is the world's leading youth media company. With print, television, online, music, events and a feature films divisions operating in over 30 countries, VICE is the voice of global youth culture. With international in house production capabilities, over 3,000 contributors and dozens of series franchises VICE has set the standard for online video. There is simply no company that creates more original content for the web.

For all media inquiries, please contact: fay@vice.com

More people are using tablets and mobiles alongside TV to watch events, but what's the secret to a successful 'second screen' experience? Martin Belam reports

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media-network/media-network-blog/2012/sep/10/second-screen-experience-mobile-tablet-tv

 

Using an iPad to chat to your friends on Facebook about what's on TV is a second screen experience. Photograph: Alamy

Over the next few months you will hear more and more about 'second screen experience' – a phrase that means you are on your mobile or tablet while the main screen, TV, hasn't fully captured your attention.

The idea that there is space for a second screen experience is based on the observation that people fiddle with their phones when they're watching television. Cait O'Riordan of the BBC observed that during the Olympics, access of their services on tablet devices peaked at around 9pm with people using them as a second screen experience as they watched the Games on TV.

The Olympics are an example with a specific focus, but more generally we can observe people looking up something on IMDB to see where they recognise that actor from, or finding out the music playing in the background of an advert, or chatting along on Twitter and Facebook during shows like The Apprentice or the X-Factor. In fact, it feels like no news story is complete without quoting some snippets of what the tweeting masses thought about the show.

Publishers have seen this as an opportunity, and have begun to create event-based "dashboards" or second screen experiences – for example, The Times' experimental Euro 2012 live hub or the Guardian's second screen for London 2012. One problem, though, is that at the heart of many of these services, the aim seems to be to solve a publisher's problem rather than the user's.

The motivation behind these dashboards seems to be a fear of being left out of the event, rather than providing something useful. It often feels like a return to clumsy top-down broadcast – suggesting that the user can't be trusted to put together their own list of people who are going to be interesting about the topic. There is a valid question about whether people are really going to turn to these second screen services rather than simply use Twitter, Facebook and so on – that they use all the time anyway.

And yet again, broadcasters and publishers face competition from new entrants. Anyone trying to market a service accompanying the Olympics on iOS in the UK had to fight for space and attention against an official app from the new media team at the Games, and an official app from TeamGB.

The key to a successful second screen experience design is making a decision about whether you are aiming to enhance the coverage for people who are watching the event, or replace first screen coverage for those who aren't in front of the TV. For the former group, it's no good using the second screen to tell people there has been a goal if they saw it live on TV with their own eyes thirty seconds previously. Telling them that this is Leeds United's fourth headed goal of the season from a corner at that end of Elland Road, on the other hand, at least adds some contextual information and a potential conversation-starter.

With hindsight, it strikes me that probably the best second screen experience during the Games would have been a very simple one indeed. One which directed you to the most interesting action at any given moment across the BBC's coverage. Something that screamed at you: "Forget the hockey; on channel 457 Federer's match has just gone into the 23rd game of the deciding set." Or: "There is a ten minute gap in the swimming schedule now, so you can catch the final decisive round of the weight-lifting before they re-start in the pool." That would have done a service for users faced with a worry of "missing out" – solving a problem for them rather than merely publishing at them a commentary on what they were already watching.

Martin Belam is principal consultant at Emblem, former UX Lead at the Guardian and helps run London IA, a network for designers, information architects and writers. He blogs at currybet.net and for the Guardian – follow him on Twitter @currybet

To get more articles like this sent direct to your inbox, sign up for free membership to the Guardian Media Network. This content is brought to you by Guardian Professional.

Boucheron showcases 26 Place Vendôme via digital experience

By Tricia Carr

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Boucheron's paper-made 26 Place Vendôme headquarters

French jeweler Boucheron is immersing consumers in the 120-year history of its headquarters at 26 Place Vendôme through an interactive digital experience.

The brand is flaunting its Paris-based “Hôtel Particulier” workshop and boutique space that was chosen by founder Frédéric Boucheron in 1893 due to his fascination with the way sunlight hit the building. Boucheron called on Jo Lynn Alcorn, New York artist and creator of Paper Art, to create a paper representation of 26 Place Vendôme that serves as the framework to the new “B Moments” digital anniversary campaign.

“Particularly for luxury brands, a lot of them are having a hard time, especially among U.S. consumers, in getting them to appreciate craftsmanship,” said Tara Jepson, director of strategy at Possible, New York

“I think it’s great for brands like this to figure out a way to tell their history and their heritage and make it relevant to a younger consumer,” she said.

Ms. Jepson is not affiliated with Boucheron, but agreed to comment as an industry expert.

Boucheron declined comment. It is part of luxury conglomerate PPR, soon to become Kering.

History in the making
Boucheron is revealing a number of significant historical facts about its 26 Place Vendôme headquarters on a new section of its Web site to mark its 120-year anniversary at its headquarters this year.  

At the top of the page is an interactive image of the paper sculpture of 26 Place Vendôme. At first it is shown in darkness, but users can move their cursor across the screen to transition the lighting to different times of day and reveal the B Moments.

Night scene 

The first moment is “Number 26.” Consumers can discover how numbers and light movements shaped Mr. Boucheron’s choice for its headquarters and his jewelry designs with additional facts, images and videos that appear below.

Sunup 

For example, the “almost sacred setting” of 26 Place Vendôme opposite from Paris’ Place des Lumières, or Square of Light, allows the jewelry in its windows to be in direct sunlight from sunup to sundown.

Next, consumers can move on to explore the “palace-like ambiance” at the brand’s headquarters by reading about Mr. Boucheron’s partnership with Hôtel Ritz-founder César Ritz and browsing other historical facts and images.

Site content 

Mr. Boucheron’s wife Gabrielle is showcased in other B Moment since she received a snake-shaped necklace from him in 1888, which prompted Boucheron’s future serpent designs.

Site content 

The next moment tells consumers about the brand’s relationship with the Countess of Castiglione since she lived in a private residence at 26 Place Vendôme and came to be a fan of Boucheron.

The last moment explores how Mr. Boucheron was inspired by animals such as giraffes, zebra, parrots and frogs.

At the end of the light cycle in the interactive image, consumers can go back and explore any of the moments, watch a reenactment of the daily light cycle or browse behind-the-scenes content on the making of 26 Place Vendôme in paper.

Making-of video

“Digitally, [Ms.] Alcorn’s paper homage does not disappoint,” said Paul Farkas, cofounder/CEO of ULN Ultra Lifestyle Network, New York. “It visualizes digital brand heritage, bridging key moments and inspiration of timeless style along a creative timeline.

“Premier digital media is the type for which wishlists are created,” he said. “Loyal fans will likely reminisce, while others will begin to look on further site pages and begin saving for passion pieces.”

They want more
Boucheron looked to enhance the experience on its Web site through the “B Moments” campaign since the site’s content focuses on its history and craftsmanship, per the brand.

The jeweler likely had the same goal for its holiday campaign that marked the 150th anniversary of the Quatre collection.

Boucheron collaborated with seven bloggers who each interpreted pieces from the collection through personal photography for the “Tribute to the Quatre collection” campaign.

Not only did the brand present the photographs on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, China’s Weibo and a section of its Web site, the bloggers also shared their own images on their respective blogs.

Both campaigns seem to show consumers a different side of the brand and draw them to a special section of its Web site.

For the holiday campaign, the blogger photographs were added daily to a patchwork-style page on Boucheron’s site where consumers could enlarge each one as they browsed.

Now, the B Moments campaign brings users to an interactive page that encourages them to explore historical facts on a patchwork-style platform and share some content via their social media accounts.

Boucheron is prompting clicks to the special section of its site through content on its social media channels and an email campaign.

“It looks like [Boucheron] is looking to tell the story of their heritage,” Ms. Jepson said. “I think is great because so many brands that are launching today don’t have that kind of history.

“On [the] one hand, they need to do that to attract younger consumers to make the brand more relevant to them, but I do not know if it really comes out in the digital experience,” she said. “But one thing that they did do really well was the behind-the-scenes video of the woman making the paper sculpture.

“It has the potential to be effective as a digital experience, but it is hard to take something so tactile and make it something that consumers can experience digitally.”

Final Take
Tricia Carr, associate reporter on Luxury Daily, New York

Tricia Carr is an editorial assistant on Luxury Daily. Her beats are apparel and accessories, arts and entertainment, education, food and beverage, fragrance and personal care, government, healthcare, home furnishings, jewelry, legal/privacy and nonprofits. Reach her at tricia@napean.com.

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Nescafe puts Facebook friendship to the test

http://socialmediainfluence.com/2013/04/15/social-media-spotlight-nescafe-puts-facebook-friendship-to-the-test/

The average Facebook user has around 141.5 friends on the social networking site, but it’s safe to say not all of these connections could be classed as close or personal. Friends from high school you’ve since lost regular touch with, that guy from one of your college classes, the woman you worked with briefly last year… all these people contribute to your virtual social circle, but what kind of relationship do you really have with them in real life?

Coffee company Nescafe aims to find out in its new campaign, hinged around the theory that a cup of instant coffee is enough to bring people together: ‘It all starts with a NESCAFE’, reads the new slogan, devised by Publicis Conseil.

‘Regular guy’ Arnaud is set the challenge of determining the value of his 1,200 Facebook friends by rocking up to the houses of 30 of them (including ones he barely knows and some he’s not seen for a long time) with two mugs of Nescafe, and having the subsequent encounter filmed.

The videos have been uploaded to a YouTube channel aptly named ‘Really Friends?’ and range from delighted surprise to dumbfounded confusion. The channel has already seen nearly 55,000 views – not bad considering the campaign has only been running for a few days.

It’s an interesting concept, and while the authenticity of each meeting can’t be wholly guaranteed, the campaign provides food for thought. How well do we know our Facebook friends, and why are we ‘friends’ with them if we would feel uncomfortable asking them out for coffee?

Indeed, it may spur some viewers on to have a Facebook ‘cull’, or revisit old friendships – but will Nescafe itself feature highly in doing so? Probably not. It’s a smart campaign but one where the product is very much secondary to the message. A cup of coffee doesn’t have to mean Nescafe, after all.

Seven Sisters, the first ever 'social media' opera, requires its audience to tune in via Twitter rather than TV.

New London-based soap opera replaces TV episodes with Twitter

Seven Sisters character Seb, played by Scott Webster and written by Susan Wareham.  

By Alice Vincent,

A revolutionary new soap opera is set to challenge the way we consume drama. New “social opera” Seven Sisters aims to entertain its audience not with filmed, scripted episodes, but a string of status updates.

Seven Sisters, which launches later this month, removes the show aspect from the traditional soap opera format, and instead narrates the love triangles and family spats in its characters’ lives through social media. Its audience will follow the various plot strands through Instagram, Facebook and Twitter updates, with extra information available on an app and in blog posts.

The idea is for Seven Sisters’ characters to immerse themselves in the lifestyles of those “watching” – to crop up, like real social media users, while checking your phone in a Starbucks queue or waiting for a bus. It’s a step up from “scripted reality” shows Made In Chelsea and The Only Way Is Essex, into their fifth and 12th series respectively, which have real-life cast members acting out soap-like stroylines.

Seven Sisters is aimed at a similar audience to these shows – the internet-obsessed, 20 and 30-something oversharers. The soap’s creative director Danielle Vanier has created five characters who live in London’s up-and-coming Seven Sisters: a hipster, a City worker with an adventurous love life, her arrogant on-off boyfriend, a fresh-faced girl from the Home Counties and an ‘alpha-male’ enjoying the bright lights. It’s been created by start up Awesix Media on a tight budget of £10,000.

The characters are perhaps stereotypes, but ones the intended audience is guaranteed to identify with. Each is faced by an actor, for photo and short video purposes, and is “written” by their own writer, who updates social networks and creates reactions Vanier's stroylines. They are, she says, in constant communication to avoid any mishaps (one tweeting that they’re in a pub when another says they’re at the zoo) and to react to trending topics and genuine news events.

Vanier says the blurring of fiction and reality is intentional. These non-existent people are linked to real addresses in N15. If you tweet them, there’s a good chance they’ll reply.

Vanier says, “It’s super-current. We wanted to tap into soap opera and social media to allow more interaction for the audience.”

Seven Sisters’ existence could be a rejected plot concept from Black Mirror, Charlie Brooker’s dystopian series about technology, but there’s potential for it to take off. Soaps consistently pull some of the highest ratings on TV and last October Emmerdale Live: The Fallout involved tweeting audience members in the panel show which discussed the soap’s live episode.

Seven Sisters launches on April 25, and the app will be made available through iTunes. You can find out more on Twitter via @awesixmedia.

Second screen and why you should pay attention in 2013

by Rhian Simms 

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Watching TV whilst browsing the internet has been around for as long as I have been using the internet.

It used to be because we needed something to do whilst waiting for slow dial-up connections to download content, but nowadays multi-tasking via a 'second screen' or 'dual screen' is part of our everyday routine.

We regularly find ourselves watching TV, browsing the internet, and updating social networks as the norm.

Neilsen found that 40% of smartphone owners in the UK use their phones at least once a day while watching TV and 41% of tablet owners do the same.

Over three quarters of people start watching TV shows after seeing positive tweets, and a recent study by Brandwatch found that viewers are on average 12x more likely to tweet about and 22x more likely to use a TV show’s official hashtag on broadcast day.

I even use Twitter as an alternative to checking the TV guide or catch up service to see what's on or how a storyline has ended in an episode I have missed and don't have time to catch up on.

So we've all been doing it for years, and...? It creates an opportunity for brands and advertisers.

On a very basic level, there are plenty of examples of TV broadcasters and advertisers really grasping the idea to maximise the buzz about their programmes. E4 saw one in four Made in Chelsea viewers tweeting during most episodes by displaying the official hashtag at the beginning of the programme, and Three's #danceponydance hashtag helping to achieve almost 14k tweets in 5 hours on the day of launch for their latest TV ad.

On a more complex level, technology integrations such as Zeebox create a platform to watch and tweet about TV shows and celebrities within one environment - showing where the 'buzz' is and influencing others to watch a programme.

But there's still plenty of room in getting it right.

2013 will be an exciting year for the adoption of the idea of second screens and how they they are changing our media consumption habits beyond recognition.

And if you're still not convinced, here is a great infographic to highlight the opportunity.

Rhian Simms is a Digital Marketing Consultant at Consult&C Digital and a guest blogger on Econsultancy. Follow her on Twitter and Google+.

How Online Fashion Retailer Bonobos Suits Up Its Content Strategy

http://contently.com/blog/2012/02/15/bonobos-content-strategy/

 

When Bonobos opened its online store in 2007, selling men’s pants, it did so with the idea that many men prefer to click and shop rather than walk into a brick and mortar location.

What do you think?

By taking the virtual route with its product, the New York-based online retailer of trendy men’s clothing had no choice but to build an exceptional ecommerce experience of its brand using web and social marketing.

What do you think?

Contently recently caught up with Richard Mumby, vice president of marketing at Bonobos, to learn how the company keeps its name at the forefront of men’s online fashion.

What do you think?

Contently: The content strategy at Bonobos is fairly extensive. What kind of content do you produce and what need does each type of content fill?

What do you think?

Bonobos: Bonobos does produce a wide range of content — from product, to social, to email — and each serves a specific purpose.

What do you think?

Content for Bonobos starts with our product. As a largely web-driven retailer, we must provide ample context around our products and create a distinct brand position. We craft a story of how each product was conceived, how we could foresee a customer wearing it, or a creative, funny story to entertain our customers. The content is usually connected in one way or another with our product names, which are individually conceived — often bringing the humor and irreverence of our brand to life. 

What do you think?

Without a physical retail store, it is critical to develop a social environment. We use our social content to create a sense of community where we contextualize our brand without explicit focus on transactions. This tact deepens the relationship with customers, which is apparent from frequent Facebook posts, questions, and responses to our content.

What do you think?

What do you think?

We know that email is a critical channel to drive revenue, but an explicit focus on transactional emails only exhausts customers and doesn’t provide a more premium brand position. We spend a lot of time finding ways to include editorial content in our regular cadence of emails. Also, we have a set schedule of campaigns around contests, events, and Bonobos culture. 

What do you think?

Contently: How does your content strategy integrate with your company?

What do you think?

Bonobos: The company started by selling pants, but we’ve always focused on developing a distinct brand in the men’s apparel space. Content is a large component of how we’ve done this — from video chats by founder and CEO Andy Dunn, to a long history of blog posts. We also hire many creative people, and we encourage employees to contribute to various content platforms.

What do you think?

Contently: How much and how often do you publish?

What do you think?

Bonobos: While we don’t have a publishing calendar, we release new content nearly daily in the form of product launches, social media campaigns, blog posts, or email initiatives.

What do you think?

Contently: What types of content have been the most well-received?

What do you think?

Bonobos: Our social media campaigns are the easiest to track in terms of engagement, response and ROI. Most recently, we held a private customer event in New York City hosted by NBA All-Star Deron Williams around the launch of our Foundation Suit collection. We asked our guests at the event to check-in on Foursquare and share photos from the party via Instagram and Twitter using #BonobosSuitsU for the chance to take home one of the new suits.

What do you think?

We also invited customers around the country to join in the conversation surrounding the event on social media. They participated by visiting our website and tweeting their favorite Bonobos suit using #BonobosSuitsU. The customer who got the most retweets also scored a new Bonobos suit. While we had 250 people attend the event, we reached more than 850,000 people on Twitter with 3,500+ mentions and 4,000+ retweets of our #BonobosSuitsU hashtag. 

What do you think?

Contently: How do you measure the success of your content?

What do you think?

Bonobos: We measure the success of our content where possible and relevant. For example, our email content is evaluated based on click-through rates. We measure our social media content based on shares and engagement.

What do you think?

The key to success with content on social is limiting the “hard sell.” We’re fortunate to have a passionate and engaged social community. Questions about product development and merchandising or quick humorous posts and photos that bring to life the Bonobos brand consistently drive engagement rates at least 10 times higher than posts designed to encourage customers to purchase.

What do you think?

How Nike uses Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Google+. Sports are an inherently social activity, so brands like Nike are a natural fit when it comes to social media marketing.

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Sports are an inherently social activity, so brands like Nike are a natural fit when it comes to social media marketing.

To find out how the sports giant makes the most of this opportunity, I thought it would be interesting to see how it uses Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Google+.

This post is the latest in a series of blogs that have taken a similar look at major brands including ASOS, Tesco, Red Bull, Cadbury and McDonalds...

Facebook

Like most global brands Nike has separate Facebook pages for each of its product categories. This includes golf, snowboarding and FuelBand, as well as two football pages – one for the American version of the sport and one for the version everyone else in the world plays.

As far as I can tell the latter actually has the most fans of any of the Nike pages (17.2m), followed by the main corporate account (12.3m) and American football (2.4m).

Most of the dedicated sports pages are updated on a daily basis with videos or images, while the corporate page is updated about once a week.

The social teams are obviously lucky in that they have a huge number of athletes around whom they can create and share content, so the global football page displays a huge amount of content featuring the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo and Andres Iniesta, as well as a lot of product-related posts.

At the moment much of the content is around Nike’s “Be Mercurial” campaign to promote its Mercurial Vapor IX boots, including video clips of personalised boots that customers have bought online through NIKEID.

Interestingly the product-related content appears to get more interactions than posts featuring players, with one photo gallery of new boots attracting more than 35,000 ‘likes’ and almost 1,000 comments.

Similarly, the American football page is updated several times per week with a focus on athletes and products.

Nike is well known for running major branding campaigns, so its Facebook pages don’t feature the smaller competitions and sales promotions that we’re used to seeing from consumer brands.

Instead it uses its social channels to cross-promote larger marketing campaigns, such as the #MyTimeIsNow initiative that it ran last year during the European Championships.

This year it is using the hashtag #MakeItCount as away of trying to encourage sports teams to train together using its Nike+ products, which are discussed further down this post.

Twitter

As with Facebook, Nike has individual feeds for its subsidiary brands, including golf, basketball, FuelBand, Nike.com and football.

For each of the feeds the focus is very much on responding to @mentions rather than pushing out marketing messages, and the rate at which some of the more popular accounts respond to users is quite astounding.

For example, the Nike.com feed (766,000 followers) responds to more than 100 tweets per day regarding order queries, stock information and product details.

It ranks alongside ASOS as one of the most active customer service feeds I’ve seen so far, and on top of that the sports brand also operates a Nike Support feed to resolve product questions and technical needs. This dedicated customer service feed also answers hundreds of questions per day.

The sports feed are also good at responding to @mentions, though not to the same level as the Nike.com or Support accounts. For example, the Nike Football feed is on hand to give out training advice, product information or encouragement to other users.

Similarly, Nike Running responds to a huge number of people to discuss their training schedule and give motivational advice.

Personally I’m a big fan of Nike’s Twitter strategy and would like to see more brands adopt a similar approach. It would obviously require a sizeable investment, but it goes a long way in turning customers into brand advocates.

For example, if you’ve just bought a pair of Nike football boots and the brand then personally responds to you with training advice and a few words of encouragement, then you’re definitely going to consider that brand when you buy sports products in future and may even recommend them to your friends.

Nike has also achieved some notable successes by using Twitter as a central tool in its marketing campaigns. During the London Olympics it managed to outshine official sponsor Adidas with a massive billboard and social campaign around the capital.

Nike eschewed the usual celebrity endorsements in a campaign that celebrated everyday athletes. It bought up hundreds of billboards around the city featuring the hashtag ‘#findgreatness’.

Adidas, which spent tens of millions of pounds to be an official sponsor, ran a campaign featuring Team GB athletes and the hashtag ‘#takethestage’.

According to Socialbakers’ CheerMeter there were more than 16,000 tweets associating Nike with the word Olympic between 27 July and 2 August compared to 9,295 for Adidas.

Furthermore. Nike attracted 166,718 new Facebook fans during the Games versus 80,761 for Adidas.

Data from Experian Hitwise shows that Nike achieved a 6% growth in its number of Facebook fans and a 77% boost in engagement on its Facebook page compared to 2% and 59% respectively for Adidas.

But while that was certainly a social success, Nike also got its wrists slapped by the Advertising Standards Authority last year after footballers Wayne Rooney and Jack Wilshere tweeted marketing messages without stating that they had been paid by Nike to do so.

Pinterest

Nike has clearly researched the demographic profile of the average Pinterest user, as the only account it has established is for Nike Women.

It has created 10 boards and amassed a respectable 9,900 followers, however all of its pins are product related and link back to official Nike websites.

Nike isn’t alone in only pinning its own content – John Lewis also applies this tactic – but personally I think it’s a missed opportunity.

Pinterest is a great opportunity to develop the brand identity and create pinboards that reflect the company’s values, but Nike is essentially using it as an extension of its product catalogue.

Google+

As far as I can tell Nike only has one official Google+ page and it gives it the bare minimum of attention.

It is updated around once per week and all of the content is repurposed from Facebook. As with most brands the level of interaction with the posts is extremely limited, with each one attracting a few hundred +1s and tens of comments.

Overall it’s fairly uninspiring, but no worse than most of the other Google+ pages I’ve looked at as part of this series of posts. 

Considering the amount of athletes that Nike has on its payroll, it should try to take advantage of G+'s unique features by hosting hangouts and Q&As.

Nike+

Not only does Nike do a decent job of marketing itself using the four main social networks, but it has also taken the time to establish its own unique social platform through Nike+.

It now has more than six million members that use it an average of three times per week. 

Since 2010 Nike has developed a range of training products that are digitally linked using the Nike+ FuelBand. Users can then accumulate ‘NikeFuel’ points and set themselves goals or compete against other users. 

It has proved to be a hugely successful product for Nike as it taps into the social aspect of sports by allowing users to track their progress using an iPhone app and share their progress online.

There are dedicated Facebook and Twitter accounts for NikeFuel which are tied into the #MakeItCount hashtag. 

It also allows Nike to run novel campaigns, such as the ‘Fuel your team’ initiative that currently allows users to show support for their favourite basketball team by earning them NikeFuel points.

Having used a Nike FuelBand before I feel the product is a victory for marketing over usability, but even so it means Nike has a product and a social network that millions of people use on a daily basis which is an extremely powerful tool for driving brand loyalty.

David Moth is a Senior Reporter at Econsultancy. You can follow him on Twitter or Google+.

#JOYVILLE. How Cadbury uses Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Google+ ?

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http://econsultancy.com/uk/blog/62382-how-cadbury-uses-facebook-twitter-pinterest-and-google?utm_medium=twitter&utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_term=jeremy+dumont

Cadbury appears to be readymade for social marketing as it is a historic brand with products that people love.

However it hasn’t simply rested on its laurels and expected the ‘likes’ to come rolling in.

In the past year we’ve reported on Cadbury’s use of Facebook and Google+ for product launches, as well as its shift away from traditional media thanks to its success in social media.

Therefore I thought it would be interesting take a closer look at how the brand uses Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Google+.

This post is the latest in a series that has already examined the social strategies of several other major consumer brands, including ASOS, Tesco, McDonald’s and Red Bull.

Facebook

It’s no surprise to find out that Cadbury has established separate Facebook pages for each of its most popular products, including Dairy Milk, Wispa, Crème Egg, Bourneville and Hot Chocolate.

Each one publishes its own content and competitions making it difficult to condense it all into a single blog post, so I'll just focus on the key highlights.

The first thing to note is that all the pages are updated on a daily basis with brand-related content, ranging from straightforward product promotions to recipe ideas.

In general each post attracts thousands of likes and tens of comments, which the social team does a good job of responding to.

Cadbury clearly sees value in maintaining an active Facebook presence and interacting with customers, probably because it has already achieved a great deal of success in nurturing its fans as brand advocates.

This is a departure from the more casual approach adopted by Starbucks and McDonald’s, which make very little effort to maintain their social communities but still achieve massive levels of engagement on their Facebook walls.

Looking specifically at the Dairy Milk page, most of the content is currently about promoting the Joyville brand with a strong focus on its competition to find a ‘Joyville Taster’. 

The winner receives a trip to the Cadbury factory, a year’s supply of Dairy Milk and the chance to be the first to taste new products.

To be in with a chance of winning you have to come up with a word to describe Dairy Milk chocolate then enter it either on a dedicated minisite or within a Facebook app.

It’s a really smart competition as the prize is positioned as a ‘sweet benefits package’ that comes alongside the fictional job. It’s a great way of rewarding fans with a prize that can’t really be won anywhere else.

The Wispa page is also running a promotional campaign to celebrate reaching two million ‘likes’. The social team has researched its fans and has begun publishing random stats about them.

Again, it’s a clever way of celebrating the community and the posts make a nice change from the usual product promos.

The current Wispa campaigns follows a brilliant campaign that the Dairy Milk team ran last year to celebrate reaching one million ‘likes’.

Cadbury realised that despite having so many fans, only 16% of them ever saw content that the brand posted on Facebook.

The challenge was to increase the engagement among its fans, as well as reaching friends of fans and the wider Facebook community. To test what content users would engage with, Cadbury decided to build a giant Facebook ‘like’ thumb out of pieces of Dairy Milk.

It used teaser ads in the build up to the event, and then live streamed in a studio decorated with user-generated content and photos. The team also responded to user requests and comments in the video.

As a result, Cadbury gained 40,000 Facebook fans and more than 350,000 people were actively involved in the campaign. Some fans even left the live feed running for hours on end.

Perhaps the most important result was that more than 33% of fans engaged with the campaign and it proved that the brand could achieve impressive results through social marketing, which helped underpin the new Joyville marketing initiatives.

Twitter

As with Facebook, Cadbury has established separate Twitter feeds for it different products, but unfortunately it hasn’t achieved the same amount of success.

The main corporate account has more than 130,000 followers, far more than any of the product-specific feeds, and tweets upwards of 20 times per day.

However most of tweets are either repurposed from Facebook or are retweets of other users that have mentioned the brand.

The social team do occasionally respond to @mentions, but these appear to make up a small proportion of the activity.

The Dairy Milk (31,000 followers) and Wispa (6,000 followers) feeds are much the same, with repurposed content and retweets making up a majority of the activity.

Personally I’m surprised that so little original content is published through Twitter, and that Cadbury responds to relatively few @mentions.

It is probably a decision dictated by resource to an extent, as it’s obviously easier to adopt a centralised approach to social and limit the amount of responses.

However ASOS and Tesco have taken the decision to respond to as many @mentions as possible, and personally I feel it is a great way of engaging with customers and building brand loyalty.

Furthermore, unlike a number of other consumer brands that I’ve looked at, Cadbury doesn’t attempt to provide customer service on Twitter. Instead it includes a link to the customer service contact information in its bio.

That said, Cadbury did make an interesting case study for the success of Twitter advertising. It revealed that a campaign to promote the new Wispa Gold using Promoted Trends increased 'positive' brand mentions on the social network by 1,800%.

Furthermore, the ‘Retweet for Sweets’ challenge associated with this saw engagement levels of 25%.

Pinterest

Cadbury UK has been running a Pinterest board for more than a year now, but its level of commitment has been somewhat lacking.

It has created just five boards and pinned a grand total of 116 images. Thankfully Cadbury hasn’t fallen into the usual trap of only pinning its own content, however its difficult to see what the social team is hoping to achieve by maintaining this account.

Cadbury has just 622 followers and there doesn’t seem to be any real strategy behind it. The boards are generally quite uninspiring – one of them is just a collection of uniform images of gluten free products – and the activity is extremely limited.

The latest board is definitely the most attractive and includes a range of images showing recipe ideas that use Cadbury products.

But overall the account is largely inactive and I can’t imagine it yields any positive results for the brand.

Google+

While researching these posts I noticed that the general trend among consumer brands is to establish a Google+ account and then totally ignore it.

There are a few notable exceptions, such as ASOS and Red Bull, but they are few and far between. However I can also add Cadbury to the list of brands that have embraced G+.

It posts several updates a day, much of which is repurposed from other platforms though it seems some of the content is unique to this platform.

The chocolate brand was an early adopter of G+ and last year social manager Jerry Daykin was kind enough to share his five top tips for using the platform.

Google has also flagged up the brand a case study for how to make use of Google Hangouts. Cadbury has hosted several hangouts in the past 12 months, including one to celebrate reaching 500,000 followers and another to let its community ask questions to Olympic swimmer Rebecca Adlington.

At the minute much of the content is focused around its recipe for Crème Egg brownies, which also links into its Cakes and Baking Community.

The group has 26,000 members who share and discuss recipe ideas, which is a great way of getting people talking about the brand and its various products.