When you think of Social Media Marketing, you probably think about Twitter, Facebook, Mashable, or even Ashton Kutcher. But what about everyone’s favorite fried white meat spot: Chick-fil-a? Bet you don’t think of them! They even have a mean cookies and cream milkshake, but that’s a topic for another day. Now I’m thirsty. Crap.
What could we possibly learn about social media marketing from a company that has more similarities to White Castle than it does to iJustine? Simply put, everything! Let me count the ways.
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Go get your target audience
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Get people involved with your brand
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Find something that works. Rinse and repeat
As bloggers, too often we write a post and sit with our fingers crossed, hoping that everyone in the universe will find our post. I’m guilty of it, and so are you, whether you admit it or not. In a perfect world, this would be all we needed. I write it. You read it. Victory. Drink.
Unfortunately, grabbing the attention of potential readers does require some work and a tiny bit of intelligence (sorry if that rules out some of you).
Chick-fil-a recently worked with Facebook to offer a completely new kind of targeted advertisement. If you clicked their ad, without ever leaving Facebook, you could get a voucher for a FREE chicken sandwich. It even grabbed your address from your profile and asked if you wanted to publish your free gift to your feed. That’s cool!
Instead of doing what the average store-front company does by saying, “Find the coupon in some obscure paper, cut it out, bring it to us, and we’ll give you something 5% off if you buy 9 other items,” they didn’t even require you to leave Facebook until you got hungry! Win.
You may write one of the most unique and helpful posts I’ve ever read, but if I don’t remember your site’s name or address, have you really accomplished anything? You must get your readers invested in your brand, and it’s not so hard!
You have seen all those cows carrying picket signs saying, “Eat More Chicken,” right? How can one company consistently think of so many clever things to put on those crazy signs? It’s simple — They don’t!
In fact, at times, when you walk into your favorite location, you’ll see a special place setup where you can write your suggestions for their next sign. Not only are they engaging their customers with humor, they are inviting us to contribute to the community!
Engage your readers, entice them to contribute to your community, and watch magic happen. Ok, not that kind of magic. Get your mind out of the gutter.
I’ve heard bloggers and social media marketers run into this stumbling block quite often. They’ll have this terrific idea that does amazing thing for their blogs. Then they say something like, “That rocked, but now I have to think of another idea just as awesome.” WRONG.
If it worked so well, why not keep doing it? Genius, right?!
Chick-fil-a recently had a pretty amazing campaign where they gave away free sandwiches to anyone who came to their store wearing a COW costume! How cool is that? (Brand Promotion, Fun, Hype all rolled up in one.) It worked so well for them…
…that they decided to repackage it and do it again. With football season kicking off, if you wear your team’s jersey into any location on a given day, you’ll receive a free sandwich! So you’re saying I can wear my Romo jersey AND eat for free? I’m so there.
Obviously, it takes more than these 3 things to be successful at social media marketing. Chick-fil-a is also known for clean restaurants, excellent customer service, and a quality product. When you couple these traits with their creative marketing efforts, it’s easy to see why the company is so strong.
Now, about that milkshake… Seriously.
13 Discussions
I think, in social media world, it’s more about building your brand more than anything. Mashable, Twitter, Ashton Kutcher is the most known names in social media for just that reason. Mashable is the authority in web 2.0 news, Ashton Kutcher challenge CNN, and Twitter let’s just say it’s the new craze that sort of challenge Facebook.
Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos, always have their focus on great customer service that thrive on repeat customers, rather than one-time transaction. So, he don’t mind providing the 365 days money back guarantee (which basically allow his customers to try and send the item back if they don’t like it) because the lifetime value of his customers is $500/customer. And I think Chick-Fill-a is doing the same thing.
Andi | Web Marketer Depot´s last blog ..5 Things I Learned from Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos.com
I agree — Branding is and should be primary. I don’t think that’s specific to social media anymore, and many companies are discovering that. Companies are learning that creating a positive image is as simple as ever — Don’t claim your great, just be great! Everything else will take care of itself.
With the ease in which we can now communicate to a massive audience via social media, impressions (positive or negative) are wait create your brand. It is now taking the place of traditional advertising.
Matt Langford´s last blog ..10 Awesome Things to Make Your Blog Rock!
Wow, I love the cow costume idea. Very smart. I love these tips. As you say, it’s easy to keep looking for the NEXT thing that works, but often we neglect the things that are already working.
Paul Hancox, copySnips´s last blog ..How To Eliminate Objections Using Headlines…
I totally agree. Bloggers have a million things that are working for them, so we should become better at using them.
Seth´s last blog ..Learning Social Media Marketing from… Chick-fil-a?
Ditto for the cow costume! Anything that brings in a sense of fun to people is almost guaranteed to become popular.
Barbara Ling, Virtual Coach´s last blog ..Today’s Quote of the Day – One Woman’s Wisdom Is….
Social marketing is a great way to get a site going and a good way of achieving that is through consistency and personal branding. Being an active participant is the key!
Thanks for the post.
I actually was added on Twitter by a local Chick-fil-a here in Fredericksburg, VA. They have contacted me a few times regarding promotions for Twitter followers, but I have never taken them up on the offer — considering that I usually only have Sundays off and they are closed all day on Sunday.
Jeremiah Hoyet´s last blog ..The Cost of Blogging
A nearby Chick-fil-a recently hosted a tweetup. Obviously, the company is pushing social media from the top down!
Matt Langford´s last blog ..Automatically Shorten URLs For Sharing Using bit.ly
Awesome post! I’m a self-proclaimed Chick-fil-A brand evangelist and just had to throw a link in here (which I rarely do in someone else’s comments) to my own blog post about Chick-fil-A… I’m In Love with Chick-fil-A.
Brandon Cox´s last blog ..Become a Fan of Life Here and There on Facebook
Awesome post! thanks for the tip.
Hakeem – technology and gadgets´s last blog ..Barnes and Noble e-book reader hits the FCC
This might be a tiny bit off topic, but the post touches on a topic that’s really been interesting to me. Digital coupons have been a successful marketing vehicle for many online brands over the last few years (usually hosting, domain registrations, etc), but its only been recently that offline brands like Chik-fil-a and Healthy Choice are really promoting themselves this way. As far as affiliate sales, this is one of the ultimate ways to increase conversion rates: simply provide the best price.
While direct mail and newspaper coupon marketing is still popular with advertisers, consumers are now printing up many more coupons on the web. Every year there is like double-digit growith in digital coupon use, and it doesn’t necessarily have to be part of a social media campaign in order to be successful.
tldr; I suck at social media but I love online coupons.
John´s last blog ..Bluehost vs Hostgator
Building ways that enable fans of a brand or company to promote a message themselves in multiple online social media venues. Fan pages in Twitter, MySpace of Facebook follow this model.
Claudia Guzman´s last blog ..Twitter use for business in Europe
Just read the post and decided i had to say something : First of all if anybody came into my store in a cow uniform they would get a free ambulance !not a sandwich. Anyhow i agree brick and mortar business for centuries have used what the gurus have just discovered, be friendly,engage the customer,over deliver etc Impulse buys at the checkout. Don’t over complicate it, it’s right there in front of you.Keep an eye open and watch the big boys, they spend millions on this sort of stuff.
norman´s last blog ..Welcome To Our Blog
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