Social media marketing is on the rise. That’s not surprising, considering 72 percent of American adults use some form of social media on any given day. Smart marketers know to go where their audience is, so learning how to create engaging social media campaigns has become a must for brands to be successful in today’s marketplace.
However, coming up with creative, engaging and affordable social campaigns is easier said than done. What’s a small brand to do when budgets are limited?
We asked marketers to submit the best creative and affordable social campaigns that others could mimic. We scoured through dozens of ideas and picked the top two, who were able to engage customers, generate buzz and helped brands build better relationships with their audience, even within the parameters of a limited budget.
Here are two social campaigns you can use as inspiration:
New website teams up with Samsung for social contest
A website geared toward photo-taking dads, Dadtography, hosted a photo submission contest for its viewers.
Daniel Ruyter, who runs the site and handled the #SmartShot campaign teamed up with Samsung to make it all happen.
“For the launch of my site, Dadtography, I was able to get Samsung to provide a NX 30 camera as a prize for the kickoff of my site,” he says.
With a cool giveaway, Ruyter created a contest around the launch, and was able to generate a good amount of buzz. The photo-submission contest lasted for a month and consisted of four weekly challenges that asked participants to upload specific types of photos like candid photos of the family. Here’s one of the Twitter posts that promoted the contest:
The top seven photos with the most shares made it to the final round where a panel of judges selected the final winner.
How did the campaign do? It garnered over 122,000 total impressions across the web and social channels, 12,000 page views and 892 social shares, which Ruyter considered an incredible success, especially for the small investment he made.
“The metrics for this campaign were really good, especially considering the marketing spend was a total of $9 for a Facebook ad,” Ruyter said. “It shows that even a small ad spend can ignite a campaign, which can help it take off and go viral.”
Marketers can try something similar. Find a valuable prize to giveaway, either an in-house item or team up with a partner, and host a photo contest on your site. It’s simple, generates awareness, engages customers and is affordable.
Kansas City Chiefs unite fans with Kingdom Cards
When the Kansas City Chiefs ventured to London the two kingdoms – Chiefs Kingdom and the United Kingdom – were united for the international game.
Before the event, fans were given small, clear cards that had football images on them and were asked to take pictures of London landscapes incorporating the cards. (It’s a page out of the Flat Stanley playbook, where kids took pictures with the paper cutout of the book character.)
Here’s an example of the cards in action:
Fans shared the pictures under #KingdomsUnite. While metrics from the campaign aren’t available, it created a lot of buzz around the game and got traveling fans to interact with the team.
Daniel Lobring, managing director of Communications at rEvolution, says it’s a great social campaign to learn from.
“It was a simple, inexpensive way to spread the word about their game in London,” he says. “It would be easy for marketers to emulate.”
Lobring says sometimes marketers rely on big ad spends or intricate promotions on social media, and that’s not always needed.
“It’s a good reminder for those in social media to not overthink and focus on the basics and making it fun,” he says.
Have you created a successful social campaign that others can learn from? Share it in the comment section below.
