How to Engage a Crowd in 3 Easy Steps

I also used to manage the social media for  a supplements website which, at the time was completely new to social media, just as I was completely new to the bodybuilding industry!  They knew they wanted to be on Facebook as this was where their target audience seemed to be hanging out!

After much research, I figured out that the bodybuilding and fitness industry is extremely competitive and everyone wants to be ‘Top Dog’ when it comes to sharing new information and expertise.  Therefore, I decided to engage, inspire and excite others through these 3 simple steps:

Crowdsourcing

I discovered that the main way to get people to engage is to prompt them to share information about themselves.  For example, I updated the status of the page with “How much can you bench press?” within 15 minutes, the page received an influx of comments with bodybuilders and fitness fanatics all sharing their experience.  I would also ask, “Which exercises are best for Abs?  Is diet also important?”- anything really to prompt and promote discussion based on the audience’s key interests.

After a few months or so, the Facebook page built a reputation for being the “Trip Advisor” of the bodybuilding industry where people would visit to seek new information about diet and exercise.  We received many messages from fans who needed help with a particular weight loss regime tailored to suit them, so again, I would use this as an opportunity to promote engagement i.e “Can anyone help Andy with his diet and fitness query?” etc.

Combine Social Media with Offline Promotions

Whilst working for the company, I was also responsible for writing offline articles to feature in fitness magazines which are often looking for factual information and noticed that a few of the fans had interesting stories to tell.Ii.e one person lost 5 stone and became a bodybuilder.  I would approach these people and ask them if they would be interested in featuring in a fitness magazine with their story, which they would agree to and we would offer them a free supplement or a money off voucher for taking part.  I found that the ones who took part in the contest became loyal Facebook fans, they would ‘like’ the status updates, re-post links and comment on page updates which ultimately encouraged further engagement.

Reach Out to Influential Bloggers

In any social media campaign, blogger outreach is extremely important to get your message across and draw in a crowd.  I would research the most influential bloggers in the fitness industry with a Google Ranking of 3+ (to help with SEO and also to gauge the quality of the content) and more often than not, they would also have a huge Facebook following.  I would target these bloggers and ask them if they would be either interested in collaborating for a magazine story or reviewing one of the products featured on the site and once published, I would update the information on the Facebook page, sharing a link to their Blog page which again, resulted in a loyal Facebook fans and ultimately advocates for the company website.

It’s Social Media Week!

This is Social Media Week!  A week for reflecting on the global impact of social media and its role of driving cultural, economic and social change in markets.  Over 150+ different events taking place in London!

As it is Social Media Week, I would like to take this opportunity to talk about a couple of my favourite social media campaigns.

BMW “What Drives You?” Graffiti Contest

To honor BMW’s “1 Series”, the German carmaker created an online graffiti contest where participants answered the question, “What drives you?” through creating their own designs on the outline of the car.

9,000 designs were submitted which, in total received 500,000 total votes.  The winners of the competition received BMW car models.

Audi’s #ProgressIs Super Bowl

The German carmaker merged old school advertising with new media, making it the first company to use a Twitter hashtag in a Super Bowl advert.

Their advert featured jazz connoissuer and two prisoners breaking out of a luxurious prison and making a getaway in a new Audi A8 Sedan.  The message of the advert, to break the confines of old luxury with Audi’s more sleek and modern take.  However, more importantly, the advertisement features the promoted Twitter hashtag  #ProgressIs and Twitter users who take part in the hashtag relay will automatically enter themselves in a competition to win a series of prizes.

The hashtag competition created a lot of online reception and the Twitter account saw a 47% increase in followers taking them up to 28,000 but noticed a spike in visitors before the Super Bowl started.

Your social media plan

When creating your social media plan, remember that creativity is key in order to grab the attention of your audience.  Does your social media strategy tell a story?

The creative aspect of your plan will incorporate the key benefits  of your company/brand and how your audience can benefit from using your service.  You should add topics for discussion which will entice people to engage with you, thus creating excitement about your company and building relationships with people who are potentially going to be advocates for your brand.

Give your brand a personality 

This is where some companies get it wrong.  Your social media plan shouldn’t consist of blasting people with sales messages, this will only alienate people.  Over the years, people have learnt to switch off to sales messages, instead why not think about what your audience will like.  What can they relate to which will tie in with your brand??  Get into the mind’s of your key target audience and think carefully!  How old are they?  What do they enjoy?  What would interest them the most? (also refer to my blog post “What is your social media strategy?”)…. Now, include this into your social media plan!

If you want to learn more about the ways in which you can “humanize” your brand on Facebook, then take a look at Aaron Lee’s post, “7 tips to humanize your brand on Facebook”

Here’s what I did…

I used to work for a wholesale corset company and they wanted to go down the retail route and sell their corsets through their own website.  Their main objective was to reach the first page of Google for the search term ‘corset’ and ‘corsets’.  At the time, I had no real idea of how to use SEO, so I decided to try achieve this through the use of social media and blogger relations focusing on burlesque, curvy ladies and anything to do with 40’s and 50’s pinup glamour and that’s when my 50’s pinup character was born!

I created a pinup character called Paulina and had a vision of what she would look like, wearing the corsets from the website and she would be the ‘face’ of the social networking sites and blog.  So we had her designed by a graphic designer and gave her a real personality!  including the retro lingo i.e. “Hi guys and dolls”.  Every two months she would change her outfit and be re-designed accordingly which again gave a reason to chat to people across the social sites, i.e. “Hey everyone, I’ve changed my outfit for the winter…I’m now polka-dot Paulina” and “How do all you dolls like my new blonde locks?  I dyed my hair for the Summer season” etc

People loved Paulina, she was even mentioned in some of the popular blogs, such as Old Hollywood Glamour , 100% People and Oola la Vintage blog.

Over a period of 3 months, the website was promoted to the first page of Google and Paulina gained many friends 🙂

Why use social media for business?

This is a question which I think everyone should ask themselves before jumping on the social media bandwagon.

All too often in my experience working in digital PR I have had companies say “let’s set up a Facebook page” without really understanding why they are doing it, other than the fact that everyone else seems to be.  This type of approach will most definitely result in a big fat FAIL and here’s why….

Lack of Engaging Content

If your’e not really sure why you want to set up your Facebook page then your’e not really going to have an idea of what content to update it with…lack of engaging content = lack of interest = zero customers who potentially could be advocates for your company/brand.

Companies that take this approach (and there are a lot of them!) will often run out of things to say on Facebook and ultimately be left with a blank page.

What does this say to potential customers who search for the company and find that their last update was nearly 2 years ago??

Create a Social Media Plan

To avoid this from happening to your company you must create a social media plan answering the questions, why, who, what, when, how and deliver a social media strategy which will engage with your target audience across the most appropriate channels.

If you would like any further tips please comment and I will be happy to help! 🙂