Turn Your Brand Into A Movement
Has technology changed the dynamic of brand promotion from sales campaigns?
There’s no doubt that technology has played a huge role in the transformation of advertising.
What once was centralized on big media channels, like television commercials, is now a more egalitarian approach. Now your mandate is to reach out to buyers through social networks, websites, and in-store digital advertisements.
Has this also changed the dynamic of brand promotion from sales campaigns?
Yes it has. Since the promoter of the product or service is no longer a person of influence, like a celebrity or spokesperson on a major news channel, that the message can gain better traction online by creating a social movement via the common person. There are a few steps you will have to take to accomplish this feat:
- Associate your brand with a cause.
- Engage “fans” of the message on social media.
- Make it easy to spread the message online.
Have a Product with a Cause
If you’re a company manufacturing and selling kitty litter, you need to realize that it’s not just kitty litter you’re selling, but you’re also creating a way to recycle wastes in an environmentally-friendly way. If you can’t find a cause directly related to your product, simply align your company with a popular cause you care about and promote it instead.
It’s important that people get the message that you are "for" something important that will help better the world - a project that needs their immediate attention and participation to get off the ground.
Consumers who want to make a difference in life may not have the money to create a non-profit of their own, but are more than happy to patronize your business if they know it helps promote something positive in the world. However, just being “for” something doesn’t mean much if you can’t get people to jump on board. The next step is to find the converts for your cause.
Get People to Join Your Cause
Unfortunately, any beauty pageant contestant can be for “World Peace”, but that’s not going to stir anyone into action. It’s a lovely thought, but until you find a way to influence others to join you in your cause, that’s what it remains: a mere idea.
To create a movement, you must inspire others to take action for your cause. Instead of a sales campaign that briefly mentions the cause, you have to inspire and promote the cause in such a way that it also promotes your product or service. You need to create a social media campaign to get the word out through education, promotional activities, and special offers.
Create a Facebook Page for your cause, schedule events and invite people on social media sites, and even offer discounts and specials for those that attend, either in person or online. Once the event is taking place, you can live tweet it.
Use sites like YouTube to document different events or as an educational tool to bring awareness to the cause and what your company’s role is to promote this social value.
Publish Your Way to Success
You can help spread your movement through the power of the written word. A content marketing strategy is even more important when building a movement as during a sales campaign. Not only will you be creating content for your site and social media outlets, but you’ll also have to create content that others can quickly publish and share on their own websites or social media channels that have a high interest value in promoting the cause.
Make content easily shareable with social media buttons on it that let them share on the social media site that they prefer. Use mobile-friendly content so that your fans and followers can share the message via smartphone, too.
You’ll want to identify your “activists” early on, through their social media outreach, and help them by making content available for them to promote. Be sure to reward them for helping to get the word out. You might offer them a free ticket to an event or reward them with a sample of your product as a “thank you” for their service in the cause. A small and thoughtful reward will go a long way when getting your message across through online influencers.
Commit to the Cause Long-Term
This is the toughest part about creating a social movement: It’s long-term. If you commit to one cause one day and another cause a different day, friends and followers are quick to figure out you’re not really committed.
Any social movement needs to be instituted for the long-term, with an ear towards modifying it based on the feedback of the people who make up the movement in the first place. This way your movement can stay fresh, inspire people, and continue to generate buzz for it and your company a long time after the initial campaign has been rolled out.
Original Post
About Author:
If you want to learn more about how to reach your audience with the right message at the right time through the right channels, please feel free to reach out to me at steve@unoapp.com. I’ll be more than happy to chat.
Steven Tulman is the Chief Revenue Officer at UNOapp, and a sales & marketing expert specializing in helping companies grow through effective marketing, improved sales performance, and excellent customer experience. Connect with Steven on Twitter @StevenTulman and LinkedIn and join my group Career & Business Leadership Forum.
Read more from Steven: ’Go Digital or Go Home!’
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