Presenting: 10 of the Smartest Big Brands in Social Media
digg_url = ‘http://mashable.com/2009/02/06/social-media-smartest-brands/’;
digg_title = ‘Presenting: 10 of the Smartest Big Brands in Social Media’;
digg_bodytext = ‘Samir Balwani is a social media marketer who helps businesses create effective web strategies. You can follow him on Twitter and get his newsletter.\n\nAs we battle a global recession, corporations are looking for new ways to sell their achat de viagra en ligne products and engage their consumers. Many have turned to the Internet, with Social Media in particular, to market’;
Samir Balwani is a social media marketer who helps businesses create effective web strategies. You can follow him on Twitter and get his newsletter.
As we battle a global recession, corporations are looking for new ways to sell their products and engage their consumers. Many have turned to the Internet, with Social Media in particular, to market their goods. Let’s take a look at 10 companies that have done a phenomenal job of taking advantage of social media platforms.
1. Blendtec Blends it on YouTube
Who doesn’t know about the “ download drama movies;Will It Blend” series on YouTube? Created by George Write, the marketing director of Blendtec, the campaign was low cost and instantly became a hit. In the video, Tom Dickson the CEO of Blendtec, attempts to blend objects in their blender. This simple idea led to a “five-fold increase in sales”.
Blendtec leveraged YouTube’s subscriber base and tried something fun and original. The campaign was a success and continues to entertain and sell.
Lesson: Social media marketing doesn’t always need to cost a lot of money. Creating funny, original video and leveraging an already large user base can be used to increase sales.
2. Burger King and the Sacrifice Facebook Application
Recently, Burger King has really been pushing the envelope with their marketing. They first started with whoppervirgins.com, then entered the social space with the “sacrifice ten friends” facebook application. The campaign quickly went viral and was adopted by over 20,000 users, sacrificing 200,000 friends for free whoppers.
Sadly, the application was shut down as quickly as it started by Facebook, citing privacy concerns. Regardless, the application was beautifully built and the idea was perfect. Burger King built in the ability to share it, the incentive to use it, and added just enough humor to make the campaign a hit.
Lesson: Successful and viral campaigns don’t just test out social media, they jump in it. Pushing the envelope can create the buzz that makes your campaign memorable.
3. Starbucks Asks for Your Advice
Social media isn’t only about using existing websites, but sometimes creating your own. To get a better handle on consumer feedback, Starbucks did just that with “My Starbucks Idea.”
The site allows users to submit suggestions to be voted on by Starbucks consumers, and the most popular suggestions are highlighted and reviewed. Starbucks then took it a step further and added an “Ideas in Action” blog that gives updates to users on the status of changes suggested.
By empowering their exceptionally web savvy consumer, Starbucks strengthens their campaign to add a personal touch to coffee.
Lesson: Thinking of ways to build your company are great, but directly asking your consumers what they want, is better. Acting on that information and doing it publicly is key to the success of this campaign.
Starbucks has also embraced Twitter, you can see their stream at @Starbucks.
4. Sun Microsystems and the CEO Blog
Want your blog to really make a splash? You could learn a lot from Sun Microsystem’s CEO blog. Jonathan Schwartz’s blog received about 400,000 hits a month (in 2006).
It’s not the number of hits that make his blog a social media success, but the openness on it. Positive and negative comments are allowed, and even the most inane are approved. Transparency from the highest position in a company trickles down and increases trust from consumers.
Lesson: Social media is a culture of transparency and honesty that must be embraced, leading by example is one of the best ways to introduce it to a company. Few things are better than a CEO that blogs or uses twitter.
Sun Microsystems also has a network of blogs, friends on
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