P&G Tests the Power of Social Media
[Posted by Shar VanBoskirk]
So I got a golden ticket to P&G's digital hack night -- a P&G party to bring together social media experts, P&G digital minds, and experienced interactive marketers to share ideas. The event is to test the strength of digital media to try to generate $100,000 for charity.
Here's how it works:
*P&G has split us into four teams -- each team has about 40 people: P&G folks, social media gurus (Pete Blackshaw is my team captain and Pandora's Tim Westergren is sitting next to me) as well as online ad folks like me and Aaron Finn from AdReady.
*Each team has four hours to sell as many Tide Loads of Hope t-shirts as possible. (If you don't know, Loads of Hope is a Tide-sponsored social initiative which raises money for disaster victims. View a spot about it here).
*We can use any digital tools available to promote our unique url to sell t-shirts www.tide1.com
I'm admittedly the most cynical analyst about social media and its measurable value to marketers. BUT, participating in this event is making me a believer. In 60 minutes through networking, well targeted ads, SMS messaging, and viral videos we have generated 1200 hits for a site that didn't even exist before 5pm tonight. We are tracking at about a 5-7% conversion rate...not bad. The other thing that is happening here is that we are adapting our marketing strategy based on feedback from people who are responding to our viral outreach. How often does that happen in a traditional marketing environment?
This is great. As a 'zero to hero' story it could be a fascinating case study. I'd really like to know the outcome of this - the strategies and tactics employed by each time - if you're willing to share!
Posted by: Brendan Cooper | March 12, 2009 at 10:34 AM
I too would like to learn more details on how you leverage social media to generate buzz and drive traffic to the tide site. please share more!
Posted by: tara greco | March 12, 2009 at 12:37 PM
Yes! More info please. Love to hear details about the tactics used and how this relatively spontaneous effort worked... Sounds so very cool.
Posted by: Brian Ellefritz | March 12, 2009 at 01:23 PM
Been on twitter for about 3 weeks. I have seen a moderate boost in traffic. Mostly traffic from people just browsing for more followers, but traffic none the less. Next step: learning how to build a stronger network and convert these additional eyeballs in to fans and sales. come check me out.
http://twitter.com/spryka
Posted by: Khurram | March 12, 2009 at 01:42 PM
A healthy cynicism from analysts on new media is good, thanks for giving it a shot Shar. Its an analysts job to protect their clients, social media has it's fair share of problems, that's for sure.
Thanks for giving it a shot!
Posted by: Jeremiah Owyang | March 13, 2009 at 08:22 AM
Shar - Would like to speak with you. Your stuff is very interesting. Scott, CEO of Veeple scott@veeple.com Thx
Posted by: scott broomfield | March 13, 2009 at 02:59 PM
Shar,
Thanks for sharing your experience. I think it was a great idea. I would be very interested in knowing how much was spent to pull off such a campaign, not just in terms of social media spending, but in resources, i.e., x number of poeple put in y number of hours. You could probably come up with some hard ROI numbers here. Any guess at the numbers?
Paul St. Amant
Softomic LLC
Posted by: Google Fan | March 16, 2009 at 04:42 AM
Shar, there is so much value in social media when you identify and locate the right audiences to engage with. I think here it comes back to measurement, circulation auditing and other accountability strategies , applicable for online media.
Posted by: Ekaterina Tsvetkova | March 16, 2009 at 04:10 PM