Social Media Strategy

Objectives

Increase average user engagement on social media by 10 percent by May 2015 Increase awareness for the newly opened location in Columbia

Target Audience

The target is 18 to 24-year-old college students in Columbia, MO. They love sweets as much as they love to express themselves and their own unique personality and style. They dont take themselves too seriously and they embrace their inner kid. They get bored easily and love everything fresh, new and exciting.

Brand Personality and Social Voice

The Strange Donuts tone of voice is fun, light-hearted and humorous. The brand has a specific style and flair that is a little bit eccentric, hence the name Strange Donuts, but still clean and cohesive. The style also includes a little bit of a retro vibe with themes of throwbacks and childlike imagery. The creative director for Strange Donuts has compared their relatable content to that of the television show South Park. The brands charity, Strange Cares, also aligns with this playful, childlike style. The owners purposefully selected three causes that benefit and empower children.1 Another major aspect of the Strange Donuts personality is its local loyalty. The brand loves making partnerships and collaborating with local businesses and regularly promotes other local companies on its own social spaces. Strange Donuts is very up-to-date with social media trends like Throwback Thursday and basics like tagging and using hashtags, but doesnt necessarily go to the next level with engagement.

Social Channels Facebook Strange Donuts has a strong Facebook following with 26,000 page likes, but comments and post shares are few and far between in relation. This gives this platform a lot of potential for an increase in user engagement. The page does a good job of using hashtags, geotags, video and Facebook events, but the majority of posts are recycled photos from their Instagram account. There is room for more original, tailored, interactive content on Facebook. Instagram Instagram is another popular account for Strange Donuts with 13,000 followers. They are very active, posting up to five times daily, which might actually be a little bit too active. However, photos are professionally shot, visually compelling and arguably account for the best content Strange Donuts has to offer. They have good use of Instagram video and frequently tag other local companies. Like Facebook, engagement on Instagram is lacking compared to their large following. There is not a lot of branded hashtag promotion that followers can use on their own, so there is room for improvement.

Twitter Strange Donuts once again has a strong following on Twitter with 9,000 followers, but brand engagement is extremely low. There are little to no favorites or retweets for any given tweet. Strange Donuts also frequently posts somewhat irrelevant tweets that have no real strategy other than possibly adding to brand voice. Strange Donuts does a decent job of retweeting or replying to followers who tweet at them, but doesnt necessarily start the conversation. Like Facebook, most of the content is recycled Instagram posts. YouTube YouTube is a social space Strange Donuts uses to house their video content, but not to be social. They only have between 400 and 2,000 views per video with hardly any comments and only 84 subscribers. The videos they upload to YouTube serve as their form of ad campaigns, some which are more successful than others. Last year, they tried out a branded hashtag video campaign, #PronutTheDonut, to promote a protein donut, and it is their most viewed video to date. This platform doesnt give them a lot of reach, but it has lots of potential to do so.

Brand Positioning & Messaging Strategy

Product Promotion The product promotion content pillar includes the use of social media channels to promote the brands donuts, merchandise and events such as grand openings. For example:

Partnerships Posts in the partnerships content pillar include tweets, statuses, photos and videos that mention, tag or promote other local businesses or collaborators. For example: Causes The causes content pillar includes posts pertaining to Strange Donuts charity, Strange Cares, and philanthropy events such as National Donut Day. For example:

Social Tactics

One tactic to promote engagement and spread awareness is using branded hashtags.4 Using open-ended branded hashtags across Facebook, Twitter and Instagram does a better job of promoting engagement than a simple follow us on Twitter by inviting the audience to participate and add to the conversation.5 Another tactic is to promote engagement is launching social media contests or interactive campaigns. Among the most popular interactive campaigns are Facebook comment-to-win contests, best photo challenges on Instagram and Twitter hashtag contests.6

A third tactic would be engaging with Twitter followers in a more direct and personal manner by replying to tweets and using promoted tweets. Promoted tweets yield engagement rates between three and ten percent on average and much higher rates than standard online advertising, such as banner ads.5 Promoted tweets are also effective at spreading brand awareness by targeting audiences that dont already follow Strange Donuts.5

References

1. Alive Magazine Blog. (2014). Strange Donuts Launches Strange Cares Charity Effort For Three

Childrens Charities. Retrieved from http://www.alivemag.com/blog/index.php/2014/10/ strange-donuts-launches-strange-cares-charity-effort-for-three-childrens-charities/

2. Feast Magazine. (2014.) How Strange Donuts Conquered St. Louis. Retrieved from

http://www.feastmagazine.com/dine/article_c4ab8f1a-8aed-11e4-9348-8b7bb855312d.html

3. St. Louis Magazine. (2014). 2013: The year of Strange Donuts. Retrieved from http://www.stlmag.com/dining/2013-The-Year-of-Strange-Donuts/

4. Study Breaks Magazine. (2014.) Using Social Media Platforms to Reach College Students.

Retrieved from http://studybreakscollegemedia.com/2014/using-social-media-platforms-to-engage-college-students/

5. Mashable. (2011). 5 proven Twitter Marketing Strategies. Retrieved from

http://mashable.com/2011/06/22/twitter-marketing-guide/

6. TRAFFIK. (2015). Emotional, Unique and Outspoken: What Millenials Want. Retrieved from http://www.traffikonline.com/2015/02/emotional-unique-and-outspoken-what-millennials-want/