Arcade Fires' music video: Using creativity and story on Google, Twitter and Youtube to increase Word of Mouth

Today we look at how social media has brought interactivity to the music industry....gone are the days where music videos and concerts are simply passive viewing experiences. With social media, individuals can get involved in creating the music videos they want to watch and share them with friends online; people can customize music videos to tell their own personal stories. Similarly, watching a concert can now become an interactive and social experience.

One case study with the band, The Arcade Fire, recently came to my attention at work. After looking it up on WARC (in an article titled, 'Google: The Wilderness Downtown'), I discovered that this campaign won the prestige Cannes Lion award 2012. Have a read here...

Arcade Fire, The Band

Arcade Fire is a 7-person, Indie rock band based in Quebec, Canada. The band has been popular amongst fans of alternative music since they released Funeral in 2004. They are now known for albums such as Neon Bible and The Suburbs, which won the 2011 Grammy awards for Album of the year, as well as the 2011 Polaris Music Prize.

In recent years, the band has also been known for their interactive music videos, which invite fans to take part in their stories. They have developed three such videos for 'We use to wait (2010), 'Sprawl II' (2011) and 'Reflektor' (2013)...

The Wilderness Downtown Google Experiment

The Wilderness Downtown is the interactive, social media version of a music video for the Arcade Fire song, 'We use to wait.' It is a Google Chrome experiment; a multi-browser, HTML5 project which allows individuals to become part of the music video...To view the project, fans must put in the address of their childhood home. Following this, they can watch a music video built around them and their personal geography. Images of fans' childhood homes are interwoven into the clip, making it relevant and meaningful to viewers. In the clip, people are also given the opportunity to write postcards to their past selves. The clip is shown through several windows, which pop up and disappear as the story progresses...

You can make your own video here: http://thewildernessdowntown.com (Google Chrome must be used and it is browser heavy) or you can view an example below, though the full experience doesn't come across as well as trying it for yourself...But how is this all related to social media?

 

Well, fans can share the experience in a number of ways: they can share their video, with their childhood neighbourhood embedded in it, with others on social media pages like Google+ and Facebook. They can send a static url of the postcard they write to friends or out into the public. Chris Milk, director the video, created an invention called the Wilderness Machine, which has been programmed to swap postcards with random senders- sort of a message in a bottle concept. Each postcard can be "planted" (a graphic of a tree appears on the screen) and individuals who recieve a postcard can respond to them (they have a special code returning postcards to the sender). This can start conversations between fans of the band. Additionally, The Wilderness Machine scans and tweets the postcard messages to its Twitter account, one postcard message a day. 

Because the campaign was so 'cool', it also generated a lot of word of mouth advertising and buzz on social media when it was released...check out the tweets from celebrities:

Ashton Kutcher – 10M followers

"this is about the coolest thing I've seen in a long time http://bit.ly/cUptyg"

Jimmy Fallon – 5.3M followers

"New Arcade Fire video-directed by Chris Milk – type in your childhood address – it's really cool. http://bit.ly/bGqWer"

Ben Stiller – 2.6M followers

"http://www.thewildernessdowntown.com/ Taking it to another level."

Rainn Wilson – 3M followers

"If u go to one website in your life, make it this one: http://www.thewildernessdowntown.com/"

Stephen Fry – 4M followers

"This is just too impossibly splendid for words… http://www.thewildernessdowntown.com/Try it"

Not long after it was launched in 2011, it had already generated 4 million visits, with many visitors creating content and sharing it with friends. What was so successful about the whole project? Well, I believe it was quite creative. It was one of the first interactive music videos launched which allowed fans to take an active role in their viewing experience. It exhibited elements of co-creation - providing fans with a beautiful and nostalgic framework to develop their own stories and shape their own entertainment. It was also easy to share, which meant that fans only had to click to pass on their videos and spead word of mouth. Further to this, Arcade Fire co-branded with Google and experimented with new technology (HTML5). This also helped to drive SEO and online discussion, as Google would not only promote the music video, but people would be interested in it due to its use of advanced technology. Pretty creative way to market music!

YouTube Concert

Following the release of the album, The Suburbs (which featured the song 'We use to wait' and The Suburbs, below), Arcade Fire also teamed up with YouTube, Veveo and American Express to perform a live-streamed concert in New York City. According to Mashable and Google, the online stream-concert attracted 3.7 million viewers and offered a range of interactive features. For example, people could play with a 'Choose Your Cam' function, switching between the directors' stream and second camera. They could also view fan-generated images, showing various childhood suburbs. 

The results? The album sold 765,000 copies in the US. Also:

The album debuted at No. 1 on the Irish Albums Chart, the UK Albums Chart, the U.S. Billboard 200 chart,^[4] and the Canadian Albums Chart.^[5] 

While its difficult to attribute the exact sales made due to social media promotions and activities, the Cannes Judges awarded this campaign for its creativity, integration of different channels and its high level of reach.

                                        

In conclusion...

Songs are about stories and creativity, performance is about sharing and experience; Arcade Fire knew this and incorporated these ideas to promote their music. They tailored the story of their music video so that it was local and personal to viewers. They made the project one of co-creation, both with customers and other brands (Google). So the music video was made 'together' with fans and was sharable with the wider community. All this  helped to generate online hype that propel the band's popularity and album sales.

Read more about The Wilderness Downtown here:

http://mashable.com/2010/08/30/arcade-fires-chrome-video/
http://www.canadianbusiness.com/lifestyle/turning-page-views-into-album-sales/
http://socialmedia.hpc.unm.edu/?p=360

Key Points to take away:

• Be creative in social media  marketing - choose different platforms or create your own, and develop unique content to get customers talking and sharing your brand online.
• Involve elements of story and play on nostalgia, particularly customers' personal stories. People love to share their own tales and are more likely to remember marketing campaigns that involve narrative.
• Experiment with something new, like new technology. Nothing gets people talking like new concepts!
• For established brands (e.g. Arcade Fire), it is worthwhile co-branding and cross-promoting with other popular and relevant brand names (Google) to generate excitement and online discussion.
• Make social media content and campaigns local, personal, sharable and collaborative. This will increase chances that the content, and the brand, will get discussed by customers online.

Creating conversation and effective engagement in the Breaking Bad series finale!

Did anyone catch the series finale of Breaking Bad last week? Did you talk about it on social media before, after or during the final episode? Today's post will examine the social media strategies used to promote the finale of the popular TV series, Breaking Bad. How did AMC, the show's TV station, manage to accumulate 10.3 million viewers for the final episode of Breaking Bad? Well, aside from providing an intriguing story line for viewers to follow, AMC used effective engagement techniques on social media.

Breaking Bad: An Introduction

Breaking Bad is a US television series that began in 2008. It follows the story of Walter White, a struggling chemistry teacher diagnosed with terminal lung cancer. To ensure financial security for his family before his death, Walter starts to produce and sell drugs with one of his former students, Jesse Pinkman.

The show ran for 5 seasons with the TV station, AMC, and developed a huge fan base. It was known for placing characters in seemingly hopeless situations, where they would need to use all their wit to escape. It was this intelligent and engaging plot that hooked viewers to follow the series. Last week, the final episode aired on US TV. Up against some critically acclaimed shows and the NFL, the TV station needed to draw attention to its final episode. This was achieved largely through social media...

What sort of social media strategies and techniques were used to promote the Finale?

Conversation and engagement on social media

Social media was used by the cast and producers of the show to interact with fans, share videos and cast predictions for the final episode. AMC provided additional content and activities to express thanks to the audience for their loyalty over the years. Here are some of the specific techniques used across different social media platforms to enhance interaction with audiences and draw viewers towards the finale...

Facebook: On Facebook, the show already had over 5,000,000 likes. To engage viewers, AMC asked followers to show their affection for Breaking Bad by changing their profile picture to the following and tagging #BBaddict. This would send the show out in style, whilst advertising the finale to viewers' friends. This activity resulted in over 57,000 likes, 3,200 comments and 13,000 shares.

                                                       

They also created conversation with fans leading up to the final episode by asking followers on Facebook, 'How is it all going to end? Tell us your predictions.' This got fans talking about their theories and resulted in 19,000 likes, 17,000 comments and 1,900 shares. This conversation continued during the airing of the final episode with fans encouraged to tweet about their viewing experiences, and to farewell the show using the hashtag #GoodbyeBreakingBad on Twitter.

Twitter: A week before the finale, AMC ran a marathon online of all the Breaking Bad episodes. Casts of the series helped to promote this with Aaron Paul (who played the character Jesse Pinkman) live tweeting the Pilot episode. As he currently has over 1.2 million followers, and the series has over 680,000 followers, this quickly spread word of mouth about the finale.

Official Website & Blog: AMC also engaged their audience on the official website with social TV activities including 'story sync' a web-based application which provided a live, two screen experience that allowed viewers to vote on snap polls, answer trivia questions, play games and review moments of the show as they watched it air on TV. Users would have to register beforehand and log-on to the platform as the show started. On story sync, viewers could vote on whether or not the main character had turned to the dark side on a 'Judgement poll'...They could also ask characters questions and rank their most ingenious criminal stunts on the 'Mastermind Meter.' These activities helped to turn the viewing experience into an interactive one, where viewers could share their ideas and feelings with other excited fans. 

                               

                                     

AMC also posted plenty of additional video content on the network's site for fans, including interviews with cast and a special final farewell episode, filmed from the finale party. This farewell video was shared across Facebook and Twitter. While it received 186 views and comments on the website, it gathered over 10,800 comments, 188,000 likes and about 40,000 shares on Facebook! Talk about spreading far and fast with social media! 

                          

Before and during the final episode, fans were encouraged to post questions on the official Breaking Bad blog, on Facebook and on Twitter, to be answered by the series' cast members and its creator, Vince Gilligan. This helped to engage many viewers who were interested in conversing with the masterminds who had brought them their favourite series.

                             

Aligned promotional activities

AMC also created offline events which were strongly connected to their social media activities. As mentioned before, a party was thrown for the the airing of the final episode. Leading up to the finale, fans could enter-to-win or buy tickets to the Finale Watch Party at Cinespia at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery, thrown by Aaron Paul (Jesse Pinkman). This was a fundraiser event, with ticket proceeds going towards the Kind Campaign, an organisation devoted to stamping out bullying.

For AMC, the event, and competition, helped to drive their audience members online, as well as to the TV - everyone who scored tickets to the event was posting statuses, pictures and tweets during the party that helped to increase awareness of the final episode.

It also drove online discussions because the event helped to support a charity that was considered important to many Breaking Bad fans. This promotional event helped to generate over 51,000 likes as well as numerous comments on Facebook...here is an example of the Facebook conversations that took place on the event/competition homepage while it was active (click to view larger picture):

From analysing the Breaking bad finale campaign, we can see that AMC created conversation and engagement online by using several of the techniques suggested by W. Glynn Mangold and David J Faulds (in their article, 'Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix):

• They provided networking platforms through their story sync applications on their website.
• They used blogs and other social media tools to engage customers, interacting with them about the finale and connecting them to the actors and creators of the show.
• They designed a product with talking points and Utilized the power of story by developing a TV series with a strong plot that invited discussion.
• They used both traditional and internet-based promotions, aligning offline activities with online ones. These activities also supported causes considered important to audiences, such as the Kind Campaign.

All this drove people to talk about the series and generated popularity for the show's final episodes. Finally, fans talked about the finale because AMC put a lot of effort into thanking them on social media. Unlike other series such as LOST, Gossip Girl or Dexter, which ended quietly or tamely, Breaking Bad provided additional content and activities that got fans involved in the finale, both online and off; they made the ending exciting for fans....Did you find yourself tweeting or Facebooking about it? I would be interested to know if you could leave me a comment!

Read more about Breaking Bad social media strategies and results here:

http://socialtimes.com/breaking-bad-does-good-with-finale-social-media_b135976
http://www.cnbc.com/id/101074132
http://vator.tv/news/2013-10-07-breaking-bad-wins-first-nielsen-twitter-ratings

Key points to take away to take away from this post:

• To engage individuals in conversation about products on social media, ask directly for opinions, experiences and ideas. Link social media activities to other topics individuals will be interested in talking about: social causes, issues, celebrities, events etc. Also, encourage audiences to post their own questions about the product.
• Align marketing events with social media activities. Events should help to drive individuals onto the brand's social media sites, whilst social media activities should drive audience members towards attending events. All marketing activities should shape an experience worth sharing on social media. In other words, they should generate interaction with others over the product.
• Social media can provide companies with a cost-efficient way to thank their customers. By using networking platforms to provide additional services, information and entertainment, companies can show they value and appreciate customers. This makes them happy, and as such is likely to increase positive brand discussion online.

Differentiation, crowd-sourcing and service: social media strategies in Melbourne's restaurant scene (Part 2)

Welcome to my second post about the social media strategies used by Melbourne eateries! As mentioned last week, cafes and restaurants in Melbourne must differentiate themselves from heavy competition as they operate in a city well renowned for its various eateries.

One avenue for differentiation is through social media - cafes and restaurants with creative social media strategies can stand out from the crowd and increase their customer base...In the last post, we looked at how Jimmy Grants Souvlakis managed to diffuse their brand across Melbourne, gaining over a 1000 followers after just one month of operations...This week we look at creative social media strategies used by N2 Extreme Gelato in Fitzroy and Espresso 3121 in Richmond to differentiate their businesses.

Case study 2: N2 Extreme Gelato - Crowd-sourcing through social media

Unlike the other ice-cream parlours in Melbourne, N2 Extreme Gelato co-creates value with customers by developing the flavours they suggest. Individuals can hop onto their official website, run on a Tumblr platform, and submit flavours they'd like to try. N2 then selects the best suggestions and turns them into real products. This co-creates value because involves customers in developing products they want to to try. In turn, this enables the store to sell flavours that actually appeal to their target market.

N2 leverages the concept of crowd-sourcing on social media. According to Mashable, crowd-sourcing can be defined as "distributed problem-solving." By spreading tasks with large groups of people, companies can gain collective intelligence, assess quality and attract target customers. For N2, crowd-sourcing has allowed the business to interact with their customers more closely on social media. The activity has empowered customers to design their own products, and in the process, helped N2 to drive positive online discussions of their brand.

After they have tranformed a suggestion into a real product. N2 promotes their flavours for the week on Facebook, Instagram and Tumblr. Through this, they not only showcase a range of unique products that differentiate their brand from others, they also credit customers for their creativity and imagination. On photos and updates about co-produced flavours, customers tag friends who suggested the flavour or who are interested in trying it. This helps to spread word of mouth advertising about the brand and products on social media...The more unusual the flavours, the better, as customers are likely to talk about them because they are oddly appealing (e.g. Apple struddle), or outrageous (e.g. Spam and mustard). This, along with their science-themed storefront, has helped the ice-cream parlour to attract many customers and online followers. Since their opening in August 2013, N2 has gained over 1900 followers as a result of their co-creation and communication strategies and their interesting store concept.

                                            

Case study 3: Espresso 3121 - Providing augmented services with Twitter

Another eatery that has used social media to distinguish itself effectively is Espresso 3121 in Richmond. The cafe has used Twitter to enhance its service efficiency. Like many other cafes, Espresso 3121 uses Twitter to create conversation with customers - letting them know about offers, daily specials and other news as well as encouraging them to leave comments and provide feedback. But the cafe has taken their Twitter strategy to a whole new level. 

Espresso 3121 has installed a screen to display twitter talk inside the cafe. This screen shows content relating specifically to their business and therefore provides customers with a chance to find out about the cafe's twitter activities. It also acts as a point of interest for customers while they wait for their orders. Further to this, the cafe has used twitter to provide an express ordering service - customers can order ahead  by tweeting a direct message to Espresso 3121. This not only benefits customers who can skip the queue; it also benefits the cafe, allowing staff to get more organised and to push through a greater number of orders. Additionally, this helps to keep the waiting area clear in peak hours. While the system has experienced a few initial teething problems, it has been well-received with customers and reviewers who have talked about it on Urbanspoon, Twitter, Facebook and other networking platforms as well as their own blogs and websites. 

Espresso 3121 has also employed the use of Foursquare to drive customers into their stores. Because Foursquare can be easily integrated with Facebook and Twitter, and has a growing number of Foodies using it, the cafe has established their venue on this site. Through Foursquare, Espresso 3121 offers discounts for loyal customers who check-in when they visit and share this across Facebook and Twitter. 

By augmenting their services through Twitter, Espresso 3121 has differentiated themselves as a cafe and become more memorable to customers (as evidenced from blog posts like this one and this one). The Twitter strategy has also brought publicity to the cafe from the likes of  Broadsheet Melbourne, who are an influential site to foodie groups in Melbourne. You can read about the Broadsheet article, here and more on the cafe's social media strategy, here. It just goes to show that creativity with social media pays off...But what do you think of these strategies?...will you suggest a flavour to N2 Extreme Gelato? Or would it be appealing to tweet an order for your coffee? Leave a comment and let me know!

Key points to take away from this post:

• Crowd-sourcing can help to diferentiate a business on social media. It not only helps businesses to solve problems and gain new ideas, it also makes customers feel valued. Businesses should provide social media space for customers to share their thoughts and opinions- this will allow them to collect intelligence and assess product quality, so they can improve their business and become even more appealing to customers than their competitors.
• Use social media to augment service provision. Social media platforms provide businesses with another way to serve customers, as well as communicate with them. If businesses can leverage social media to enhance the ordering, customisation or delivery of their products, they can stand out from their competitors. 
• Think of new and original ways to use social media - don't just use it to talk at customers, use it to interact with customers. Consider the main functionality of the platforms and brainstorm ideas around this. For example, Facebook has a strong relationship-building element. Businesses might want to consider how they can create activities on it that can help create a brand community. Question how social media currently works and consider new methods of useage. Can it be used in a collaborative and public way rather than individually on a phone or computer? Experiment! 

Differentiation and Diffusion through social media in Melbourne's restaurant scene (Part 1)

The idea for my post came this week while having brunch with my sister. As a foodie, I really appreciate the many good cafes and restaurants available to us here in Melbourne. But if you were to start an eatery in this city, it would be highly competitive. This has made me wonder...how can small cafe and restaurant businesses differentiate themselves from their various competitors? 

One way is though their use of social media! This is the first of a 2-part-post on social-media savvy eateries in Melbourne. In these posts, we will look at the strategies they have employed to stand out from the crowd.

Case study 1:  Jimmy Grants - Selecting new platforms to target influencers & co-creating value with unique content/ promotional activities 

For those who watch Masterchef, Jimmy Grants is the new gourmet souvlaki joint opened by George Calombaris in August, 2013. While his fame as a Masterchef judge has added to the success of his restaurant, Calombaris has also been clever in marketing his restaurant online...

To appeal to their young, hip, urban customers, the restaurant has established pages and profiles on social media platforms commonly used by their target demographics. This includes Facebook and Twitter, but also newer platforms such as Instagram and Tumblr. Their official website is created on a Tumblr platform, so the content they post can be easily shared by their fans. Tumblr is a blogging site that has been popular with both Foodies and Hipsters, who are influential groups for the restaurant.

Foodies are important because they are potential food bloggers and photo-sharers. If we consider Brian Solis' 3 pillars of influence, these individuals have reach (high popularity on social media), resonance (high posting frequency) and relevance (high authority on the subject of food). Consequently, they have a high level of influence on social media.

Hipsters are the dominant sub-cultural group in the inner city suburbs. They have a tendency to want to try new things before others. As a result, these groups are Innovators and/or Early Adopters that can help to spread word of mouth for the restaurant. By selecting social media platforms commonly used by these two groups, the restaurant has been able to differentiate their brand and diffuse it more quickly across Melbourne.

To connect with their target audience the restaurant has developed a fun online brand personality to relate to their customers. This is portrayed through the interesting and quirky content posted on their social media pages. For example, the restaurant has created their own memes about the 'food culture' of immigrant grand-parents and posted this across social media. This not only matches the theme of the restaurant (Jimmy Grant is old Australian rhyming slang for immigrants; the theme of the restaurant is about immigration and multi-culturalism), it also establishes a connection with customers who can relate and laugh at the quotes. 

As their target audience are becoming increasingly health conscious, and souvlakis are not known for being the healthiest of meals, the restaurant has worked to address this concern on social media. Instead of providing just nutritional tables, they have posted creative photos deconstructing the ingredients of each souvlaki sold on their menu. These post have not only been informative, but also creative. 

On top of providing interesting content, the restaurant has also used social media to run a promotional Scavenger hunt for the last few weekends. Staff have posted pictorial clues on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and asked followers to find specific objects hidden around Fitzroy. Individuals who find the objects specified can claim a free souvlaki. This idea was unique and helped to gain publicity for the restaurant as blogs/food communities such as Broadsheet Melbourne, and Mel: hot or not, published stories about the promotional activity. 

 

From analyzing Jimmy Grants, we can see that the restaurant has used social media effectively to target and attract social influencers. Rather than use social media for straight advertising, the business has engaged their customers with interesting content that make them want to talk about the restaurant and its food. Although Jimmy Grants has only just opened in August, they already have 715 followers on Twitter and 1897 likes on Facebook. Talk about quick Word of Mouth! Have you guys tried out Jimmy Grants or heard about the restaurant on social media? Let me know with a comment!

Feel free to read a little more about their social media promotional events here:
http://www.broadsheet.com.au/melbourne/events/event/jimmy-grants-souva-search-27-09-2013

Key points to take away from this post:

• To reach their target audiences, companies should use a combination of popular platforms like Facebook and Twitter, but also conduct research about the target audience and select niche platforms appealing to their their interest. Eg. Instagram or Tumblr, for art, crafting and youth culture. 
• Firms should create content that entertains and engages people on a personal level. This means more than just creating status updates about new products online; it means understanding the trends on social media and using them - memes, trolls, creative pictures and hashtags etc - to speak to audiences in their own language. As Andreas Kaplan points out, no ones wants to interact with a boring organisation online.
• Firms need to incorporate fun promotional activities with social media. This helps to shift online audiences from being 'likers' to actual customers. Conversely, it also increases interactions with a brands' social media pages by drawing in new customers who want to keep up with the brand online.
• Organisations must also identify the influential groups of their industry and develop unique content and activities that will attract them to join and talk about their social media pages.

Become The Wolverine! Virtual experiences + social media (Part 2)

Virtual experiences + social media in entertainment marketing

On my last post, we talked about using virtual experiences with social media to attract customers and augment offerings in travel campaigns. But virtual media can be used for more than just tourism advertising. Consider entertainment and film-based marketing. Younger audiences often develop fandoms for their favourite movie or TV characters, particularly if they are superheroes or fantasy characters - just think of all the Comicon conventions or midnight blockbuster film screenings where individuals dress up as Star Wars, Harry Potter or X-men characters.

Entertainment firms can take advantage of this and create shareable virtual experiences that allows audiences to become the characters they love. By doing this, firms create additional value for their audiences; they augment the entertainment they provide, turning it from a passive viewing activity to an interactive one. Audiences are not just waiting to be entertained...they can join in the fun themselves. The more fun they have, they more likely they are to share experience with others on social media. This co-creates value, leading to greater promotion for the product and company. Let's look at a creative film campaign that used virtual experience and social media to attract its audience.

Case study: The Wolverine Augmented Powers Campaign

20th Century Fox studios wanted to attract audiences to the new The Wolverine film. As the sixth installment in the X-men series, the film was not expected to receive the same hype as it predecessors. Because of this, the studio needed to make the film stand out to their target audience. To achieve their goal, the studio decided to create campaign that would augment the film for customers by providing them with a virtual experience where they could becoming the lead character of the Wolverine. 

This experience was not offered through an online game, but through actual kiosks placed in shopping centres and cinemas in 17 different countries according to Mashable. Individuals could play on the kiosks for free. When they approached, a Microsoft Kinect sensor would transport the user to a scene from the movie where Wolverine fights a Yakuza soldier on top of a speeding bullet train. Individuals would become 'Wolverine' in the battle, their swift hand movements turning into claw swipes on screen.

To link this to social media, the kiosks would take pictures of individuals engaged with the virtual experience and post it on their Facebook walls as well as on the official fan page.

This campaign was strong because it reflected a great understanding of the target audience; it appealed to them effectively by giving them the chance to live out their fantasies. According to the studio, the activity augmented the film; 'By slicing through obstacles and defending themselves from ninja attacks, fans would experience a virtual thrill ride, based on an exhilarating scene from the up-coming movie.' By providing a virtual experience through game kiosks, the company changed the film (the product) from a viewing experience to a fun, participatory experience. 

This not only got fans involved with the movie, it also enticed them to share the experience....so it was a smart idea to provide players with a photo memento to be shared on social media. The photos allowed players to arouse the curiosity of their Facebook friends and helped them to recommend the activity, and the film, to others. I think the shareable element was a great idea and might have been better if the kiosks had recorded short videos of players. Videos would have demonstrated the actual activity. It could have also helped to generate a higher level of online discussion about the campaign if players had used funny or 'cool' moves. 

Nonetheless, the campaign was highly creative and played a part in promoting the film in countries such as Mexico, New Zeland and The Phillipines. In the end, The Wolverine generated ticket sales of over $370.5 million USD internationally, which was about three times more than the films' production budget of $120 million. 

More information about the campaign can be found on Mashable and the inspiration room

http://mashable.com/2013/07/02/be-the-wolverine-kinect/

http://theinspirationroom.com/daily/2013/wolverine-experience-augmented/

After reading this case study, do you think it was a strong campaign? What other industries might benefit from creating campaigns with shareable virtual experiences? Leave a comment and let me know!

Key points to take away:

• Virtual experiences can help to create a strong social media campaign in experience-based industries. This can include tourism (as discussed in our last post), but also entertainment, where audience members often seek to be like their favourite movie characters or Hollywood celebrities.
• Virtual experiences help to transform passive experiences (advertisements, films etc) into interactive experiences.
• To be linked effectively to social media, the virtual experience should include a shareable element, a photo, a video or some digital token that can be embedded on peoples' Facebook profiles/blogs/ Twitter feeds/ Pinterest accounts and shared with friends or followers. This helps to arouse awareness and interest in the campaign (friends may go try out the virtual experience too) and in the product (as a result of this advertising, they are likely to become aware and interested in the product as well.)

Send your Facebook profile to South Africa! Become a back-up dancer in Hong Kong! Virtual experiences + social media (Part 1)

Welcome to post #6! Today, we explore virtual experiences on social media, looking at 2 creative travel campaigns for Cape Town, South Africa and Hong Kong.

Virtual experiences: An Introduction

Social media marketing is about creating an experience for customers, not just using social media to conduct straight advertising and selling. A few weeks ago we looked at a successful case study where US TV station, HBO, used social media updates and games to lead audiences to Game of Thrones events offline. This highlighted one way of creating fun experiences for customers using social media.

However, organisations can also create fun experiences for customers online. By providing simulations of real-life experiences, companies can allow customers to 'try' products or services before they buy them. Or if they have already tried these offerings, a virtual experience can augment products and services, using interactivity, animation and graphics to bring the product or service to life for customers. If this is conducted on social media, individuals can not only enjoy the virtual experiences themselves, they also share them with with friends, family and peers.

Virtual experiences help to generate word-of-mouth advertising because it allow customers to tell interesting stories about the product or brand. According to Mangold and Faulds, from the article 'Social Media: The Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix,' stories are memorable and repeatable. By helping to create stories that individuals can share about a brand or product, virtual experiences help to drive online brand discussions. Below, we will look at two creative case studies that have succeeded in creating brand discussion online:

Case Study 1: Send Your Facebook profile to Cape Town Campaign

Advertising firm, Ogilvy, helped to create a social media campaign for Cape Town Tourism that sent individuals' on a virtual holiday to the city through Facebook. Individuals could sign up and select the aspects of a holiday they were interested in (shopping, dining, adventures). This information was then used to tailor content to individuals' timelines. To send peoples' profiles on a virtual holiday, Ogilvy and the Cape Town tourism board put photos, videos and status updates that not only entertained individuals, but made it look like they were actually on holidays in Cape Town to their friends! Individuals who joined up for the program also had the chance to win a real trip to Cape Town.

This campaign was quite smart because it used virtual experience to give customers a taste of what it would be like to visit Cape Town. There were many different pictures and videos that were placed on individuals' profiles that displayed the beauty of city. Rather than give people a tour of the main attractions, this campaign took individuals to the secret gems of the country and allowed them to visit small communities and beatufuil natural mountains and beaches. By conducting this campaign on social media, pictures and experiences were 'shared' naturally, as peoples' friends and families would be curious with the Cape Town content appearing on their newsfeed.

What were the results of the campaign?

Overall tourism up by 4% and bookings for the following year up by 118%. On social media:

Case Study 1: Hong Kong Summer Spectacular Dance campaign

As mentioned in a previous post on this blog, Hong Kong hosts many events during the summer months including a large pop concert with many Chinese performers. To attract audiences from Asia to travel to Hong Kong and attend these events, the Hong Kong tourism board created a virtual music experience for audiences. Individuals could create their own music video and become dancers - they just had to upload their photos and their face would be placed on a pre-recorded dancers' body. This would create a funny videos that individuals could share with friends on platforms such as Facebook or Renren Wang (chinese social media platform).

                     

This campaign used virtual experience to give individuals a taste of 'stardom' and allowed them to experience the fun activities taking place in HK during the summer. These music videos not only showed the summer events, they were also outrageous and humourous media clips that amused individuals and enticed them to share with friends. According to Mangold and Faulds, outrageous content generates discussion and sharing online. In addition to this, individuals could encourage their friends to go on the Hong Kong Tourism website like their videos. The individual with the most likes could win a trip to Hong Kong with free accommodation. 

What were the results of the campaign?

The campaign received over 3000 submissions and the videos recorded received over 300,000 views. The site also had over 50,000 page views. Overall, the campaign raised travel to Hong Kong during the Summer months from the target destinations including Korea, China and Taiwan. 

Why were these virtual campaigns so successful? 

There were a few things that both campaign did that helped to increase success:

• Both campaigns gave audiences fun experiences that they might not yet have experienced in real life, e.g. travelling to South Africa, dancing in a music video
• Both campaigns were interactive and allowed individuals to personalize their virtual experience, e.g. select your holiday interest, select which photo to upload and which dancer to become
• Both campaigns provided avenues to share the content, e.g. on Facebook and other websites
• Both campaigns used competitions to incentivize viewing, participation and sharing. 

This is what I have observed. But please leave a comment... let me know if you have noticed other things that have made these campaigns successful! Would you try a virtual travel experience on social media? Would you share it? 

Key points to take away from this post:

• Make virtual experiences ones that customers haven't had the chance to experience in 'real life.'
• Allow these experiences to be personalised and shared across social media.
• Use virtual experiences to give customers a taste of the product or service being sold.
• Make experiences outrageous or humourous to generate discussion and sharing.
• Provide an incentive to share content!

Taking advantage of User Generated Content in the tourism sector

This week we're going to look at User Generated Content (UGC), specifically in travel campaigns developed by the Hong Kong Tourism Board and Visit Norway.

User-Generated Content: An Introduction

As a result of social media, online content can now be produced by ordinary people, rather than just media corporations; these days everyone can create, publish and share their own opinions, ideas and interpretations. User-generated content (UGC) can include comments, photos, videos, stories, reports, reviews and digital artworks. Social media platforms facilitate for the sharing of UGC.

Should companies incorporate UGC in their social media campaigns?

The use of UGC depends on the situations surrounding the firm or industry. In most cases, UGC can help companies to create a higher level of engagement with customers. For those in the tourism industry, it is highly beneficial to incorporate UGC in social media campaigns. Why?

Firstly, when people travel, they tend to take photos, film videos, make scrapbooks, write journals, give reviews or blog about their experiences. As a result, there is already a large pool of content available for tourist boards and travel companies to tap into. When they display UGC, these organizations not only provide lots of interesting, positive content, without high costs or effort, they also make customers feel proud of their work. This sense of pride encourages customers to spread word-of-mouth about the campaigns.

Secondly, travelling is about trying new things and having fun. But sometimes people don't know about the fun activities that exist outside the borders of their own country. UGC like photos, videos and stories can help to bring awareness to, and sell these exciting travel experiences. Below are two successful case studies where tourism organizations have used UGC effectively. The platform used in both cases happens to be Instagram (but UGC can be showcased on many other platforms like YouTube for videos, Facebook for stories etc.)

Case study 1: Hong Kong Tourism Board's Summer Spectacular Viewfinder



To raise awareness for Hong Kong's various tourist attractions and hotspots in summer, the country's tourism board ran a photo competition. Because they knew that locals were avid Instagram users, they took advantage of this platform and asked their audience to send in their best Instagram photos of Hong Kong. The board then developed a website, where visitors could view these photos on a viewfinder. Participants could link family and friends to this website, increasing word-of-mouth.

By creating a competition, the board provided an incentive for customers to send in their best photos. By developing a special website to display this content, they made audience members feel like their work was valued, and therefore worthy of sharing. This campaign resulted in 426,000 likes and shares on Facebook as well as 74.4 thousand micro-blog references (like tweets) on the Chinese social media site, Weibo. It raised inbound travel to Hong Kong from China and South-East Asia over the summer that the campaign ran.

Case study 2: VisitNorway's Your Way campaign & current Instagram platform

A few years ago, Visit Norway created the 'Your Way' campaign in central and Eastern Europe asking audience members to participate in a competition making creative works that portrayed Norway as they saw it. The process of the campaign and results can be viewed in this video: 

As part of their current social media strategy, Visit Norway now runs an active Instagram channel. Like the Hong Kong tourism board, Norway's main tourism organization has created a special platform to view these photos. This platform has gained 560,000 likes from the public on Facebook:

            



From these campaigns, we can see there are a number of benefits with incorporating UGC in social media campaigns. UGC provides:

• Voice: If firms encourage audiences to generate and share their own content about their brands, they give voice to their customers. This can make customers feel valued and appreciated.
• Authenticity: By handing customers the power to generate publicity for a brand, firms can create a sense of legitimacy. A customer's display of enthusiasm for a brand is often considered more believable than a company's advertisements.
• Personal connection: Firms can establish a strong personal connection with customers through UGC if they interact with their audiences' contents.

However, we must also we aware of the problems with UGC, including:

• Negative contributions: Content can be created by trolls, who damage the brand's reputation with poor-taste jokes; angry individuals, who post abusive or racist content; and criminals, who post illicit images or documents.
• Control: It may appear totalitarian to the public if firms exercise strict control over other individuals' content...but firms still need to monitor for abusive or illicit contributions.

How have the case studies examined become successful and managed these issues?

Both the HK Tourism Board and Visit Norway were successful because they maximized the benefits of UGC and minimized the issues with it:

1. They both created competitions to provide an incentive for posting positive UGC. Because users wanted to win the prizes or gain recognition for their work, they were willing to put in more effort to create appropriate and high quality content.
2. They created their own channels and platforms to showcase user-generated content. This allowed them to show that they valued the participation of their audience members. It also allowed them to screen content before posting it online. These platforms were then linked to other social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Weibo, etc. so they could be shared with other individuals.

Key points to take away from this post:

• Incorporate UGC on social media to encourage customer engagement with brands.
• Be aware of all the benefits and issues with UGC before engaging in it.
• Provide incentives that encourage individuals to make positive contributions and share work.
• Monitor content, but don't control it too much. Provide posting guidelines and screen public contributions first before releasing them online.