Gaining new social media followers is a major challenge for many brands due to the cost and energy associated with attracting social fans.
An effective remedy to this challenge is co-marketing.
Co-marketing is defined as an ‘opportunity for two brands to work together on promotional efforts with a co-branded offer.’ An example would be if Marketo, a marketing automation company, and Ogilvy & Mather, a global advertising agency, were to develop a collaborative video and post it on their own Facebook pages while linking to each other’s Facebook account. This approach would help both Marketo and Ogilvy & Mather gain more Facebook fans since they’re both reaching new audiences and driving them to their own Facebook accounts.
To help you develop some co-marketing programs, I’ve come up with three ideas to get you started:
1. Develop an incentive-driven program
A growing number of businesses are paying Instagram users with large followings to share branded photos. For example, some restaurants are paying local Instagram users who have over 500 followers to share #foodie pictures of the restaurant’s dishes on their Instagram accounts.
You can emulate this approach by creating an incentive-driven program to encourage Instagrammers or other social network users to share photos of your company’s products.
You can offer product discounts, a special ‘shout’ on social media, or even offer to write a reference letter if the social media user plans to become a professional social media ninja or guru .
2. Develop co-content marketing programs
Co-content marketing is similar to guest blogging – a professional contributes an article to a brand’s website and both the professional and brand promote the content on their own social media channels.
The only major difference between co-content marketing and guest blogging is that a piece of co-content doesn’t have to be a standard blog submitted by an external professional. It can be a different content format or from multiple contributors: an infographic based on insights from ten experienced copywriters, an interview series with digital marketing experts, or an eBook written by 20 seasoned web designers.
Co-content marketing is useful because it helps you attain free brand exposure and increase your chance of gaining new social fans. Individuals who contribute content to your website will share the content on their own social networks because they want followers to see that their expertise is valued by another brand. This gives your brand exposure to their connections cost-effectively and also develops their interests in visiting and following your social media channels.
3. Create an exclusive co-branded social media offer
Co-brand an offer with a complementary company and promote the offer on both your social media accounts.
For example, if you’re a fitness club, you can co-brand with a local organic foods retailer and offer a 25% discount to your club to their social media fans. Vice versa, the retailer can offer a 25% discount to its store to your social followers.
When promoting the offer on social media, you and the retailer should provide links to each other’s social networks so that both of your audiences can visit and follow you both social channels.
This partnership will help both sides gain qualified followers because you’re both reaching targeted audiences who are likely to be interested in your offerings. For instance, individuals who eat organic foods are generally very health-conscious and are likely to be interested in using a 25% discount to a fitness club. Individuals who go to a fitness clubs are also generally very health-conscious and would likely be very happy about getting a 25% discount at an organic foods store.
Conclusion:
Attracting new social media followers is a lot of work, but it doesn’t have to be that way.
By using the three digital co-marketing tactics above, you can leverage your partners’ reach to gain exposure for your brand to qualified social media users and entice them to become your social media fans! These approaches help you increase your social media audience size cost-effectively!
If you have other digital co-marketing techniques you want to share, let me know via Twitter at @SmarttCanada!
Bio:
Ray Wang is the Marketing Coordinator at Smartt, a Vancouver digital consulting agency. He writes about copywriting, digital marketing trends, and social media marketing.