Part 3 of 6

Learning From the Oscars

Okay, so in the last post, we were talking about the newsroom US Cellular created to be active on social media during the Oscars broadcast on television. Do you know why they would do that? It’s to be in position to jump on any creative opportunity to get their name, brand and message out – utilizing the captive audience during the Oscars.

Below, is the picture that US Cellular tweeted. Do you think it was effective? What is your response to their company for doing that?

The key is tying the company name, business, or theme into the event theme at the time. Oreo’s “You Can Still Dunk in the Dark” tied perfectly into the arena being in the dark at that moment – and you can bet everyone was on their phone connecting to others!

The biggest hit on Twitter was the Oscar Mayer company. Do I need to explain how that company name ties in with the Oscars? The tweet and retweet activity put them at the top of the #Oscars conversation.

1. Feb 25 Oscar Mayer ‏@oscarmayer

We’re trending! Must be a lot of sandwich makin’ goin’ on right now.

710 RETWEETS
253 FAVORITES

4:21 p.m. – Feb 24, 2013 · Details

Yeah, that is funny! Humor is risky but can be effective. Did you see how many retweets they had? That’s free advertising to 710 people.

To conclude this post, I’d like to share an excerpt from a blog reviewing the Oscar social media activity. I agree that most companies were just saying anything and not being relevant or creative. Here are four great reminder tips for doing social media for a business. An excerpt from:

Social media lessons from Oscars’ real-time marketing By Kevin Allen | Posted: February 26, 2013

http://www.prdaily.com/Main/Articles/13921.aspx#

We can certainly take a few lessons away from the Oscars last night:

• Fit the brand message to the event and the moment. The consensus last night around the #oscarsrtm (Oscars real-time marketing) hashtag was that too many brands were forcing it. The reason Oreo’s social efforts are working is because they’ve fit the execution to the brand purpose. There’s more strategy behind the move than “We should be doing this.”

• When it comes to real-time marketing, the bigger the event doesn’t always mean better returns. Find smaller, even local events that your fans are already passionate about, and create content around those.

• Just because another brand has great success with something doesn’t mean that it will precisely work for your brand. Real-time marketing is a tool in the tool belt. It’s not the solution to every modern marketing campaign.

• Without the infrastructure in place to execute in real time, you’re going to have difficulty making it work. Legal is going to be a nightmare when there are trademarks involved, so preparation and staffing is key to real-time marketing activation.

Perhaps most importantly, brands should remember to add value to the conversation online. Don’t just shoehorn your brand into some event that happened.