“A social media campaign is a strategic marketing effort that organises a series of coordinated actions during a limited time frame to achieve a specific marketing goal.” (Alexandra, 2022). Social media campaigns are created with only one goal in mind: they contain one main message that is customised for a distinct audience. Dividing your social media marketing plan into multiple campaigns allows you to achieve goals easier and provides a sense of purpose and direction for social marketing efforts. However, that’s not all. These online campaigns can also help you:

motivate your team and allow for a sense of direction
improve reach, audience engagement, and lead generation
maintain a consistent posting schedule that is organised in strategic campaigns
boost brand awareness
can improve the chances of going viral

An infographic that explores some of the benefits of brand’s creating their marketing campaigns on social media. (marketingoriginals.co.uk, 2018).

After researching what a social media campaign is, I chose 3 successful brands that were able to generate amazing results while gaining the appreciation of audiences worldwide.

The first campaign I wanted to explore is Dove’s ShowUs campaign. The brand partnered with Girlgaze (a community of diverse community of non-binary and female-identifying creatives) and Getty Images (a large online provider of royalty free images) to create an initiative designed to promote body positivity and an inclusive version of beauty. Results prove that dove managed to expand a gallery of 10,000+ photos of women and non-binary images across the globe by encouraging their target audience to share images of themselves on Instagram with the correlating hashtag.

A screenshot taken from Dove’s ShowUs campaign that provides examples of the images posted in their gallery on Instagram. https://www.dove.com/us/en/stories/campaigns/showus.html

Although Dove didn’t promote any of their products throughout this campaign, they still benefited from the exposure it received. By promoting diversity, natural beauty, inclusivity, and women empowerment, Dove has managed to create an overwhelming positive brand image and improved their Instagram reach and engagement. The ShowUs campaign clearly targets Dove’s key audience and it tackles social issues women are affected by nowadays.

A second screenshot taken of further images provided from their targets audience to promote body positivity and inclusivity. https://www.dove.com/us/en/stories/campaigns/showus.html

The next social media marketing campaign I chose to discuss is National Geographic’s ThinkBeforeYouLike. I am going to focus on a different social media channel, Twitter, as the campaign was spread around multiple accounts. National Geographic used it’s platform to raise awareness of an issue that’s hid behind innocent seeming content – the reality behind the adorable posts of cheetah cubs. Their message was simple and straightforward which made their wide audience (anyone using social media) ask themselves about the context behind each posts and the fact that they are secretly promoting cheetah exploitation and smuggling.

The main image used by National Geographic taken from their Twitter feed to explore the animal trafficking happening behind usual ‘cute’ content. https://twitter.com/NatGeo/status/1427655771735699469

The campaign is educational which sends a meaningful message not only through the words but the imagery combined. There were a few images used to provide a huge emotional impact since users have never been exposed to the truly depicted sad reality that the cubs lived in. The overall campaign had a positive impact to the online community and proved again that National Geographic is a genuine brand that deserves respect and recognition. Specifically for the channel Twitter, the engagement from the post included hundreds of retweets and likes, followed up by infographics in the replies from the brand of how we can help stop the trafficking of the endangered animals.

An image of an infographic provided throughout the Twitter thread allowing users to receive important information on how to prevent this trafficking happening and how they as an individual can help. https://twitter.com/NatGeo/status/1427655771735699469

The final social media campaign I am going to display is LinkedIn’s NextWave campaign. This is slightly different to the other two I previously explored in which this goal is used to celebrate people from the industry. They honoured 120 successful professionals on their platform under the age of 35 that had a significant impact on their brand by sharing a series of posts dedicated to each nominee. This was promoted on their separate social media accounts to broaden their target audience, especially young people.

An image created at the banner taken from LinkedIn’s blog exploring the top professionals 35 and under. The banner relates to the professional campaign aiming to reach younger audiences.

LinkedIn included entrepreneurs from around the globe, proving the future of innovations whilst maintaining inclusivity and that success has many faces. This links back to their target audience in order to allow for users to relate to the positive brand awareness. By sharing the stories of numerous successful business people, LinkedIn inspired their audience and used storytelling to keep them engaged and curious about the professionals that made the list. The fact that individuals were celebrated for their success would allow for younger entrepreneurs to thrive to be on future lists.

References

Alexandra, 2022. 10 Social Media Campaign Examples to Learn From. [Online]
Available at: https://socialbee.io/blog/social-media-campaign-examples/
[Accessed 13 November 2022].

marketingoriginals.co.uk, 2018. Create a Social Media Marketing Campaign With A Stunning Impact. [Online]
Available at: https://marketingoriginals.co.uk/social-media-marketing-campaign/
[Accessed 13 November 2022].