Twitter is an influential social media platform. It has a lot of power because of its reach. Any individual or brand or business that can utilize the potential of this platform will gain a lot of visibility and exposure. But since the platform is one of the biggest in the world the competition in each niche is quite high. Running a successful Twitter campaign can be tough. But it isn’t impossible. Let’s take a look at some companies that have been successful in their Twitter marketing campaign.
Successful Twitter Hashtag Campaigns
Let’s look at some of the top Twitter hashtag campaigns that ended up quite well for the brands.
#ShareACoke – Coca-Cola
#ShareACoke was a campaign launched by Coca-Cola in 2013. This campaign was a huge success. It is one of the best examples of how to connect with your customers even if you are a big-name brand.
Share a coke seemed like a welcome message for customers to come and share a coke with their loved ones. You would get a personalized bottle when you used one of the centers. The campaign was hugely successful. Countless users poured in to share their experience giving free exposure to Coca-Cola.
#MyCalvins – Calvin Klein
Contests and Giveaways are some of the marketing strategies that many brands use to gain more exposure and visibility. One of the Twitter hashtag campaigns that show this nicely is Calvin Klein’s #MyCalvins.
You will notice that this hashtag is trying to create a personal connection with the users and like the previous one, it was successful in generating a lot of user-generated content. The idea of this hashtag campaign was to get the customers to pose in their Calvin Klein wears. It was a sort of contest that helped Calvin Klein widen their reach further.
#LikeAGirl – Always
Always has been quite good at its marketing campaign over the years. So, it was bound to get it right when it came to social media platforms as well. Its campaign #LikeAGirl was a great example of purpose-driven marketing. It showed the intentions of the brand and created a brilliant campaign to connect with its target audience.
Always is a brand that capitalized on its product niche and celebrated the strength of women. This campaign was welcomed by Twitter users and the hashtag became viral. This led to a major boost to the brand’s outlook and exposure on social media.
#PutACanOnIt – Red Bull
Sometimes you need to reach out to the creativity of your audience and let them do all the work while you ensure that their content gets the limelight. #PutACanOnIt was a campaign started by Red Bull in 2015. What’s interesting is that it wasn’t even their idea. They saw something interesting put a hashtag on it and let it rip!
You know the images where you play with the perspective (look I am holding the Eiffel tower), a photo was uploaded by a Twitter user who held a can over a Mini Cooper. The post got some good traction and Red Bull decided to capitalize on it. The campaign gave Red Bull lovers a chance to share their creativity.
#NationalFriedChickenDay – KFC
KFC is one of the brands that are very active on social media, especially Twitter. So, it has to be one of the brands which got a Twitter campaign right. Similar to the Red Bull campaign, KFC capitalized on a popular hashtag and built its campaign around it. The hashtag started trending when Fried Chicken Lovers decided to show their love for the “delicacy” by dedicating a day to it.
Users poured in to share their stories and used the hashtag. KFC understood the power of the campaign and decided to jump in. It became KFC’s most popular hashtag campaign and ensured that it gets a lot of traction.
Successful Twitter Campaigns
Now, let us look at some popular Twitter campaigns that saw clever marketing mixed with the right timing. These are not specifically related to hashtag campaigns though they did have catchy hashtags because that’s the norm these days.
CadburyUk – Twirl Orange
Twirl Orange, though available now in stores, was a limited edition chocolate bar when it first came out and people were begging to get their hands on one. CadburyUk timed their product launch right and it gave the brand a huge boost in exposure. They came up with the Twirl Orange bar and announced that this is a limited edition product.
Only 10k bars were present and you could request to buy one through their presale event that they live-streamed. You had to comment on the Livestream to get your hands on one. The campaign was launched in 2020 when the world was quarantined and people needed something exciting to do. Needless to say, it was a massive success.
OnePlus India – Celebrating Oxygen OS
Oxygen OS is the operating system used by OnePlus smartphones. Well, just by looking at the name of the OS you can guess where it is going from here. When 1500 days since the launch of its OS, OnePlus decided to commemorate the moment by using a Twitter campaign.
Using Twitter’s ‘First View’ feature the company launched a campaign with a conversation card. The card had a prompt – “Tweet #OxygenOs”. If you did tweet it then OnePlus India would plant a tree. Yup, the stuff that releases oxygen to the atmosphere. Well played OnePlus, well played.
The campaign was widely successful and received over 27k tweets in one day.
Al Faris Rent A Car
Al Faris Rent A Car is a car rental company in Dubai. They decided to use the power of Twitter to create an ad campaign to boost its exposure. The campaign ran in Saudi Arabia and was quite successful. The company partnered with Dice Marketing and the goal was to connect with their customers on Twitter.
The idea was simple – run a contest and generate traction. People will enter a contest via Twitter. One winner will be selected. The prize – they will get to rent a car for a day. No cost. The campaign gave the company some good visibility as it drew around 1 million impressions and got around 5.2k likes.
The ad campaign was used to target specific audiences who have engaged with the company’s tweets previously or have shown some interest in renting a car.
Gatorade – Streaming Game 6 of 1998 NBA Finals
In 2020, a lot of companies decided to come up with creative ways to connect to the audience. They understood their frustration and gave them a chance to relive one of the best moments in NBA history. They streamed the NBA finals of 1998 and everyone got to see the glory of the Chicago Bulls as they won their 6th title.
Make-a-wish Foundation Bay Area – SFBatKid
We wanted to showcase this entry because not everything has to be about selling products. Sometimes genuine connection among people and a will to do good can often result in a huge outpouring of love and support. Make-a-wish Foundation’s campaign to help a kid live his dream received huge amounts of popularity. The campaign was launched in 2013.
The protagonist – Miles, then a cancer fighter (now a cancer survivor), got live his dream of being Batman for a day. He got to wear costumes, save a damsel in distress and thwart the actions of Riddler and Penguin. The campaign #SFBatKid received huge amounts of support and had over 1.7 billion social impressions.
How to Launch a Successful Twitter Campaign?
Now that you have seen some of the examples of top campaigns on Twitter, let’s take a look at how one can launch a successful campaign themselves. Twitter has a lot of reach. If you can nail the right moment and target the right audiences your brand will gain a lot of exposure. It is very easy to get buried by the competition but a lot of smaller brands have made their presence quite significant in a niche.
The quality of your Twitter marketing campaign matters a lot. In this section, we will list some of the steps that one can take to launch a successful Twitter campaign. Let’s take a look
Get Your Profile Right
Your Profile is the first thing that you need to fix. After you launch a campaign, interested users will first visit your profile.
- Your profile should convey to them all the relevant info that they need to know about your brand. Write a short but precise bio. It should tell your target audience about your brand in a few words.
- Your Twitter handle should match your company name. There shouldn’t be any confusion. If you have already chosen a name and have already gathered some followers then it is advisable to keep it. Try to maintain the same username on every platform.
- Add a decent and standard profile pic representing your brand. It should be of high quality and should generally be your brand logo.
- The header should also be a high-quality header. It must convey some meaning to your audience. You can even change your header image to be more campaign-specific.
- Add the link to your website in your bio. Interested users should be able to visit your website. This will increase the chances of driving traffic to the website.
- Try to get Twitter verification. The blue tick signifies trust. A brand with a blue tick is often trusted more by users. So, put some time in for verification.
Set Some Goals
Trying to achieve success without a clear plan in mind can often lead to sub-par results. If you need to gain optimal outcomes from your campaign you should look into setting SMART goals.
- Specific
Your goals need to be specific. Having a broader or more general goal will lead to dilution of your efforts and might end up giving an average outcome. Be very specific. Instead of a goal of increasing your followers, a goal to increase followers by 1000 in 2 months is better as it talks about the specifics.
- Measurable
This means that your goal is quantifiable. So, if you keep specific goals you will be able to measure your progress. If your goals are meaningful and motivating you will have a much clearer idea of how you are progressing.
- Achievable
Your goal should be achievable. If you want to gain 100k followers in 2 months and you are starting from 0 then it may not be attainable. Do your research and see what can be a realistic goal to set.
- Relevant
The goal should be relevant to the broader picture of your brand. For example, if you are looking to increase your followers using Twitter campaigns then these followers should contribute to growing your business.
- Time-Bound
The goal you set should be time-bound. That way you can be more focused. Goals with no time limit are seldom achieved and if you do achieve them it ends up taking too much time and effort.
Research is the Key
The success of your Twitter marketing campaign will depend on the quality of your research. So, it is very important to do your due diligence while researching to gather info for your campaign.
Who is Your Audience?
Your research should gather all the demographic and psychographic info of users you are looking to target. Age, gender, location, preferences, etc.
- What posts do they like? When are they online? Which profiles do they follow in your niche? Etc.
- Targeting the right audiences will gain followers who like the kind of content you put out and will be interested in your brand.
Who’s Your Competition?
Researching your competition is as important as researching your target audience. It is always good to know who you are up against and what they are doing right.
- Look at the type of content they upload to Twitter. The type of posts, and the theme followed.
- How are they interacting with their audience? Is it gaining them more engagement?
- Go through their Twitter history and see how they evolved? Did they start gaining engagement suddenly? If yes, then what did they do?
- Looking at their performance and strategies find gaps in yours. It will help make your strategy more robust and you will be off to a good start.
Decide on the Type of Content
Next, you have to figure out what kind of content you want to put out. Remember that the quality and the tone of content you publish will determine the voice and outlook of your brand.
- The research data for your target audience will help in determining what kind of content they are generally engaging with.
- Nowadays, video tweets are gaining good engagement as well. A nice short video can be more impactful than a traditional tweet. However, you can do that as well. Just try to mix things up once in a while.
- The voice of your brand is important to determine. The current younger generation and young adults often look for transparency, honesty, and authenticity from brands. They want brands to connect with them on a personal level.
- Humor is often employed by brands as it is one of the ways to connect with people.
- Sarcastic voice is also adopted by many brands as it works well with their audience.
- Keep the brand voice consistent. The more frequently you change it the less you connect with your audience as they will not know what to expect from you.
- Lists, infographics, facts, and figures to deliver information can be more engaging to users. Use catchy color combinations on infographics and charts.
Learn How to Use Hashtags Optimally
People might think that it is a no-brainer to use hashtags. Everyone on Twitter uses them. But not everyone is looking to grow their brand and sell their products and services. Using Twitter hashtag campaigns can often lead to a lot of exposure if done right. So, you have to use Hashtags optimally if you want to gain more exposure.
- Twitter Reports that brands gain 50% more Engagement using hashtags than the ones that don’t.
- Gather Hashtags by researching your competitors’ tweets. Use tools to generate and analyze powerful hashtags.
- Build a list of hashtags that fit your brand and campaign. Research the potential of these hashtags using any of the numerous hashtag research tools out there.
- Now, use them relevantly in your tweets. Do not spam hashtags. If you can fit them naturally in a sentence then they will look unobtrusive.
Conclusion
These were some of the steps you can take to ensure a successful Twitter campaign. There are no shortcuts. You have to put forth your best effort and utilize your strategy. Be patient. Create a feedback loop to analyze the performance of your campaign. Whenever you feel that something is off you will get better insights since you have specifically set up everything. You can fix your strategy to gain the most out of it. All the best for your Twitter campaign.
