How to Build Your Traffic on National "Anything" Day!
If Instagram is any indication, bloggers already know that it's fun to join in on all of those "National This-and-That Day" hashtags. Oh, it's National Ice Cream Day? Pull that Chipwich recipe out of your archives and post on social for a few extra likes from new folks.
But, as a marketer, I like to think of strategic ways to capitalize on moments like these--and make those campaigns feel more authentic than reposting some cheesy Internet joke that has nothing to do with your brand just to milk engagement. Luckily, in the food space there's always tons of food-focused fun going on that you can latch onto. Here are a few ideas (based on our own marketing campaign with Tasty Bev!) for maximizing these mini campaigns.
Start With the Content
...and the day. We had our sites set on International Bacon Day since everybody loves bacon and it fits well with our mission and social media voice--indulgent, fun, and accessible recipes! But we noticed that a number of different sources cited different dates for Bacon Day. Luckily, that leaves some flexiblity to plan.
We settled on Wikipedia's definition--the Saturday before Labor Day or September 3, 2016--and searched through our database for delicious-looking, bacon-laced content. Check and check.
Find a Partner (Or a Bunch!)
Our next step was to find somebody whose mission and branding aligned with ours so that we could get more buzz around our International Bacon Day celebration. We reached out to Tasty Bev (think of it like a FoodGawker for drinks only!) about doing a fun eblast trade. The idea was that we'd narrow down our focus even more to celebrate bacon drinks. Bloody Marys, bacon-laced vodka, and more!
With Tasty Bev along for the ride, we knew we could reach more food-lovers and get the word out about both of our brands while celebrating a fun "holiday." If you're a blogger, team up with 10 other blogger friends. Plan to all publish a [bacon] recipe on the same day, link back to each other, and share like crazy on social to maximize your content lift.
Keep a Goal in Mind
Once we decided to celebrate International Bacon Day alongside Tasty Bev, the next question was... why? Perhaps this should have been our first question, but as content creators, I'm sure you can relate: there is an assumption that coming up with new ways to package your content is always good. That doesn't mean, though, that you don't need to be deliberate about the purpose of a particular campaign.
For us, we wanted to do two things:
Drive traffic to our content partners.
Spread the word to new bloggers about using Tasty Bev and Chicory.
So, by teaming up on our newsletters and swapping space on social, our very similar markets (food bloggers!) could learn about our partners in a fun, organic way.
Have a Plan for Distribution
So, you know you want to talk about bacon and you have 5 blogger friends/partners ready to hop into your campaign. Don't assume that if you build it, they will come--bloggers are smarter than that and we know that 90% of the work, when it comes to blogging, is about promotion!
Set up a social sharing strategy, host a Twitter chat, send out a press release to outlets about your plans, invite a brand to join in the fun and donate their products to the campaign. The more voices you have talking about your fun "holiday" ideas, the more eyeballs will look your way.
This post was produced in partnership with TastyBev.co, a drink recipe curation website that displays a feed of beverages from juices and smoothies, coffee and tea, to cocktails and more! Similar to Pinterest, this feed is a quick, photo-centric reference with a recipe title and author credit. With one click viewers are redirected to the authoring blog’s post to obtain the full recipe details. Drink recipes are searchable by type, diet, ingredient, or by author!
Tasty Bev is all about the recipe authors and creators especially food bloggers. If you have drink recipes, of any kind, hosted online you can submit them for the chance to be featured on Tasty Bev by entering the necessary info into the simple form on their submissions page.