Not too long ago, whilst checking out the Lynx Australia Party across the Internet campaign, I noticed that Lynx has a Facebook page. Not unusual nowadays; Gorilla’s on Facebook, Redbull and Quiksilver are on Facebook, even my local Sainsbury’s (a Supermarket in the UK) is joining the party. But what does having a Facebook (or any other social network) presence give a company or organisation? The answer … we can BIG them up!
For those of those of you who worship at the shrine of marketing guru Seth Godin, you would have read his Blog the other month ‘Launching Brands in Public’. He has come up with the idea of collecting comments consumers have posted on Facebook, Youtube, Twitter etc and presenting them in one web page so that a company can directly respond (for a price of course). In my humble opinion, these company forum pages feel like damage control, a way for companies to control any potential web-based negative publicity. But not all consumer/customer remarks are necessarily negative…
Social networking sites have quickly become perfect playgrounds for companies to boast their presence in our lives and also their credibility, as let’s face it, who isn’t on Facebook? The best thing about it though is that these pages, open for the whole world to see, are free and fantastic endorsements of how great a product, brand or company is. Lynx Oz, for example, sent X-number of guys free Lynx products to promote their new shower gels. These happy customers then bigged them up on Facebook and encouraged us all to get hooked up by Lynx. Free stuff, a personal recommendation and a cool FB site, I’m a girl and Lynx is looking pretty cool to me. Also, I just quickly checked out the Quiksilver FB page, and was enthusiastically told by Eduardö Brachö that “Quiksilver are the best, top 1”. I don’t know who Eduardö Brachö is but he likes Quiksilver! RedBull are biggin’ themselves up on Facebook and getting respect from all their fans (and me … check out their Pitstop in Times Square!)
These kind of cool web pages are awesome ways for companies to stay in touch with their customers/ consumers/ fans and promote their brand. I think though, at the end the day … who just doesn’t want some free biggin’ up?