One of the best things social media has done for marketing is to give it some creative energy again. Not since the 1999 Internet heyday have we seen brands innovate so many unique ways to generate audience “buzz” among a group of people they’re trying to reach. Craftsman, Sears’ powerful tool and equipment brand, has discovered one particularly creative way by using a retail showroom in downtown Chicago as the linchpin for an integrated social strategy that reaches millions each month. And now thanks to Comscore Social Essentials, a new product designed to measure the reach and impact of social media brand exposure on Facebook, brands like Craftsman can finally understand who’s really getting the message.
Known as the Craftsman Experience, the showroom serves as everything from production hub, to research facility, to tourist attraction for the Do-It-Yourselfer and self-professed Garage Geek. Craftsman Products are available to touch, feel, and even test on an unsuspecting nail. It houses the world’s first DIY radio station that pumps out How-To wisdom over the airwaves from America’s DIY designer Frank Fontana, along with a complete television production studio.
I’m not a DIY’er and don’t visit Chicago frequently, so I have to get personal for a moment to explain how I first came upon the Craftsman Experience. When your two life’s passions are as divergent as advanced data analytics and Landspeed Motorcycle Racing, you are not often afforded the opportunity to bring the two together in a meaningful way. So when a client asked me if I would participate in Craftsman’s three-part made-for-viral miniseries about motorcycle racing, I jumped at the chance.
Craftsman’s miniseries was developed as a means to engage with the Craftsman Fan in an interesting way that would generate organic viral impressions that extended well beyond the Fan. The shows featured people from all parts of the motorcycling industry – from famous bike builders like Erik Buell to completely unknown Landspeed Racers. While the backdrop was a generously equipped garage full of Craftsman tools, there was no explicit use of the products in the show. The point was to reach the Craftsman Fan audience with an engaging message, but also to go beyond them to reach their Friends and engage them with the brand.
With Comscore Social Essentials, we were able to truly understand how these efforts reach beyond the Fan into their Friends and extend the reach of these creative efforts. In fact, Social Essentials shows that both Craftsman and Kenmore (who has a similar “Experience” retail hub on the same Chicago city block) are able to double the reach of their messages through Friend of Fan exposure – showing a strong amplification effect from Fans to their Friends (reaching between 1/3rd and 1/2 of Fans and subsequently doubling that effect through Friends of Fans monthly.)
Social Essentials also shows that the overlap among Craftsman, Kenmore and Sears Facebook Fans is less than 10%, suggesting Sears’ strategy of developing brand-specific Facebook environments is paying off in the sense that they are reaching a significant number of unique individuals with each brand presence.
In terms of reaching a relevant and interested audience, Fans of the three Sears brands are more than twice as likely to visit a Sears online property than the average Internet user. This may not be surprising given their self-selected affinity towards the Sears brands, but it is interesting to see that Friends of Fans are more than 60 percent more likely to visit a Sears online property (13.0% vs. 7.9%). This data point likely in part reflects the fact that “birds of a feather flock together,” but it may also reflect the effect of trusted persuasion of Fans on their Friends.
Clearly these social efforts are reaching a great audience and finding ways to creatively communicate with their brand audiences – arguably audiences we might not traditionally associate with edgy new media approaches. And I enjoyed being able to play a part.