74% of consumers refer to social networks before making a purchase. And 72% of companies have increased their sales and generated more in-store traffic thanks to their Social Media strategy.

Investing in social networks is therefore absolutely essential for brands. Whether to raise brand awareness, reach a wider audience, boost sales or create a community of loyal, committed customers, social media marketing is an ultra-efficient communication channel.

All the more reason to create a relevant Social Media strategy, in which your company will detail the actions it intends to take on social networks. In this article, we’ll take you step-by-step through the process of drawing up this action plan.

SUMMARY

• What is social media marketing?
• Why do companies need a Social Media strategy?
• Steps to follow for an effective Social Media strategy?

Social network marketing involves using platforms like Instagram, X (formerly Twitter) Pinterest or even TikTok to promote your brand to potential customers and sell your products or services.

Social media marketing can take many forms: from the simple act of sharing content on these platforms, to (paid) advertising campaigns or partnerships with influencers (known as influencer marketing). Interaction with platform users (by reposting their publications, replying to their comments, etc.) is also a form of social media marketing.

By social media strategy, we mean the action plan a company creates to plan its efforts on social networks. This involves defining objectives, audience and expectations, as well as developing a content calendar and performance KPIs to measure the achievement of results.

What you need to remember is that social network marketing is a unique acquisition and sales channel. It therefore requires specific expertise, dedicated resources and in-depth tracking and continuous improvement.

This question may seem obvious when you consider that almost all brands have a presence on social networks. But it is nevertheless important to understand the benefits of a good Social Media strategy in order to identify the results that your company can reap from it.

• Increase brand awareness. 53% of consumers say their use of social media has increased over the past two years. It is therefore essential for brands wishing to raise their profile or federate a community of committed customers to communicate via this channel.
• Create a relationship of trust with your audience. Social networks also have a huge impact on the trust that consumers place in businesses, particularly among younger people.
• Increase sales. Beyond the reach of social networks, the content shared on them is extremely effective in converting new customers. The more authentic publications and social selling levers that are gradually being integrated into the platforms make them excellent tools for promoting products and boosting revenues.
• Make it easy to track performance. Social networks integrate tools that make it easier to track key performance indicators. This makes it easier to assess the return on investment of your social media strategy.

Now that we’ve proven the relevance of developing a Social Media strategy, it’s time to take action. To create a precise and effective action plan, it’s important to follow these steps.

1. Establish your brand’s objectives on social networks

As we’ve seen, social networks enable you to reach and engage your prospects at every stage of the sales funnel. But it’s also a complex marketing channel, requiring a great deal of time and resources from companies. So it’s important not to jump in blindly, but rather to target your strategic objectives precisely.

The idea is to focus on one or two objectives that are particularly crucial for the company. If it is just starting up, the main challenge will be to raise awareness and generate new leads. If it is already well established, social networks can be a lever for engagement and loyalty, etc.

Each objective must be linked to precise performance KPI’s, which will enable us to monitor their achievement and adjust the Social Media strategy if necessary.

2. Analyze your audience

To create impactful content on social networks, you need to understand who you’re talking to and what your audience’s expectations are. The best way to do this is to question your audience and collect zero-party customer data (through interactive mechanisms such as polls, for example).

Brands can also benchmark companies in their sector or content creators in their niche. By studying their publications and the interactions they generate with their audience, they’ll have a better understanding of the codes they need to respect to share their own content (the tone to use, the frequency of publication, the most popular formats, etc.).

3. Choose the best channels to invest in

The worst mistake a brand can make when drawing up its Social Media strategy is to be everywhere at once and simply duplicate its content across all these networks. Each platform has its own specific audience and codes. You therefore need to choose the channel that best reaches your target audience, and the content format that best matches your brand image.

4. Plan and diversify your content

With these last elements, the brand can start planning and sharing its content. The aim isn’t to publish as often as possible, even if regularity is crucial to cracking the social network algorithm. Rather, it’s to create truly differentiating content that generates strong emotions in its audience, resonates with their expectations and values, and captures their attention.

Gamification is an excellent lever for making content on social networks more original and engaging. Competitions, for example, are a very popular format on platforms, helping to capture users’ attention (particularly through the promise of an attractive prize).

These campaigns are all the more powerful when backed up by other levers of visibility and engagement specific to social networks. For example, they can be publicized via an advertising campaign or a partnership with an influencer to reach a wider audience.

5. Measure results and adjust your Social Media strategy

The most important KPIs to track on social networks are engagement KPIs. They enable brands to assess the relevance of their content to their audience and the interest it generates.

Depending on the results of its publications and advertising campaigns, the brand can refine its Social Media strategy. Many companies, for example, have learned from experience that the more authentic the content (i.e. the less elaborate and promotional it is), the more engagement it generates.

Conclusion

Boost your Social Media strategy by integrating gamification into your marketing campaigns. Marketing games are highly effective at capturing attention and engaging your audience. To create differentiating interactive experiences, you can choose from a catalog of playable mechanics the one best suited to your strategic objectives. Our team can also take charge of your campaign!

De toutes les mécaniques de gamification à la disposition des entreprises, les instants gagnants sont parmi les plus efficaces. Si les jeux marketing sont puissants pour engager son audience, c’est parce qu’ils permettent de faire gagner des dotations attractives. Et avec des jeux concours instants gagnants, la récompenses est immédiate !

Ce format de marketing peut être utilisé à toutes les étapes du parcours client afin de permettre aux marques d’engager et de fidéliser les consommateurs. Pour profiter du potentiel des Instants Gagnants, nous présentons les objectifs que les entreprises peuvent viser. Pour ces objectifs, nous vous partageons des exemples de campagnes de jeux concours instants gagnants inspirantes. 

SUMMARY

• What is an instant win competition?
• Why launch an Instant Win: objectives and examples of successful campaigns
  

Largement adopté pour stimuler l’engagement d’une campagne, l’Instant Gagnant offre la possibilité de remporter des cadeaux instantanément. On le distingue d’un autre jeu comme le tirage au sort, pour lequel il faudra attendre avant de découvrir les gagnants. 

Il est possible de combiner les deux en ajoutant un tirage au sort en étape finale du parcours de l’Instant Gagnant. Ainsi, les joueurs qui ont remporté une dotation peuvent participer à un tirage au sort complémentaire et tenter de gagner des cadeaux d’une valeur plus importante (comme un voyage). 

En fonction de son univers de marque et de l’objectif de sa campagne, la marque peut opter pour différents types de jeux concours Instants Gagnants. Elle aura le choix entre : 

• La Roue de la Chance. Les participants peuvent tourner la roue et tenter de remporter un cadeau ou un code promo.
• Le jeu grattage. Dans cette mécanique simple et rapide, il suffit de gratter un visuel pour découvrir le gain. Entièrement personnalisables, les jeux à gratter permettent d’intégrer des éléments de son univers de marque ou de s’adapter à un temps fort (comme Noël ou la Saint Valentin). 
• La machine à sous (ou Bandit Manchot). Inspiré des jeux de casino, cet Instant Gagnant consiste à aligner plusieurs symboles. Il permet de distribuer des cadeaux à son audience. 
• Mais aussi la Pinata, le Shuffler, le Grappin, le Click & Win ou encore le Flip & Win. 

Instant Win offers companies a highly effective way of increasing visibility and engagement. Here are the 3 main reasons for organising a campaign of this type.

1. Engaging your audience

The first advantage of Instant Win is that it makes you want to take part, since you know immediately whether you’ve won or not. For the brand that organises it, the operation of this interactive mechanism is simple. Instant Win works by time slots designated as “winning”. All yuo have to do is enter at the right time to win a gift. Outside these time slots, all participants lose out (or can win a promotional codes in the case of 100% winning instant games).

Eurotunnel’s Jackpot campaign

To capture quality leads, Eurotunnel offered its public a captivating game. The jackpot (or One-Armed Bandit) enabled the company that manages the tunnel to strengthen its communications with transport operators. Carriers had to download a Transport Ticket Number (TTN) to take part.

Thanks to this popular mechanism and attractive prizes (smartphone, headphones, bluetooth), Eurotunnel registered more than 29k games.

Crédit Agricole’s pretty Christmas accounts

With its “Pretty Christmas accounts” campaign, Crédit Agricole immersed its audience in the spirit of the festive season. Each day, the advent calendar unveiled content highlighting its solidarity initiatives. More than a communications operation, this Instant Win game was designed to engage the community. This format, adaptable to the Regional Banks, enabled Crédit Agricole to strengthen its local roots.

The result: over 10,000 new subscribers to the brand’s mailing list and an opt-in rate of 40%.

2. Organise instant win competitions to generate leads

Creating an Instant Win competition is a great way of collecting leads. You can ask people to fill in a form before launching the wheel of chanceor cracking a digital pinata. Collecting first-party data (shared by users) will be easier. The brand will be able to refine its customer knowledge and understand the consumption habits of each individual.

Sensation Crispy de Lindt

Following the RGPD announcements, Lindt put in place an annual strategy to recruit new leads and build its base through gaing. This approach, based on marketing chestnuts and product highlights, took shape with the Sensation Cripy campaigns.

The aim was to recruit opt-in leads and promote the product via two engaging mechanics; the Wheel of Chance and Pinball. The campaign exceeded 15,000 leads and achieved a particularly high opt-in rate of 62%.

The Speedy Advent Calendar

For Christmas, Speedy launched an Advent Calendar aimed at engaging its audience and recruiting leads. The campaign was a great success, with 37k registrations and high engagement, reaching an average of 7.6 games palyed per participant. This operation provided excellent visibility during a crucial sales period, the festive season.

3. Boost your conversion rate with instant win competitions

Instant win competitions are ideal for companies looking to increase their conversion rate or build customer loyalty.
By awarding promotional codes to the winners, brands can stimulate engagement, encouraging people to visit the website and make pruchases. In this way, they can encourage an increase in their sales and a better conversion.

Showroomprivé Crazy days

The Crazy Days campaign enabled Showroomprivé to attract customers who responded to the game, while giving the bradn high visibility (with a 76% participation rate) during the sales period. The Instant Win, a one-armed bandit, was used as a sales generator, to stimulate conversion through the distribution of shopping vouchers.

BZB Game Center

Thanks to an engaging multi-mechanical system, Bizzbee offers an immersion into the world of gaming. After each game, users receive a voucher, boosting sales over the festiv period (with a conversion rate of 2.4%). An integrated conversion pixel monitored the performance of the interactive campaign in real time, continuously optimising its effectiveness.

Conclusion

Organising an Instant Win competition is an excellent way to generate leads, engagement and conversion. Discover
our interactive mechanisms that you can customise or adapt to a specific marketing event to boost your campaigns throughout the year!