How Oreo Won the Marketing

Oreo is not only a sandwich cookie consisting of two chocolate disks with a cream filling in between but it’s a brand that really keeps you connected and attached.Oreo is one of the best companies in the world in terms of social media marketing.I am really amazed to see how precisely they connect with their audience through their content mix.

Chapter 5 in the Groundswell shows a perspective that "you brand is what your customers say it is". So the companies listen to their customers will win the market, and there "listening" means market research.
Social Media is one of the key things that you can’t miss if you talk about "listening". But just having Social Media presence is not enough, it is important how a Brand communicates with their existing fans/followers. It is really important to understand your audience, know their preferences and keep engaging with them on a continuous basis.

1. Set up your own private community.
2. Begin brand monitoring. Hire a company to listen to the Internet.

Oreo has hit more than a couple social media home runs. Their tweet during the Super Bowl, the 100-day “Daily Twist” Facebook campaign, the "Cookie Vs. Cream" videos on YouTube, and their spur-the-moment Twitter banter with their arch enemy, Kit Kate,demonstrated true mastery of social media. 

Oreo's Super Bowl Tweet

When the lights went out at the New Orleans Super dome during the Super Bowl, much of North America came to a halt. Football players shuffled about the sidelines in the barely lit arena, while tens of millions of television viewers looked for something else to do during the 34 minute blackout. Here's what Oreo did:

The ad generated more than 16,000 re-tweets and was seen by tens of thousands on Twitter. The media lauded it for being one of the best Super Bowl ads bar none. The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, and dozens of other publications wrote articles about it. 

Oreo's Daily Twist Campaign

Each day from June 25 to October 2, 2012, Oreo released a whimsical image of the cookie redesigned to commemorate something that had happened on that date.

On September 27, an Oreo was shown with referee stripes noting that the National Football League’s referee strike had ended. On August 5, half a cookie with red cream and tire tracks symbolized the Mars rover landing. You can see them all here.

The campaign was housed primarily on Oreo’s Facebook page and managed to increase customer engagement 110%, according to the company. Oreo also added nearly 5 million likes during the campaign’s run.

Oreo's Cookie Vs. Cream Video Campaign
Oreo's 'Cookie vs. Cream' videos are a clever campaign housed on their YouTube account. They feature wildly elaborate machines that are designed to split Oreo cookies into two pieces and remove the cream filling. The first video from this ad campaign shows a seperator created by physicist David Neevel, and in three weeks it received over 4 million views.Oreo went on to produce three more videos featuring creative seperator machines. The four videos have been seen over 5 million times and have generated thousands of positive comments.

In the Chapter 6 of Groundswell we can see that "talking" is also important to the companies. We can talk with customers in four ways: videos, social networks, blogs, and communities. 
Build connections that create loyal brand advocates. Create a bridge between your employees and your customers. Scale engagement across your teams with workflow and automation. Develop a platform to share thought leadership.

Video clips
Through its Wonderfilled campaign, Oreo uses 30 second video clips to show what happens when a variety of people get their hands on an Oreo. 

From American hip hop recording artist Chiddy Bang to country music artist Kacey Musgraves, and even an ordinary little girl singing about the joys of sharing Oreos with her dad, Each video targets a different audience and has a specific theme, but they are all equally captivating and perfect for the viewer to share on their social media outlet of choice.

Snack Hacks
In addition to these targeted short video clips, Oreo also offers “Snack Hacks.” Snack Hacks are a collection of YouTube videos that are about 10 seconds long and provide the viewer with cool and unexpected ways to enjoy an Oreo. The videos are very simple, short, and effective at letting the viewer know there’s a lot more you can do with an Oreo than dunk it in a glass of cold milk.

Are you pinning yet?

Pinterest:The Hot Social New Network

What is Pinning?

Pinning is a way to share interesting internet content via a virtualpinboard. Each board has a personalized theme, and users “pin” links to the board. Each link is depicted by a photo or graphic from the link. Your friends can “re-pin” your links to their own sites, or to their own Facebook or Twitter accounts.

Where do I find pinning site?

The big player in the pinning craze is Pinterest.com. So big, in fact, that it grew from nearly non-existent in mid-2011 to logging over 7.5 million unique users in December 2011 (Commodore Media Metrix, January 2012). According to Experian Hitwise, which measures the most popular websites based on total visits, weekly visitsto Pinterest.com grew 170% in just the first three weeks of 2012. A January 2012 report from Shareaholic cites Pinterest as the #5 source of website referrals – referring more traffic than Google+, LinkedIn, and YouTubecombined.

All of those numbers mean that whether popularity is measured by how many users a website has, how many times they visit, or how often a user moves (“refers”) from there to a commercial site… Pinterest.com is definitely popular. The fact that a user must be “invited” to use Pinterest.com by another user – or by requesting an invite from the site itself, which takes days – makes these statistics all the more stunning.

 What is Pinterest for?

A social media site built around the concept of sharing photos, Pinterest users can “pin” photos to their boards for sharing with other users. With a predominantly female audience, Pinterest is a popular place to share photos for wedding planning, home redecorating, recipes, vacation destinations, and books. However, despite popular belief, the business doesn’t need to be product-based in order take advantage of the benefits that Pinterest offers.

 How to Pin stuff?

Start on the Pinterest site itself. Each Pin in your feed features its own "Pin it" button; select it to Repin that image to one of your own Boards. 

Pinning new images is easy with the official Pin It Button, a simple drag-and-drop browser extension. When you come across an image you like, just click the button and select the corresponding picture. Assign the pin to a Board, add accompanying text and you're done.

Or head to the Pinterest homepage and click the "+" sign to add images or video of your own, or via URL.

Finally, via Pinterest's mobile app, you can Pin and Repin the same way you would via desktop, minus the browser extension.

What's the social angle?

Pinning's more fun when you do it together. To find other Pinners, access the dropdown menu on the upper-left side of the navigation bar and filter Boards by category. When you see a good Pin, leave a comment, Like it, or Repin to one of your own Boards. If you find a Board especially interesting, follow its updates, or head to the Pinner’s profile and follow all of her Boards. Like Twitter, it's an open network, so follows don't require permission, and you don't have to follow anyone back.

You can tweet or share Pins on Facebook to help expand your network across all three services. Or simply copy the embed code to include the pin on your blog or website.Check out the Popular category to see what pins are trending at the moment. It's a great way to find new content and Pinners who share your interests.

Any new things I need to know?

Pinterest now adds a new messaging feature that allow users to have one-on-one and group conversations about specific pins. They can send a pin to one or more of their friends, who can reply with text messages or pins of their own.

Pins sent within messages are dynamic, which means users can interact with those pins without leaving the conversation. Users can click on a pin to see the source, for example, or save it to one of their own boards directly from the message. Along with group-messaging functionality, this will be especially helpful for friends who are trying to plan projects and trips together, according to Pinterest.

"Say you’re organizing a camping trip with friends — try sending Pins to the whole gang so you can figure out where to go and what meals to make," Tom Watson, a product designer with the company, said in a blog post. "If you need a reminder of who’s bringing what, just pull up the conversation right from your notifications."

On the web, messages look a lot like Facebook's Chat Heads. When users receive a new message, the notification appears beside a circle that shows the sender's profile photo. In addition to standalone pins, users can also message entire boards or individual profiles. On the mobile side, messages appear in a separate window, although the chat head-like avatars are also displayed.

Pinterest's messaging also takes advantage of the platform's guided search, a feature introduced earlier this year that helps users find the most relevant search results. Users can perform searches using guided search directly from conversations to quickly find the content they're looking for.