How "LUSH cosmetics USA" can enhance customer engagement?

In the first part of monitoring, you were introduced "LUSH cosmetics USA" social media and their customer engagement via groundswell. Two weeks past, a lot things have changed for "LUSH cosmetics USA" and there are some new things I found.  In this post, I will continue to monitor some changes of  "LUSH cosmetics USA" and considering the problems I find in my post, I will also figure out some steps that "LUSH cosmetics USA" can generate more buzz in the groundswell and enhance customer engagement.

• New campaign: Make Fur History

Cruelty-free cosmetics brand LUSH is joining with the Association for the Protection of Fur-Bearing Animals and Montreal SPCA in hopes to #MakeFurHistory. People can join the fight against the fur trade by taking the pledge online or spreading the hash tag, #MakeFurHistory, with a picture of your favorite fur-bearing animal via your Twitter and Facebook accounts.

We see that many people support LUSH #MakeFurHistory campaign on Facebook.A major tenant of the LUSH is not to test its products on animals; these vegan and vegetarian products attract consumers fighting for animal rights.  LUSH also makes the majority of its products with fair-trade ingredients, which grabs the consumer who is concerned with social justice. LUSH’s target markets are women 18-45 who are middle to upper class and desire fresh organic beauty.

• Consistent increase of fans and followers

  

  Twitter increase fans and followers

  

  Oct.29th

  

  Nov.3rd

The increase in fans and views on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and Google+ continued in last two weeks(data gathered from Starcount). The daily increase of fans can be 600-700 on Facebook, and the most fan increase in on Instagram, about 2000 a day. During the two weeks, followers increased more than four thousand on twitter only.

From the data I gathered from Tweetstats, LUSH cosmetics has about 124 tweets per day and 1610 tweets per month. On Thursday it has the most tweets-568 tweets. About the hourly tweets, around 4 pm it has the most tweets in a day-435 tweets. What's more, the graph shows through Sept 14th to Oct 14th, the tweet number grew from 961 to 2259 in one month. 

You maybe wonder why tweets increased that much on October and reach to the peak on Oct 14th.

• #LUSHoween - LUSH Halloween 

Lush Cosmetics love any excuse for a lim-ed product launch. Whether it’s Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day, Easter or a campaign special, Lush have our backs with season tailored goodies. Halloween is no different. This year, Lush launched their Christmas and Halloween ranges at the same time , new product for Halloween is October 1st online, and 3rd in stores, and new products for Christmas is in the mid-October. That's can explain the peak in the graph of interest over time at the beginning of October, and the peak in the graph of daily blogs citation trend in the mid-October (data gathered from Google Trends and Ice Rocket).
As a result of  Make Fur History Campaign, we can see there is a peak at the beginning of November in the first graph and As a result of Make Fur History Campaign, we can see there is a peak at the beginning of November in the first graph and the line rose up in the second graph.

• Feedback and problems

- Different types of criticisms on Facebook and Twitter

It wasn't easy to find negative comments on its Facebook pages, as positive comments seem to be more frequent than complaints; however, I categorized different types of criticisms:

A. The staff is overbearing. By trying to be too friendly and helpful, some staff members come off as pushy. Or the opposite, staff is snooty and the customer feels ignored.

B. Products weren't as fresh as they should be, or the customer was expecting something different from a certain product.

C. Discontinued products: comments asking for discontinued products to be brought back (this is not exactly a complaint, but we have seen a lot of these)

D. After ordering online, customers complain that the products arrived late or damaged. (They sometimes post pictures as well.)

On the positive side, happy customers leave comments as well: to thank the brand and express how much they love it, praise the staff members for their help, post pictures of their makeup, nails, in-store experience, etc.

- On LUSH cosmetics forum   

                         

As a communication platform for customers and LUSH cosmetics USA, I found sometimes there standard answer in it. Customers deserve to feel special, so I don't think they should use standard answers. If they response this angry customer in one short sentence, I don’t think this customer will be satisfied with their solution. Also they failed to give timely response to their customers sometimes.

- Problems on Facebook

- During the two weeks, I have noticed that LUSH cosmetics on Facebook didn't respond to their customers’ questions. As an example above, five days past, LUSH hasn't given a timely response. But on Twitters, I can see an active communication between customers and LUSH. I think maybe LUSH cosmetics should pay more attention on timely response on Facebook.

- To grow a Facebook community, brands promote what they stand for, knowing that the fans share the same values. LUSH cosmetics did really good at that aspect, they held campaign for protect animals rights, but here are some followers hold opposite opinion with LUSH on Facebook.

For example, in LUSH #MakeFurHistory campaign, many customers support LUSH’s value about people shouldn't use fur and what LUSH post on in their Facebook, but there are some customers don’t agree on that, so they have argument on Facebook. Also I can’t see there is any response from LUSH to deal with these replies. I think this can make LUSH loose their followers.

• Few steps to enhance customer engagement

- Assess customers’ social activities. Listen to your customers, and talk with them.  If customers are happy about the in-store experience, they will tell you on Facebook, and it’s important to show them that you’re thankful. If they are unhappy, they will also tell you. The company has to show that they care, and try to fix it somehow.

- Decide what you want to accomplish. Company should support their customers, and  energize their best customers to evangelize others. Then try to collaborate with them to figure out your objectives of each activities or campaign.

- Plan for how relationships with customers will change. LUSH should involve right people in their campaign and measure the effectiveness of their campaign.LUSH seem to have an international community of loyal fans. It becomes easier to do customer service on social media  when fans are ready to step up and defend the brand at any time, as well as answer other fans’ questions.

- Pay attention to what your fans/customers are complaining about: staff, products, orders, etc. and try to fix any problem they may have as soon as possible. 

The Wrong Play at the Wrong Time

McDonald's has enlisted professional skeptic and former "MythBusters" co-host Grant Imahara for its latest attempt to counter what it says are some of the persistent myths about the quality of its food. The launched it’s new "Our Food. Your Questions" series began on Oct 13^th with TV spots showing real people's questions and an invitation to consumers to pose questions via social media, such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.  Imahara is featured in a series of webisode videos addressing consumers' persistent doubts and questions.

McDonald's is hoping their campaign will dispel the unappetising rumors about "pinkslime", worm meat and other burger fillers that have long haunted the chain. The company is also inviting the public to send questions via Twitter and Facebook about what actually goes into their food. Among the many stubborn rumors circulating on social media for years include claims about burgers that never rot. Another question on its US homepage asks: "Does McDonald's beef contain worms?" to which the answer is simply "No. Gross! End of story." A video posted as part of the campaign showed Grant Imahara, a former host of the TV show Mythbusters, touring a Cargill beef plant where McDonald's burgers are made. However, it could be the wrong play at the wrong time.

Social media is not the right answer

Ben Stringfellow, a spokesman for McDonald said, “People are looking for faster, more straightforward responses to their questions about our food.” Actually they’re not. That’s what late-20th century research techniques and the ad agency told you. 

What they’re looking for is quality food (quality, which by the way, it turns out they’re willing to pay for at fast-casual restaurants), served in a reasonable timeframe. That’s not exactly the secret of the decade. But with consumer decision-making more emotional than rational, Q&A, no matter how many social media platforms are used, isn’t the answer to this problem. A new wrap, a “natural” frappe, or a social media app won’t fix what needs fixing. It’s the brand. And it needs reinvention.

That and what the brand stands for à la emotional engagement. Where emotional engagement with a brand is high , consumers are six times more likely to trust you. When they do, they don’t ask questions like “Are your ingredients pure?” or “Is it actually meat?” They walk into your restaurants already believing all that! 

The right answer for McDonald

When your hamburgers are rated as the "worst in America," it's not time to show customers educational videos about meat processing -- it's time to make and market better quality hamburgers. 

McDonald's has the right idea with its "build-your-burger" test program in several locations, which lets customers order custom burgers via a touch screen menu. It makes McDonald's burgers look fresher and more "bistro-like," as opposed to pre-made burgers which are left under the heat lamp.

As for its value menu, McDonald's needs to offer more creative menu options, on par with Taco Bell's Doritos Locos Tacos or Burger King's French Fry burgers, to get customers talking about the chain (in a positive way) again.

McDonald's Q&A social media campaign is an interesting approach to improving its public image, but it simply shines the spotlight on the fast food giant's previous problems. If the company wants to turn itself around, it needs to give customers better quality hamburgers and more exciting menu options -- not simply remind them that they're not made from pink slime.

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.