The Best Social Media Campaigns Are The Ones You’ve Never Heard Of

A few weeks months back I spoke at a MediaBistro/PRNewser event on social media and was asked what my favorite social media campaign was. As a marketer I have a few that deserve the golf clap and some that deserve a standing ovation. I say this because most campaigns aren’t targeted at me, a 35 36 year old, workaholic, white guy. And just to be clear, I’m not supposed to be the target for most of these campaigns. Mass/reach plays don’t typically work when it comes to social media.

And as I stated on the panel, just because it’s in the trades doesn’t mean it was a good campaign. I’ve been preaching the difference between niche and reach plays in social media for a while now and I’ll say it again for those who skimmed the first paragraph — most reach plays don’t work. Look it up. Papa John’s, Burger King, some cause stuff and what else? Not a heck of a lot of success, but a whole lot of fail.

That being said, you’ll never see someone give some credit to brands, campaigns and yes, agencies, that have run some pretty great word of mouth campaigns that utilize social media. One reason might be competitive advantage. Another might be because every company is different, as as such their campaigns, results and success aren’t transferable. I’d like you to share your great social media campaigns in the comments of this post.

I’ll kick it off by giving the answer I gave to the MediaBistro event attendees. The campaign is called Fiskateers, created by Brains on Fire, a branding firm in Greenville Charleston , South Carolina. I met Spike and Geno of BoF through WOMMA and have seen this project since nearly day one of the launch. The concept is simple: Crafters love Fiskars scissors, so let’s give them a space to connect with each other and the brand. Spike recently tweeted that the project delivered $1.6MM in ROI for the brand. Wham-bam, indeed.