Creating a social media page is simple enough, but getting your customers to engage with it can be no easy task. That’s why Dixie State University Campus Store continually looks for new ways to cross promote their social platforms and get students excited about interacting with them.
As a prime example, the store recently hosted a Cutest Couple Contest that encouraged students to interact with them via Facebook and Instagram. Starting in late January, they prompted students to pose with their college sweetheart and post the photo to the either social platform using the hashtag #dixiescutestcouple. They were even permitted to post once to each page as a strategy for increasing their odds of winning.
The store promoted the new initiative to students through a variety of channels.
"We put an ad on our school's radio station, hung posters up in-store and around our building, had our cashiers tell students about it as they checked out and, of course, posted on our social media pages,” explained Courtney Greenleaf, Marketing and Promotions manager.The only requirements were that both participants were current Dixie State University students and that they each had proof of student identification. Once all the submissions were received, the race was on! Each entry competed to see who could collect the most ‘likes’ over the next three weeks.
“We had over 20 entries and all of them were eager to win,” Greenleaf said. “It really helped increase interaction on our pages and we gained quite a few new fans and followers in the process.”
The top 5 pairs were then invited into the store for a one-of-a-kind giveaway drawing. The store selected one couple at random for the grand prize: a one minute shopping spree! Standing back to back, the couple's midsections were duct taped together and the 60 second countdown began.
“We gave them each a large shopping bag and set them loose in the store,” she said. “We roped off certain areas such as electronics, textbooks and computers, but other than that they had free reign!”
The two then raced against the clock while hoarding as much as they could into their shopping bags. The couples who had gathered for the drawing stayed to cheer them on, along with the store’s staff members.
“We played the Jeopardy theme song as they went, which created a fun atmosphere,” Greenleaf added.
By the end, the couple scored $1,500 worth of store merchandise!
“They were ecstatic,” she described. “They even decided to share their winnings with the four other couples by divvying out Dixie sweatshirts, which was so generous. I think it’s fair to say that all five couples walked away feeling like winners!”
Greenleaf believes that the promotion was well worth the cost.
“It was fairly easy to implement, and the students did a lot of the work for us,” she said. “It definitely created a buzz and, by the end, we had 10 new brand advocates wearing our apparel around campus; it was great!”
