David’s Bridal Celebrates Finding Your “One Love”

David’s Bridal – the only national bridal retailer – prides itself on being a leader in the wedding industry, offering consumers an unparalleled selection of bridal attire, accessories, gifts and favors. Dedicated to helping brides create the wedding of their dreams, the company is always looking for new ways to bring this commitment to its target demographic, women ages 18-34. Responding to the changing media climate and consumer preferences, David’s knew it had to get more involved in the online space as a way to reach potential customers. In response, Lippe Taylor created an online campaign that aimed to generate positive buzz online, engage consumers with the brand and encourage online sharing, all while promoting key brand products. The resulting program was extremely successful in tapping into the emotions of finding one’s “one love,” generating not only superb online bridal buzz, but more than 1.7 MM engagements, with 91% of entries shared over multiple social networking sites, and a 112% increase in social networking traffic on David’s Bridal website.

More details and metrics on the campaign here

“In consideration of our entire customer base, we exclude “adult” material from appearing in some searches and best seller lists. Since these lists are generated using sales ranks, adult materials must also be excluded from that feature.”

Within hours, the social web was abuzz with activity. At the time of writing this post, more than 25,000 tweets with #amazonfail, #glitchmyass, #stilldelisted and #sorryamazon had gone back and forth, the online petition against Amazon’s “Adult Policy” had nearly 28,000 signatures and the AmazonFail group had attracted 4,125 members.

So, what are the lessons to be learnt?

• Be prepared. Word on social media spreads like wild fire and traditional approaches of PR crisis management are ineffective in these situations. Bypassing organizational hierarchies, there should be an internal crisis management protocol or an escalation matrix which provides a nimble mechanism to ensure faster response. I came across this article in WSJ which is a good analysis of Domino’s response to the “disgusting video” recently.

• Listen, but of course! In the Web 2.0 world it is all about power to the people. What was common between both the Amazon & Dominos “situations” was that the spark was provided by blogs with small but loyal followings. More than 4 in 5 bloggers blog about their experiences with companies (Technorati, 2008) and with 77% of active internet users reading blogs (Universal McCann, 2008), one can’t overemphasize the fact that companies need to keep their ear close to the ground at all times. Besides paid tools like Radian6, Filtrbox, Techrigy etc, there are various free tools like Google Alerts, Social Mention, Blog Pulse, Board Reader and Twitter Search that can be used to monitor buzz about your company, your brand and your competitors.

• Get the message right. Amazon’s communication left room for a lot of speculation and when they finally released a statement of apology stating that it was an “embarrassing and ham-fisted cataloging error”, it was “too little too late”. The message would have been more effective had it been from a senior Amazon employee rather than a PR release.

• Be where the conversation is. In this case, Amazon should have tweeted, blogged and youtubed its heart out. But even at the time of writing this post, there was nothing on Amazon’s official twitter account in response to the barrage of tweets.

In hindsight, it is easy to criticize and advise. What else do you think Amazon should or should not have done?

Bloomberg recently posted an article discussing the down side to marketing via Twitter. In the article a Twitter user of 2-months expresses her frustration with companies contacting her based on what she tweets. As with any social media tool that grows in popularity, marketers and brands set up shop hoping to reach their consumers in their natural environment. After a while the community becomes so flooded with poorly targeted and irrelevant marketing messages that users either flee the community all together, or the site begins putting stern regulations into place. In the case of Twitter, I think it’s important to highlight the difference between marketing and spam, which is something the mentioned article doesn’t do a great job of distinguishing. There is no doubt that Twitter spam (“twam”) has been an issue in recent months. Flooding consumers with messages unrelated to their needs or interests, mass auto following, hacking into accounts, etc. is a practice no reputable marketing agency should ever support. On the other hand, joining conversations where your service or brand is welcome or relevant is something I think we all agree can be an effective tactic.

The Twitter user highlighted in the Bloomberg article is upset that Home Depot contacted her after she told her followers that she was going to buy some paint at either Home Depot, Lowe’s, or Ace Hardware. The brand responded with a quick note wishing her luck and asking her if she needed any help. Maybe I’m having a hard time separating “Christy the consumer” from “Christy the marketer” – but what’s the big deal? I think the consumer should feel empowered by this. They are now being heard and have influence on how these brands operate. It was her perfect opportunity to respond and say ‘what can you do for me?’ As long as a line isn’t crossed into spamming territory (i.e. Home Depot “tweeting” or direct messaging her daily about hardware specials, sending her info on grand openings at store’s out of state, sending her countless customer surveys), I think customers should be excited by this new found authority and embrace it with open arms – or retreat to a deep dark cave with no Wi-Fi.

Bottom line – marketing can quickly turn into spam based on a single, poorly placed message, while spam on the other hand can never turn into marketing.

In his presentation, Plouffe shared some simple, yet brilliant, lessons that all marketers should consider:

• Reach people in every way possible. These days, people receive information in many different ways and they don’t always overlap. Therefore, the campaign “tried to meet people where they live and not make any one communication [medium] superior to another.”

• Have a consistent message. It’s important to keep a balance between inspiring creativity (user-generated content) and making sure your message is maintained.

• Use people as your messengers and validators. The Obama team armed and empowered individuals to spread his message. As Jalali Hartman, Yovia.com CEO, wrote in his paper ‘Obamanomics,’ “The campaign was not successful simply because it got a lot of people out to vote. It was successful because it got a lot of people out getting others to vote.”

• Have a lot of information. There is no such thing as too much data. The Obama campaign provided people with information constantly and consistently in multiple formats through various channels. Most of all, they were transparent and honest, building a trust and giving people the power to make their own informed decisions.

• Have as much data on your customers. Pay attention to the audience you’re trying to reach and diversify the media and the message based on where they are and what’s important to them. After all, not everyone visits the same websites or watches the same programs. And they’re not all interested in the same issues.

• Communicate with them… a lot. Treat it as a relationship with open two-way communication. Talk WITH your audience, not AT them. Plouffe says his team received amazing feedback that allowed them to better understand barriers and how people receive information and helped them make improvements during the campaign.