In this blog, I am going to do an in-depth case study of the most epic of the epic to inspire your content marketing. More specifically, I'll take a look two content marketing pillars who have created the foundations of what a great content marketing strategy is all about! This should give you some basic inspiration that you will be able to take with you to your next content marketing meeting. Let's take a look at the company that gives you wings, and the company you use to film when you get those wings.
Red Bull's Stellar Content Marketing: 7 Key Features
If you aren't a big fan of energy drinks, chances are you still know about Red Bull and can recite their slogan from memory, "Red Bull gives you wings!" Regardless of lawsuits stating the drink does not, in fact, give one wings, Red Bull's slogan is a great example of just how this company wins at content marketing. Let's look at a few other ways they're a content marketing juggernaut.
1. World Records Were Broken. Can We Ever Forget the Parachute from Space? I was one of the millions that tuned in for Red Bull's Stratos jump from the edge of space in October 2012. It was an incredible thing to watch and what a feeling of realizing you're watching history in the making! If you weren't one who watched or happen to know nothing about it, Felix Baumgartner did a free fall from the very edge of space and represented Red Bull. While it happened over two years ago, Red Bull is still using this highly successful campaign over at their Stratos Team website. It was a great way to not only advance the energy drink, but to also promote science and space travel.
Just how effective was this jump, in sales and marketing results? An Econsultancy report said they had 900,000 Facebook interactions on jump day, and sales of Red Bull rose an entire 7% to a figure in the billions within six months.
Now, I understand that not everyone can break a world record in their content marketing, but this company went to the extreme and did that-and it got them somewhere! If you have a crazy, record-breaking idea for your marketing: well, who's stopping you from doing it?
2. Red Bull Uses Excellent Sports Action YouTube Videos. While most of Red Bull's customers are not those who participate in extreme sports or high action events, they do know that it is a great marketing scheme. The company utilizes YouTube to provide videos to their over 3 million subscribers using different extreme sports in a video series. They have a series about racing in Seattle, as well as featuring individual sports such as mountain biking, parachute jumps, and extreme truck racing (in snowy conditions!). You can catch all of their videos by heading to their YouTube account. Prepare for some major action-packed adventures!
In addition to Red Bull's extreme sports videos, Red Bull also live-streamed events such as Lollapalooza. Those who couldn't get to the music festival were able to watch it live on Red Bull TV, which was another great marketing scheme from this awesome company.
3. They Put Their Customers First. One of the major ways Red Bull wins in content marketing is that they always put their customers first. This is a great way to interact with their client base and make people feel welcome. While their customers might not necessarily participate in extreme sports or the other events Red Bull sponsors, their client base still enjoys watching them. The company states that the product is completely secondary. What comes first is what the customer wants and how the company can deliver and meet those wants and needs.
4. Red Bull Uses Multiple Formats for Content. Red Bull understands the need for multiple content formats because they understand people consume it differently. Because of this, the company not only uses their awesome digital marketing skills, but they also utilize a magazine, social media, images, and blogs (depending on the campaign). This is a great way to reach out to their audience in enough ways to keep reaching a significantly wider audience. You can find more about their overarching content at their awesome website, Red Bull Media House.
5. They Make Marketing More Than Just a Department. Their media house states they are not the only ones responsible for coming up with these stellar content ideas. Red Bull believes that they can get some of the best, most effective campaigns by involving their entire company. This is a great way to make sure they are not only engaging their customers, but their employees as well. Happy, engaged employees can mean major success for any business! Consider asking your employees to help come up with some awesome marketing campaign ideas or things they'd like to see from your company. Your employees are housing a wealth of information and if you neglect it, you can miss out on some pretty epic inspiration!
6. Red Bull Has a Strong Slogan. As I mentioned earlier, the incredibly memorable slogan did bring about a lawsuit (people sure can get lawsuit happy, can't they?). Regardless, you cannot deny that Red Bull has created one of the best slogans. Why is it one of the best? Because whether you consume Red Bull or not, you know the slogan already. How many of us have it memorized? Let's see; recite the slogan with me now! "Red Bull gives you wings!" This is a great example of creating a memorable slogan that helps people remember your company quickly and easily!
7. Let's Not Forget Those Awesome TV Spots. Along with their memorable slogan, something no one can forget about is Red Bull's amazing TV spots. They've been around for quite some time, and we all know what they look like. Those odd little cartoons with silly, overdramatized voices in hilarious situations are something that have made and are currently making a huge impact. Check out a few of their 2014 TV spots!
http://www.ispot.tv/ad/7FxX/red-bull-light-bulb
http://www.ispot.tv/ad/7EhX/red-bull-santa-can-fly
http://www.ispot.tv/ad/7Fa0/red-bull-tune-teller
GoPro and Their Epic Marketing Strategy: Looking at 7 Memorable Features
GoPro hasn't quite gone to the extreme of the Stratos jump, but their product may have recorded even more extreme activity.
This company is another great pillar in the content marketing world. Their strategy is quite similar to Red Bull's by focusing on a lot of extreme sports and awesome adventures. However, they do aim to reach out to everyone, trying to include those who don't participate in racing trucks through and over snowdrifts. In short, pretty much anyone can pick up a GoPro and record what they're doing!
If you're interested in extreme sports and hilarious things animals do, then GoPro's video campaigns are perfect. Let's take a look at their content campaigns and how the company is so successful with them.
1. Capturing Epic Moments from Fans for Fans. There are many fans of GoPro whether they are cattle farmers in Missouri who want to check up on their cows in the back of their 50-acre land or are athletes catching hair-raising stunts. GoPro likes to feature videos and content from their fans on their YouTube account, which is a great way to ensure that their clients get content that interests them. While they might not feature every video that is submitted, it still gives a great chance for their fans to provide content for other fans. Such a cool way to promote engagement while getting content you know clients want to see!
2. Teaming Up with Another Powerful Team - Red Bull. One thing GoPro knows is that a successful partnership can make for an even more successful product. Just how did Red Bull capture some of their more amazing stunts? How did GoPro get the funding to sponsor well-known athletes? The two companies joined teams and have created some incredible content together. If you're unsure about partnerships working in your favor, just take a look at GoPro and Red Bull's successful pairing! Remember, you can always team up with someone who can benefit from your company such as Red Bull benefiting from GoPro. This works amazingly for both companies!
3. GoPro Utilizes an Epic YouTube Strategy for Their Brand. GoPro also has an incredible YouTube strategy that any company, large or small, needs to take into consideration. Many businesses might spend a significant sum of money for getting some awesome, professional quality videos, but they forget something very important - YouTube is a social media channel! What do you need to do on a social media channel? Well, you need to be social, obviously. GoPro makes sure to engage with their fans on their YouTube channel by responding to comments. While this seems rather small, it is really a huge step that helps promote the company further and bring in even more engagement on their videos.
4. They Promote Engagement by Providing Content their Clients Want. Another way that GoPro promotes engagement is by giving their clients what they want to see. Most of their client base probably wouldn't be too interested in seeing a cattle farm from a GoPro camera. However, they are interested in seeing epic content such as extreme sports and cool moments from firefighters and other professionals. They provide this to their client base and get a high amount of engagement, which helps promote the brand further. This is important to all content marketing schemes because you need to make sure your audience gets what interests them.
5. They Focus On Telling Stories in Their Content. As I've stated a number of times, storytelling is a great way to connect with your audience and drive engagement. This is exactly what GoPro does, and it has proven to be amazing for the company. They provide stories through video or they will share a video and later share the story surrounding it. This helps to make the content relatable to the audience, and bring about more social shares, engagement, and interest. This is actually a great way to become viral since people simply love stories. We all love stories because they give us the chance to relate and feel something whether warm fuzzy feelings or awe.
6. GoPro Doesn't Just Promote Extreme Sports, but Regular Life. It seems like GoPro could lose a big chunk of their audience if they only focused on extreme sports. The company seems agree with that thought because they not only share extreme sports videos, but they also share videos of regular life or things that aren't necessarily someone skydiving. They have videos ranging from a firefighter administering oxygen to a cat to a dad videoing his baby slowly falling asleep, according to NYdailynews.com. They want to sell their product to people who live regular lives and don't frequently do death-defying stunts. This has provided a plethora of videos of silly things and a few sad videos like what a dog does when its owner leaves.
7. They Know Which Social Channel is Perfect for Them. When it comes to social media, we all want to use as many channels as possible to have the best reach. However, this doesn't work with every company and you need to know which platform will work for you. This is exactly what GoPro does. While they have Facebook and Twitter, the company knows that there is one particular platform that is absolutely perfect for them - YouTube. They make sure to market their YouTube channel frequently, which is helping them build more and more subscribers. This is a great example of finding the channel that will work for you. It might not be as obvious for your company as it is for a camera company, but you can find out through analytics and seeing where you get the most engagement.
Ready? Set, Get Your Extreme On
You don't have to go the way of Red Bull and GoPro, but now is the time to get to some extreme content marketing and copywriting. You can easily modify the inspiration taken from these two companies and morph them into something that will make your business highly successful! What are some things you've learned from this blog?
I hope you are able to take away the importance of storytelling, social media, and client engagement along with many other ideas from these particularly epic companies.
Let me know some of YOUR favorites in the comments!