Pets and Social Media: 3 Powerful Campaign Concepts

Pets and social media go hand in hand; users are always looking to share the next cute picture of their family dog or mischievous cat.

An estimated 13 million households in the UK alone own at least one pet. Instagram has 14 million monthly active users. Facebook? 35 million. That’s a big potential audience just waiting to be captured.

But it isn’t just the numbers; the crossover between pets and social media is plain to see. It’s difficult to imagine a world in which you could browse Facebook, Youtube, Twitter or Instagram without stumbling across Maru, Boo the Dog or Grumpy Cat.

In fact, a survey of pet owners conducted by the Telegraph in 2014 found that ‘almost one in four dogs and cats now has their own social feed or page’.

Taken at face value, that statistic means that there could be more than 4 million cats and dogs on social media in the UK. And that’s ignoring the other popular pet choices; fish, birds and rabbits etc…

Clearly, there’s real potential for pet brands to engage a huge and varied audience on social media, whether it’s Twitter, Facebook, YouTube or Instagram.

With that in mind, we’ve come up with 3 on-trend social media marketing campaigns your brand could use to reach a wider audience in 2015 and beyond.

Pet Hub

This is an interactive hub that enables you to make use of user generated content to amplify your brand and products using key influencers across numerous social media platforms.

How it works…

Installed on your website, in a microsite or as an app on your Facebook page the Pet Hub uses content gathered from any of your social media channels using mentions and hashtags.

Content moderated by a community manager is then published to the Pet Hub, along with distinctive calls to action such as ‘discover’ and ‘shop now’.

Sharing is maximised through regular competitions, in which those who have submitted the best images are given the chance to win.

Why you’ll love it…

• It has the potential to drive high volumes of traffic through to your site, exposing them to your products and maximising on potential returns.
• Campaign hashtags drive sharing and exposure across social media platforms, encouraging brand engagement, potentially alongside additional campaigns or promotion.
• Regular competitions enable you to capitalise on social sharing, incentivising entries across all social media platforms.

What Does Your Pet Say About You?

Pet owners are always talking about their pets. But what do their pets say about them? This attention-grabbing Facebook quiz app poses fans with a series of questions about their pets and what that says about them.

How it works…

After answering a series of questions about their pets or pet preferences, users are told what their choices say about them.

Potential entrants are encouraged to ‘enter to win’ using their email address – prizes are decided based on the answers given.

To maximise exposure entrants are then prompted to share the competition with friends, a mechanic incentivised with additional competition entries.

Not only does this campaign promote sharing and social media exposure, it drives traffic to your site via ‘shop now’ buttons.

Why you’ll love it…

• It has the potential for high levels of engagement, using an approach that has proved successful across a number of industries in a fresh and exciting way.
• On the back of exceptional engagement, incentivisation can be used to maximise on data capture for current and future promotions.
• Using direct calls to action, the app drives high volumes of traffic to your website daily, exposing entrants to your brand, products and shop front.

Caption This

Images of pets are some of the most captionable. It’s easy to come up with catchy descriptions for pictures of cats doing bizarre things, for instance. And it’s that potential for enthusiastic involvement that makes this simple caption mechanic so appealing.

How it works…

Daily changing, this app sits either in your site or on your Facebook page keeping users and fans continually immersed in your brand.

Beside the image sits two text field, enabling entrants to submit their caption and email address easily and without barrier.

Once captions have been submitted, users will be able to vote upon and share the previous day’s submissions – the winner coming away with a prize and potentially being entered into a bigger draw at the end of the promotion.

Why you’ll love it…

• The simplicity of the mechanic and incentivisation means that entries and data capture will be maximised, improving company communications now and in the future.
• Content and frequency of caption competition and numerous opportunities for sharing will result in high engagement rates and wider brand recognition.
• Voting for entries increases sharing and engagement opportunities, exposing as many as possible to your brand and products.

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These are just 3 of the many social media campaign ideas we’ve had for the promotion of pets and pet products – each example is designed to drive high levels of engagement and interaction with your brand, while implementing effective data capture to bolster your future campaigns.

To find out how you can make the most of your social media activities now and in the future, please call us today on 01179 111 420, or email rich@digitalvisitor.com.

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Digital Visitor is the UK’s leading digital agency in travel and tourism.  We help leading Hotels, Attractions and Destinations attract more visitors, more tickets and more sales through their digital channels.