Overview
As marketers, learning is a constant each and every day as we plan, post, tweet, “LIKE” and communicate with target audiences on behalf of The Core, DMA Solutions and our clients. Most of the time, our lessons are learned in the moment, when we have that awesome opportunity to connect and make an impact with a curious consumer, fresh produce advocate or grower.
Recently, we experienced several significant marketing revelations shortly after we published a blog post to The Core titled, “Ending Hunger One Garden at a Time.” Written to highlight Katie’s Krops, an inspirational cause lead by a fourteen year old girl on a mission to fight hunger one vegetable at a time, this simple post reminded us of the power of commitment and meaningful content.
In an effort to recognize this young lady’s commitment to growing fresh produce and giving it to people in need we offered to contribute $10 per photo to anyone that wished to take a photo of their personal garden and post it to The Core prior to July 1, 2013. We decided internally, we’d be thrilled if we received 25 photos. We never anticipated what would happen over the next four weeks.
The Core has an established voice on Twitter and over the years, we’ve been dedicated to nurturing our presence as a marketing voice on social media. As a result of this, once we began sharing tidbits highlighting our post on Twitter, while connecting to @KatiesKrops, our post went, well – viral. As it happened, we were delighted and validated to witness, yet again, another example of how a post, comment, tweet or video can take off and be absorbed, shared and amplified due to our ability to connect to the masses with the push of a button.
A Welcomed Result
From an internal analytics perspective, leading up to July 1st, we experienced a lift in not only social media connections via Twitter, but also views to our blog as well as new subscribers interested in hearing more on our thoughts regarding FRESH. Overall, it was a win for DMA Solutions, The Core Blog and Katie’s Krops.
What We Learned:
Virality is a welcomed accident.
When we wrote the post about how Katie’s Krops inspired the DMA Solutions team, never in a million did we anticipate the virality that our post would have on The Core’s community and Katie’s community, alike. Not only did our traffic to The Core increase during the month, but we also set a new all-time record for comments posted directly to our blog. Best of all, Katie herself joined in the conversation on The Core Blog to further connect with her tribe. Smart girl.
Influencers of FRESH extend beyond food bloggers.
How connected are we really as fresh produce marketers to the vast number of influencers and causes that devote their time and energy towards the promotion of our farm fresh products? Perhaps as marketers, we should take a cue from Bonnie Plants, Disney’s Friends for Change, Amazing Kids and the other organizations that have aligned themselves to thoughtfully support Katie’s Krops. When you consider the possibilities of what and who is out there promoting the benefits of farm fresh food, imagine the possibilities for your business from both a strategic and philanthropic perspective.
Giving is good, no matter how big or small.
A contribution to a cause doesn’t have to be huge to make a big difference – for you AND the cause. We were clever in our approach with the Katie’s Krops post and weren’t even trying to be strategic. In the end, the result of the post meant good things for The Core and for Katie’s Krops. We can’t think of a better way to donate $1,500 and we think that Katie will be thrilled. Mission accomplished!
Consumers are connected and care about our products.
Consumers’ connections to the fresh produce industry’s products are abundant. Just take a look at some of the photos that were posted by proud consumers in their personal gardens that joined our cause to help support Katie’s Krops in the SlideShare below. As mentioned above, if you strategically select your cause, you can tap into that pride and passion and earn the respect (and potentially the purchasing power) of these fresh produce hungry individuals. From a social media perspective, the reach potential and connection points that link you, your cause and consumer together are endless.
Children will change our industry.
We’ve been hoping this day would come and we believe at DMA Solutions that slowly and surely, the children of the world will absolutely change the way that they view food and begin to make smarter, healthier eating choices, powered by fresh produce. The culture shift is in process and we are simply thrilled to be along for the ride and part of the conversation.
Photos We Heart
The proof is in the pudding and we’ve got a lot of it to share. Feast your eyes on some of the great photos that people posted to help raise money for Katie’s Krops.
