20 years in business is quite a success story, and for the AriZona Iced Tea company (makers of different types of iced tea, sports beverages and the Arnold Palmer “Half and Half” drinks), it was time for its fans to create the winning design for the celebrations, while having some fun with it.
The company teamed up with Creative Allies, a social media company who focuses on design competitions so “let people from around the world design for rockstars” as their website says. This time, the competition in June of 2012 encouraged participants to create a 360 degree design for a can while following the rules. The winner received the recognition of designing the winning can, $5000 and a year supply of AriZona Iced Tea.
Even if you weren’t a designer, the companies 20th anniversary celebrations (and special website) gave participants the opportunity to get involved in many different ways!
The result was over 2000 entries for the can design, and 3700 Facebook posts about the competition. This helped to push the AriZona Iced Tea fan page to over 3.2 Million followers, and its twitter page to over 50,000 followers.
So if you are thinking of running a social media design campaign like this, here are a few points to think about:
- People like iced tea (don’t we all)
- Sometimes its fun and potentially cost savings to have your customers design your products
- A campaign can result in positive (or negative) reactions, so be prepared for both
- Provide the opportunity for others to get involved in different parts of a campaign, especially if they are not the best at drawing.
- Cross-post on different social media platforms, on the company website and email campaigns and continue to promote throughout the campaign, not just at the beginning (Plus 4 other tips by Wishing Ponds Blog)
- Utilize the tabs on Facebook Fan Pages and #hashtags on Twitter to keep organized
Web References:
Creative Allies
AriZona Iced Tea Company
AriZona Facebook Page
AriZona 20 Year Celebration Website
T ips for Contests
Submitted by: Barry Rooke – SMBP Student University of Waterloo
To contact the author of this entry please email barry@infinitesm.com
If you have concerns as to the accuracy of anything posted on this site please send your concerns to Peter Carr, Program Director, Social Media for Business Performance.