There are several reasons why a brand may want to promote themselves on social media, but most relevant is their ability to engage with the consumer in a cost-effective way, and to reach potential customers and audiences. Brands that receive healthy recognition on social media can use their platforms as a great way to appeal to target audiences, with a vastly growing number of users on Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok . In a 2022 report, it showed mobile phone users were up by 170 million globally, with a similar growth in active social media users. Therefore, it is in a brand’s best interest to use these platforms – if brands promote well, people will give you a follow – they want to see more! Having a look back at 2022, it’s interesting to review some of the most talked about brand campaigns that used social media, and why they received such reaction, be it good or bad. Social can be used to create brand love or show a brand’s culture or sense of humour, spread important messages, get people talking or bring a brand back to being relevant. But going viral can also destroy a brands credibility or reputation by giving users a chance to share opinions. Social media gives customers and the public a voice and this can really help make, or break, a business. 

The ‘Spotify Wrapped’ campaign is a clever way for Spotify to get its customers to promote them on their own social media platforms. This is immensely popular and #Wrapped is trending every year. Every December, each customer can view their top played songs of the year, plus artists and albums they’ve enjoyed the most. Spotify designs this slideshow in a way that appeals to the user, usually making it colourful and funky. They can then choose to share their ‘Spotify Wrapped’ onto social media platforms, usually Instagram, and it has become a bit of a trend! In this way, Spotify has created a recurring campaign that everyone looks forward to, whilst getting users to promote the music platform on their own social media pages. In this case, social media was a key factor used by Spotify as it was always intended to utilise such platforms as a way to showcase individuality. Fun traditions like this create brand love and retain customers and get a community going that people want to be involved in.

Another social media campaign that stood out last year was the gender pay gap bot on Twitter. A Twitter bot called out companies that promoted International Women’s Day but still had gender pay gaps within their business. It was set up by social media manager, Francesca Lawson, to call out companies on Twitter that congratulate the women on their team, yet do not pay them fair wages.  This information was gained from a 2018 UK government system that required companies to report their salary differences. “The bot exists in order to empower employees and members of the public to hold these companies to account for their role in perpetuating inequalities… It’s no good saying how much you empower women if you have a stinking pay gap”, Francesca Lawson told the New York Times. Not only does this bot call out the empty recognitions to IWD that huge corporations publicly announce, but it also raises awareness, on social media, and went viral, highlighting the gender pay gap that is still so relevant to today’s society. For this campaign, we can see how a social media platform was cleverly utilised in order to spread awareness about an important issue.

Towards the end of 2022, when we began to welcome the Christmas chocolates to our shelves, Mars decided to remove Bounty chocolates from Celebration boxes. When this was announced, a large amount of people took to Twitter to complain straight away, with numerous polls being created. It is reported that Celebrations scored a ‘PR hit’ with this shock revelation, receiving free publicity on Twitter from Piers Morgan, Lorraine Kelly, and Richard Osmond, and even a mention on the popular British chat show, This Morning. This reaction was recognised by John Harrington, the UK editor of PR Week, who stated that “Every couple of months in the UK PR industry, you’ll get a campaign where everyone just sort of bows down and says, yep, they did that well”. Taylor Herring, the PR agency that were behind this Mars campaign, did great on this, earning viral coverage for the removal for Bounty from the Celebrations boxes, for free! This is a classic example of how PR and social complement each other well when it comes to getting brands talked about organically for the right reasons. 

The rate of TikTok users is growing rapidly, with the average user being on the platform for 23.5 hours a month. Data shows it is one of the fastest growing social media platforms, and in 2022, was the most downloaded app in the world. Expert, Charlie Ayling, of Meltwater states that it is ‘monopolizing social in a way we haven’t seen before… being an exciting opportunity for businesses’.  In 2022, many brands took advantage of TikTok’s popularity, using the platform as a way to promote themselves. One example is Chipotle, a well-known fast-food chain mainly based in the US. Currently with 2.1 million followers, and having amassed over 51 million likes on their videos, the Mexican chain is recognised as successfully using the platform to grow and expand. They successfully encouraged TikTok users to partake in the #ChipotleLidFlip Challenge, which first originated from an employee of one of the restaurants, and was later duplicated by over one thousand people, trying to replicate the stunt! In this case, we can see how social media has brought about a trend to ‘go viral’, which means it can often be utilised by brands to showcase their sense of humour, and again, get people talking about the brand.

However, going viral on social can sometimes be used to a brand or business’s detriment. In December of 2022, fashion house, Balenciaga, received major backlash after an advert gone wrong. After posting a fetish themed ad with children promoting their new seasonal handbags, people took to social media and TV chat shows to announce their outrage. Kim Kardashian, being a brand ambassador for Balenciaga for years, even spoke out to her 349 million followers on Instagram saying ‘I have been quiet for the past few days … because I wanted an opportunity to speak to their team to understand for myself how this could have happened … I appreciate Balenciaga’s removal of the campaigns and apology’. This reaction not only affected Balenciaga themselves, but the huge brand that Kim Kardashian has made for herself, due to her close relationship with the famous fashion house. They did publicly apologise, and stated they would be taking legal action against their production company… but how long will it take for people to forget? Again, this is a scenario where the public used social media platforms to highlight their disdain for this particular brand, with even a heavily public figure taking to Instagram to discuss her views. It’s a case in which we can see how the reaction around a campaign completely spiralled, and how the brand lost control of their own narrative.

As we can see, successful, and potentially damaging, viral brand ads and campaigns don’t often set out to become as popular as they do, but they definitely get the public talking on favoured social media platforms. When designing a campaign or ad, brands desire “talkability” John Harrington of PRWeek said – “it’s the idea that people are talking about your brand. If you can get it right, then you can get a huge amount of coverage that you wouldn’t get necessarily from a big, mega-budget glossy advert.” But if you get it wrong, it can go really wrong. Social media gives the public a voice and, overall, the chance to engage with consumers – brands just need to be careful that they are going viral for the right reasons!

Written by Izzy Muzzell – connect with me on LinkedIn