Successful Brand Market is in Cultural Relevance

Successful brand market is in cultural relevance. The Hershey Company is uses a micro-marketing plan to manage the company’s many brands.  The Hershey Company was founded in 1900 by Milton and Catherine Hershey. Milton had a passion for making candy. For more information on this great story go to www.thehearsheycompany.com website. When talking about brands, it is important to note that Hershey, and product companies like Hershey, have many brands and … each of the Hershey family of candies has a designated twitter handle. The company, the amusement park, and the Milton Hershey School for Children also has twitter handles. Needless to say; there is a strong Hershey presence on twitter … or at least there was a strong presence.

Let me explain. The purpose of twitter is to provide a short, brief message of 280 characters where registered members of twitter can respond, retweet, or like the message. Some might call it micro-blogging. Twitter also allows for pictures and graphics. Recently, twitter has opened space for short videos or gifs. The strength of twitter is the use of hashtags. Hashtags connect content with audience and increase search engine optimization. The key to success is being in the right place at the right time and keeping the message simple, concise and CULTURALLY RELEVANT!

The Hershey Company join twitter in June 2015 … and by 2016 the company and all the brands were heavily tweeted in the twitter world. For one campaign, the Reese’s brand tweeted, “All trees are Beautiful!” in support of their Reeses’ peanut butter cups shaped like Christmas Trees. The response was amazing!!!

The tweet reached 1 billion impressions, 82% brand mentions, 146% brand positive sentiment, 13,000 hashtag mentions, and 260,000 social mentions. The rate of return was epic for their company and it was all through twitter. Through one very cultural relevant tweet, The Hershey Company’s Reeses’ peanut butter cup brand served their audience.

M.C. Hammer is one of the most followed Twitter Handles … he states, “Forget the numbers and just be interesting.” Just four years ago, Hershey was posting daily and sometimes many tweets per day … in 2019 The Hershey company has found the twitter is not as culturally relevant. The quantity of tweets has been reduced, but in the quality of tweets has increased. Leading up to Halloween when candy is given out to children, there were 23 tweets and 2 paid ads in the month of October. Following Halloween, in the month of November, there has only been 2 tweets. That doesn’t mean that Hershey is not watching twitter, because there have been a few customer comments or complaints in November, but within a few hours the issues is addressed and resolution is offered.

The bottom line is Twitter has evolved to presenting information and linking the user through hashtags, functional content, inbound links, with pictures and videos… the point is to propagate the story by being relevant and interesting. In order to be convey the message, the tweets are not in volume, but in significance. The Hershey company has exchanged the twitter madness for concise, culturally relevant content. Which drives us back to knowing the demographics and psychographics of our target persona.

I believe there is good advice in follow following The Hershey Company and M.C. Hammer … “Don’t count the numbers, just be interesting.” Being interesting is knowing what people are interested in. Which drives us back to knowing the demographics and psychographics of our target persona … than Successful Brand Market is in Cultural Relevance.

Thanks for listening and be sure to look me up on twitter … Donald Crane.

You know I love ya,  Don

Hershey: An Epic Story to Tell Beyond Irresistible Chocolate

The Hershey company Instagram page has over 407,000 followers and is following 45 people. There are 405 posts from the company on Instagram. The company’s first Instagram post was on July 7, 2015. That is roughly 288 weeks and on average the Hershey Company posts twice a week. There are certain weeks a new product is introduced or special philanthropic event drives an extra Instagram post. On the other hand, the tagged posts are too many to count and Instagram does not provide the information to the observer. It becomes very obvious the Hershey Company is using Instagram to drive their story and to connect to consumer stories through tagging.

At first glance it appears The Hershey Company (www.hearsheycompany.com) is favoring Facebook, but upon deeper investigation the marketers are using both Facebook and Instagram for different purposes. Facebook for awareness and Instagram for storytelling. Hershey is keenly using social media networks to connect with the prospective buyers and move the consumer down the sales funnel. Specifically, in Instagram by appealing to the consumer’s visual sweet tooth.

The pictures are beautiful high definition while very attractive and engaging. Pretty matters in the Instagram world and the Hershey company has provided beauty and appetizing visual appeal. It is also worth noting how many people have tagged Hershey in their personal posts. It is a conservative estimate for every “one” HersheyCompany post there are “fifteen” tagged @HersheyCompany posts by happy consumers or customers using a Hershey product in a dessert recipe. Hershey has a very impressive Instagram community.

Milton Hershey is attributed with creating Milk Chocolate. Mr. Hershey is also attributed with building within the DNA of his company a goodwill towards the community and beyond. The Instagram platform fosters a community story which fits well within the company DNA. For example: the first Hershey Company Instagram post from July 7, 2015 is a picture of a journal cover highlighting the last three letters of “Hershey” along with the Hershey kiss logo. The first post started with “HEY.”

Another series of posts from 2016 highlighted the employees, their backgrounds, and what the employee would offer as a tip for getting a new job. The caption included background information on the employee’s family and working personal information to increase the ethos of the workforce. One post discussed the employee’s first job helping check in patients at his mother’s doctor’s office in India.

A more recent post from September 11, 2019, posted a colorful and bright picture of a staff retreat. The furniture is decorated in the bright, vibrant candy wrapper colors. The audience is actively engaged in what is being presented. The faces that can be seen in the picture are smiling and happy. The caption reads; “Throughout the week employees are sharing stories about what it means to them to be a “Moment Maker,” and how they personally contribute to making more moments of goodness for customers and consumers.” This particular post has over 1,214 likes and four additional comments.

The Hershey company has a current campaign titled “Heart Warming Project” (heartwarmingproject.com). The campaign is part of their sustainability philanthropy department. The campaign offers $250 grants to students to increase connection for inclusion and empathy within the student communities. The Core vision is: “Meaningful connections and friendships are essential in today's complex world. We believe that the smallest heartwarming gesture can make a big difference. That's why we're partnering with leading organizations to promote social and emotional connections at home, school and in the community.”  Hershey used videos of students to report on successful use of the grants. The student was interviewed and asked brief questions concerning their respective projects. It is very powerful to watch the student talk about how and what the money was used for. It should be noted the videos do not promote Hershey or the products, but impresses on the audience a tremendous amount of heart-warming goodwill.

Hershey did not take down a video of a person who is a food critic reviewing the Hershey Candy Corn Bar. It is a funny video that does not look very favorable toward the confection, but is not harsh or overly critical. The reviewer has a niche in reviewing odd foods. “New_Food_Friday_ig” is the user id and in his blog post he reviewed a Hershey candy corn bar which he stated, “tastes more like sweet white chocolate and isn’t very good.” Their willingness to leave up the post speaks to the over-all story. Hershey realizes that not all candy is going to appeal to all people. The community and audience is within their micro-marketing plan which is implementing several smaller brands and their respective sales funnels. The strategy is not in vanity likes, but in building a community of consumers.

Hershey receives an A+ from me on their use of Instagram as a story building platform. There are posts of yoga, bike rides, making s’mores, moment maker employees, Hershey-world international visitors, and introducing a new CEO. Each post includes pictures and videos to accompany each. The story of The Hershey Company’s mission is inclusive, civil, and inviting. Instagram’s purpose is to be a platform to share photos and videos to which the Hershey team transformed the platform to match their mission and create a story telling community. I think Milton Hershey would be pleased. 

May our stories be filled with vivid memories and shared within our communities with good will. You know I love ya, Don