Focus Text – Chapter 15 In recent years, social media has become extremely important to not only consumers but also to businesses. This particular exercise focuses on Facebook. This assignment asks yo

by Jennifer Moire on May 23rd, 2011 8:51 AM on www.allfacebook.com

We spoke to Jenna Rose Robbins, director of marketing and social media at Fiji Water, about how the company engag es

with its passionate fans via Facebook.

How does your position as the lead Facebook page administrator differ from what the traditional webmaster used to

do?

Managing a Facebook page is quite different from being a webmaster because it’s far more immedi ate, in terms of responding

to both requests and trends. A Facebook page administrator is the consumer -facing voice of the brand, while a webmaster is

more the technical wizard behind the curtain. Websites introduced a new flexibility — and immediacy — to marketing, and

social media only upped that ante.

Brands are now expected to respond to their fans and consumers in real time and should take it upon themselves to engage in

the conversations about their products that are already happening. Now that social media has made the online conversation a

two -way forum, brands now need to have a voice that is far more approachable than the “brochure” copy that comprised the

webpages of yore. Facebook offers a convenient platform to do so.

What is the company’s strat egy for spurring engagement and generating likes especially

during slow periods?

Keeping our current fanbase engaged is key. We know how much our brand means to them, so

we like to make sure we maintain our connection with them as often as we can, even if it’s just

through discussions of current events. Plus, we have so many regular online programs, both

small and large, that there isn’t that much downtime between slow periods.

Do you have a favorite campaign you’ve launched on Fiji’s Facebook page?

Until now, the majority of our online campaigns have been based on our website. However, we

have a few Facebook campaigns in the works that we’re incredibly excited about, and they’re

all about rewarding our fans for their loyalty and listening to their interest s.

Fiji is a brand that inspires a lot of passion, to the point where we’ve seen people get into spats on Twitter about who’s th e

biggest Fiji fan, so we want to make sure we reward that level of loyalty. We’re hoping to launch a campaign around that idea

by the end of summer. We also note our fans ’ other interests, such as their pets — you wouldn’t believe how many photos

we’ve received of a furry friend and a bottle of Fiji. People are almost as passionate about Fiji as they are their pets, so we’ve

come u p with a fun campaign that marries those two.

What special skills or knowledge does Fiji Water look for when hiring for social media positions in general, and for

Facebook in particular?

Voice, tact, and gut. They need to get the Fiji brand and understand who we are as well as who we aren’t, and convey that to

our audience in a voice that underscores our USPs. There are a lot of conversations going on around our brand that, although

positive -sounding to those having them, are not the sort of conversations we want our brand to be associated with. Knowing

how to navigate these conversations, and choosing which to engage in and which to avoid, is as important as speaking the Fiji

voice.

Graciously turning down the opportunity to participate in these conversations, as well as fielding other off -brand requests, is a

refined skill that not everyone can handle. There’s a lot of gray in this area, so gut feeling plays a key role. Do you have a ny favorite Facebook tools that you like to use?

We’ve been using polls a little more often, both for fun and to gage fans’ interest in marketing ideas. But we generally keep it

simple and use the basics, such as the event calendar and photo albums. We ha ve a third -party agency that has helped us

build our fan -gated contest app, which has proven to be a huge success, so I’m sure we’ll continue to use that.

How many people work with you on Fiji’s Facebook page and presence? If more than one, how do you divide tasks or

projects?

There are two of us who officially work on the page. I handle the everyday strategy and fan response, while Ben Upham, our

associate manager of social media, posts content from our other online destinations (e.g., the Fiji Water blog) and researches

innovations for Facebook, such as new apps or social media management systems.

Since my responsibilities also include other marketing areas , such as events, it makes sense for Ben to focus on some of the

more long -term projects, so they can have more attention. We discuss strategy and any large projects such as contests

together.

What does Fiji do differently, if anything, with its Facebook p age presence as compared to other bottled water brands

or other beverage brands such as Coca -Cola?

Fiji strives to differentiate itself by being accessible. We talk to our fans, not just at our fans, by initiating conversations on

subjects other than our b rand.

For instance, during the Super Bowl, we posted to our wall during key points of the game and asked our fans for their

reactions, because we knew our fans (at least those in the U.S.) were watching and we wanted to engage with them during a

moment tha t we all could share in real time.

Almost each of those Super Bowl posts garnered more impressions than any other Facebook post in the previous six months.

Also, even though we regularly receive photos of celebs carrying our product, we rarely post those b ecause it’s too much

about us and doesn’t offer much value for our fans.

An exception was recently made when Michael Bolton sent us a behind -the -scenes photo from the set of his Jack Sparrow

video with The Lonely Island. We knew how viral the video had bec ome, and how much chatter was going on about it around

the web, so we posted the photo and asked people to name the celeb. The result was one of our most popular non -contest

posts to date. People loved the timeliness and goofiness of the meme, so we built upon that.