It’s that time of year again! Umami Marketing’s annual round-up from a year which has given us even more unique and innovative social media marketing than ever before! Today’s post is all about Social Media Marketing, and our picks for the best brands to follow in 2014.
Once again, we’ve gone through the tough task of scouring our Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Pinterest accounts and narrowing them down to the top brand for each social media platform. This is always a difficult job as brand marketing is becoming more creative than ever, and we are highly entertained every day while scrolling through our newsfeeds….but we’ve managed to come up with the list below, and we hope you enjoy our top picks!
Favorite Facebook Brand – Starbucks
Starbucks is one of the world’s top brands, and that shines through on Facebook. They are masters of posting content that takes advantage of all four seasons – cozy, warm posts for a cold winter’s day; bright and refreshing posts for a hot summer season – and their design team creates these beautiful images and collages that can really connect with anyone who enjoys the comforting, social aspect of enjoying a cup of fragrant coffee or tea. They also regularly host unique contests on their page, like the White Cup Contest, where they encouraged customers to take their “cup doodling” to another level.
With almost 38,000,000 likes, Starbucks is a very engaging brand on Facebook with an active social community. They know their brand, they understand their followers, and they are always consistent with their content. Described in one word, we’d say their feed is “comforting”; the perfect go-to page to warm you up during these cold and rainy winter days! Keep up the great work, Starbucks.
Favorite Instagram Brand(s) – GoPro and Oreo
Okay, okay…we just couldn’t decide, so had to go with both GoPro AND Oreo for our favorite brands on Instagram. Let’s start with GoPro first: with a sense of adventure in every post, GoPro curates the most amazing content for their Instafeed. They’ve created an awesome community (of 3,600,000 friends!) by regularly re-gramming their followers’ original GoPro shots in their “Photo/Video of the Day” series. GoPro has done an amazing job of posting content that is beautiful, engaging and will make you say “wow”, all while promoting the abilities of their hardware. We dare you to scroll through their photos and not get goosebumps…(you’ll probably also want to go out and immediately learn to surf with a GoPro).
Next up is the Oreo Instagram profile, which is one of our all-time favorites (and not just for the delicious cookies). Oreo’s marketing team creates content that is funny, adorable and memorable and can connect with followers young and old, through a mixture of images, videos, recipes, and re-grams of follower’s posts.
Oreo always seems to connect with relevant current events through its posts. Whether it’s the Met Ball, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie release, or a favorite holiday, Oreo’s team is sure to have a quirky, timely post that will make all of their followers giggle. Oreo has a team of pros working to produce a relatable, generation-spanning instafeed and we highly recommend adding them to your follow list.
***(Oreo also has a stellar Facebook page, so make sure to check that out as well).
Favorite Twitter Brand – American Express
American Express has been hugely innovative this year. To take advantage of the Twitter platform, they have undergone a huge digital transformation to further engage and support their card members and merchants. In 2013, they launched unique technology that allows card members to securely connect their Amex accounts to their social media accounts, and tweet certain #hashtags to buy products through Twitter. This not only opened up a whole new channel of commerce for consumers, but also provided merchants with yet another way to reach their customers and sell their products.
They’ve also initiated their @AskAmex handle, that is operated by a team of member support representatives dedicated to responding to inquiries via Twitter, which grew their followers by 50% from 2013 to 2014. This year, they’ve also created #AmexOffers, which provides you with instant updates on promotional deals through Amex merchants. Amex’s Twitter feed is a prime example of how to provide your consumers with the best customer experience possible, while providing them with information they want.
Favorite Pinterest Brand – Whole Foods
Whole Foods is very transparent about their brand and what they offer as a natural and organic food market, and this is clearly shown through their Pinterest feed. Of course, they post tons of content showcasing their healthy and natural food products, but their account also hosts a bevy of useful information sharing decor DIYs, gardening tips, recycling tips, fitness information, and everything you could ever want to know about food.
As Pinterest is a visually driven platform, Whole Foods does it right by showing off recipes, seasonal-focused food products, appealing decor projects and motivational fitness photos to attract and engage their followers. Bright, colorful and high-resolution, we don’t think they have a Pinboard posted that doesn’t appeal to at least one of us and invite us to learn more about their brand and their business.
And there you have it, Umami’s first marketing round-up of 2014: our favorite social brands! With such a successful year in social media, it really was tough to narrow down our picks for each category. Are there any other clear winners that you think we should add to our list?
