Rather than relying on traditional advertising, consumers are turning to social networks to learn about brands and products.
Brands and retailers also can craft their own compelling, social content in order to boost engagement and sales. For example, e-Commerce startup Country Outfitter was able to boost attention by 250% by developing lifestyle content using the Playbuzz platform. Over the past two calendar years, the retailer also has seen social drive more than 37% of its web site traffic.
Instead of focusing on product-focused content, Country Outfitter recognized the opportunity to craft content that aligned with the entire country lifestyle, including entertainment and pop culture. In fact, four out of the brand’s five most-viewed content pieces relate to music.
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“Our content supports our retail business of course, and it also serves as an independent media outlet,” said Lela Davidson, VP of Media & Entertainment at Country Outfitter. “We realized that our audience was terribly underserved in mass media, so we decided to build a true publication with Country Outfitter Life, creating material that is tailored to middle American values and sensibility.”
Other playful content pieces Country Outfitter has released include personality quizzes about country music, trivia quizzes revolving around famous southern cities and content focused on country culture.
Prior to discovering Playbuzz, Country Outfitter had a large, but unengaged, social media following.
“Our presence in social was already strong, so our challenge is to keep that audience engaged,” Davidson explained. “Having a huge social following doesn’t do you any good if they don’t interact with your brand.”
Expanding Content Reach Across Channels
Country Outfitter team members discovered a Playbuzz quiz on another media site and “were attracted by the ease of functionality,” Davidson said. “Quizzes were starting to gain momentum on Facebook and we wanted to be part of the trend without devoting internal resources to develop a platform of our own.”
Now, the brand taps into lifestyle trends and public figures to develop a variety of interactive content. Davidson noted that the brand keeps its content evergreen “so we can promote it periodically, or whenever the subject hits the news cycle.”
The Playbuzz platform empowers the Country Outfitter team to create and embed quizzes on owned media channels, including social networks and the company blog. Although promoting the content on these owned channels helped increase e-Commerce traffic, Country Outfitter also would see a surge in site traffic due to additional exposure on the Playbuzz web site.
When the Playbuzz homepage features Country Outfitter content, the retailer sees a “significant amount of high-quality referral traffic,” Davidson reported. “These users consume twice the number of pages per session and stay on site 2.5X longer than users who come from other channels.”
Playbuzz’s quizzes were especially effective for Country Outfitter in 2014. However, the retailer is looking to update and ramp up its content arsenal. The quizzes are still popular but “we’re looking at other formats to keep things fresh,” Davidson noted. “Playbuzz continues to innovate so we can focus on what we do best.”
