Social Media Campaign Ideas

Social media offers endless opportunities and benefits for marketing your business. While this is the beauty of social media, the infinite possibilities can make it hard to come up with ideas for social media posts and campaign ideas without getting overwhelmed. If you’re looking to leverage the power of social media to grow your business, here are some social media campaign ideas to inspire you.

Giveaway Campaigns

Social media giveaways are great social media campaign ideas if you are looking to increase engagement and get more followers. Just make sure that what is being given away is related to your business. You want entrants to be interested in your business, so that any followers or engagers you get from the campaign can also be potential leads.

Instagram Giveaways

There are different ways to get entrants for giveaways. For example, on Instagram, users can enter by following your account and liking your post, or reposting it with a custom hashtag. Another way users can enter an Instagram giveaway is by tagging another user in the comment section of the contest photo.

Facebook Giveaways

On Facebook, you could create a post for a contest to your business page, and have users enter by liking and commenting on that post. Or, you could ask a question in your post, and users could enter by answering the question in the comments.

If you are asking a question, it’s a good idea to ask a question that has something to do with your services or your audience’s preferences. This way, entries can provide you with feedback about your services or insights about your target audience.

Contest Campaigns

Another similar idea for a social media marketing campaign is a contest. Contests are a bit more involved: they typically require more effort on the user’s part such as by submitting a photo or writing something; and more effort on your part as you may have to put more thought into selecting a winner, and offer a more substantial prize.

On the other hand, contests can build a quality following, can get your followers engaging with each other, and entries can make great material for future social media posts and even blog entries.

Instagram Contests

Instagram is a great venue for running a social media contest. Users can enter by posting a picture of themselves using your product or service — either in context or in an unusual way. Or, you could ask users to post a photo with a caption expressing what they love most about your business.

If contest entries are public, you are sure to ramp up traffic from users checking in to see the latest entries. If you would prefer entries to be private, or if you only want to offer the contest to certain loyal followers, you could proceed privately through Instagram Direct messages.

Facebook Contests

Many Instagram contest ideas can also apply to Facebook. However, if you are looking to do a less visually oriented contest, you could use Facebook to do a fill in the blank, Q&A, or trivia contest.  Contests and giveaways both build a sense of community, and get users checking in frequently to look at entries and to see who won.

Series on a Theme Campaigns

Running a series on a theme over a period of time—a day, a week, a month—is one of the more versatile social media campaign ideas. You can use a series to go into depth on a particular topic, to touch on various topics within a broader subject area, or to simply familiarize users with your company culture. People like having an idea—whether specific or general—of what’s coming up next, and a series appeals to that sense of predictability.

In addition to the time frame, the content that comprises your series is also very versatile. It could be a set of articles on your business blog promoted across social, or can be a set of platform-specific posts such as happy customer photos on Instagram, informative Facebook posts, or bite-sized tweets. The important thing is to maintain continuity and consistency, both among each post as well as with respect to your overall brand messaging.

Fundraising/Philanthropy Campaigns

Is there a particular cause that you care about, is relevant to your business, or is in line with your values or culture? Support this cause through a social media campaign!

There are different ways to carry out this idea. You could have users nominate and/or vote on an organization for your company to donate proceeds to. Or, you could choose an organization and donate a particular dollar amount for every social share (or every 10 social shares, etc, depending on how many followers you have and much you are able to donate). You could also combine this with a contest campaign, where those who donate are entered into a drawing for a prize.

Cause-driven social media campaigns are a good way to appeal to your audience in a unique way. They will enjoy a nice refreshing change in your posts, appreciate a chance to contribute, and see the more personal side of your business. In addition, niche markets can form around causes that people care about, so keep that in mind when thinking of or carrying out your campaign.

Ongoing Custom Hashtag Campaigns

Social media campaigns don’t always have to be carefully planned or carried out over a finite period of time. A simple custom hashtag that you use frequently and which you encourage followers to use can serve as an ongoing social media campaign. Not only can custom hashtags facilitate brand awareness and community building, they can help you distinguish your business from competitors.

Your custom hashtag should be short but effective, catchy but easy to remember, and relevant to your business name or service. It is also important to check and make sure the hashtag is not already in use. Instagram and Twitter are the best places to employ this social media campaign, as Facebook and Pinterest hashtags are less common and LinkedIn does not use them.

Sneak Peeks

Sneak peeks utilize an element of suspense and anticipation to capture the attention of your target audience. Tease your followers with snippets of an upcoming blog post, pictures showing only parts of a new product, or hints about something you’ve been working on that you’re excited to reveal. This type of approach can bring some enthusiasm to your audience, and will keep them coming back to your account, either to see the latest or the full reveal.

Social media offers endless marketing options, can be leveraged for any business, and can support a wide range of business goals. It can be overwhelming, but the best thing to do is to just start. Pick one of these campaign ideas, start working at it, and see where it takes you. The beauty of social media is that with its large number of users, real-time results, and flexibility of use, you can quickly gather data and make appropriate adjustments as needed.