Happy Smoothies

About “Happy Smoothies”: Happy Smoothies is a fictional company, which sells delicious smoothies to boost people’s vitamin consumption and health. The company sells its products all over the European Union and aims at providing high quality juices to customers who value natural, environmentally friendly smoothies that will make them feel good and supply them with all the vital nutrients they need to have a productive and happy day.

Social Media Strategy

target group

Smoothies have turned into an almost stereotypical refresher for urban city-dwellers and youngsters. This audience strongly cares about buying environmentally friendly, ecological and natural products. Additionally, they want companies to be aware of their social impact and act as a consciously. Happy Smoothies will, therefore, use a part of its revenues to support selected charity projects. Customers would be actively engaged in choosing these projects. This opportunity to directly participate would become part of broader engagement strategy through which clients will be further tied to the company.

goal

Happy Smoothies’ social media strategy strives to turn Happy Smoothies into a recognizable brand. By conveying a fresh and innovative image, consumers will immediately associate Happy Smoothies’ products with positive attributes such as healthy, ecological, natural, refreshing and motivating. The Happy Smoothies brand wants to appear approachable as well as relatable and give its customers a feeling of being included and being listened to. The company knows that behind each screen there is a human being longing for social interaction. Although it is a lot harder to build a fruitful relationships through social media, Happy Smoothies will simply treat clients as normal people. Furthermore, it will encourage them to engage and, hence, actively contribute to Happy Smoothies’ social media presence and reach. This will help the company to show its human side and avoid being perceived as bureaucratic and aloof.

strategy

Happy Smoothies will start a process of product branding by becoming an active part of costumers’ daily routine. The company will do so by mostly refraining from classical product advertisement but rather focusing on creating content that is relevant to consumers and touches on current issues while avoiding taking a stance on divisive or polemic issue. Happy Smoothies’ social media strategy is all about creating positive images and linking them directly or indirectly to the product. By building an image that fits the company’s spirit and product, Happy Smoothies will be able to diversify quickly, broaden its reach and tap exploit new target groups. Treating customers like human beings instead of simply seeing them as anonymous Internet users and allowing them to gain an insight into Happy Smoothies’ operating and daily routine will generate a comfortable and familiar atmosphere clients will automatically link to the product. Happy Smoothies will be recognized as fun, easy-going, healthy, energizing and benevolent.

means

a) Website: Happy Smoothies’ website will be the center of its strategy. It will be user-friendly, easy to navigate and, most importantly, visually appealing. Since websites are usually one of the main sources people tend to refer to when seeking information about a product, the company recognizes that its website needs to be “on point”. Its brightness, colorful design and positive outline will create a first impression that matches the image Happy Smoothie’s wants to transmit.

b) Blog/Vlog (Client Participation and Engagement): Happy Smoothies’ official blog and videoblogging feature will be an integral part of its website. It will complement the website and offer the company, its employees and its customers a space to publish longer texts about the product, provide in-depth documentaries on the product, its ingredients, social impact and production process. Additionally it will enable clients to publish their own content such as pictures, stories, videos or basically anything they positively link to Happy Smoothies. This feature will get people talking about Happy Smoothies and its product and further widen its reach.

c) Youtube: Youtube has become the world's second most used search engine. The video sharing platform, hence, offers sheer endless opportunities for a thriving company to tap into new customer pools. Happy Smoothies will share interesting insight into the company's operations and production process via Youtube. This will further increase transparency and integrate customers into Happy Smoothies' daily routine. Youtube could also serve as an open space for Happy Smoothies to launch and promote competitions with the aim of further engaging consumers. "Design your own Smoothie" or "Happy Smoothies' next TopDesign" are just a couple of possible contests the company would use to integrate its clients and their ideas into its business. Youtube seems like an ideal platform for such projects.

keep it short and sweet!

d) Microblogging: Happy Smoothies believes that it will be necessary to make its message clear by using as few words as possible. People’s attention span is continuously shortening and they usually have neither the capacity nor the willpower to read through endless product analyses and promotions. The message will therefore be short and clear. The best way to achieve this goal is by sticking to visual content and very limited text. Microblogging platforms will enable Happy Smoothies to do exactly that. The short but very precise and well-placed messages and ideas will transmit the product’s delicious taste and link it to sentiments of pleasure and enjoyment. The Microblogging feature would also give customers the possibility to share their positive experiences with the Happy Smoothies community as well as voice any possible complaints. Happy Smoothies' mantra is: Meet negativity with positivity! Complaints or negative comments will, therefore, not be ignored or deleted but rather dealt with, giving Happy Smoothies the chance to find a satisfying solution as soon as possible.

e) Mashup: Happy Smoothies believes that marketing messages should be subtle and get people talking. The company aims at not forcing its product on customers and creating the impression that it is not even trying to sell anything. By designing its own mashups as well as letting consumers publish their content, Happy Smoothies would be able to recycle and repackage already existing content and turn it into a new piece of work that would nonetheless contain the same message. This will give Happy Smoothies the possibility to continuously change and diversify its content while not changing its key message. As a result, clients will not get bored and at the same time further internalize Happy Smoothies' message. It will also give them the possibility to incorporate other aspects of their lives and directly connect them to Happy Smoothies.

f) Podcasts: Podcasts will be used to further enhance transparency. Happy Smoothies will provide its customers with interesting documentaries, analyses and reports about the company, the products and its strategy. It will use this means of communication to inform clients about the company’s current state, its plans for the future and to explain its goals and methods. Happy Smoothies will simply use podcasts to tell its stories and give consumers the feeling that they are an indispensable part of the Happy Smoothies family.

a social business is a connected business

g) Folksonomy: Nowadays, peer recommendations are far more influential than active advertisement. That is the reason why Happy Smoothies will increasingly focus on “getting the conversation started” and integrating its product into people’s online lives. By creating content communities for people with common interests, Happy Smoothies will bring its customers together and create new platforms and open spaces for communication and dialogue. This will not only spread the message but also enable the company to turn Happy Smoothies into more than just a smoothie. Happy Smoothies will apply a P2P, people to people, strategy to promote its product.

h) Newsletter: Happy Smoothies' weekly newsletter's main goal will be to "educate" consumers. It will do so by providing them with interesting facts, stories, and information related to current issues. Inspirational quotes or questions of the week will incentivize clients to think about and reflect upon certain issues. Additionally, the newsletter would update clients on all the company's novelties. Ideally, the newsletters would also include a country related section which would specifically focus on regional events and issues. This feature would further enhance Happy Smoothies' direct and close relationship with customers.

Works cited

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Hootsuite. "Social Media for the Enterprise - A Business Case." YouTube. YouTube, 01 Feb. 2013. Web. <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SjX3160MEPQ>.

Hydroponicpro. "Social Business Media Revolution 2013." YouTube. YouTube, 01 Mar. 2013. Web. <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WHtI7nSJub0>.

WsiOmegaSolutions. "5 Social Media Marketing Content Ideas for Excellent Customer Engagement." YouTube. YouTube, 06 June 2014. Web. <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cju1p1EMIDQ>.