By Hayley Gregory
HORMEL® Chili launched a campaign called Chili Nation last November, to harness the power and passion of chili-loving consumers everywhere. A key part of the campaign was to encourage chili lovers to shamelessly declare and share their passion for chili in its delicious and messy splendor. To bring this to life on social, we here at Zócalo Group created a dynamic and interactive experience to energize and mobilize chili lovers to move from dabblers to advocates by fueling and crowdsourcing new ways to enjoy their Hormel Chili often and with pride.
Fans Share Their Passion for Chili
To do this, we launched a Facebook activation called 50 States of Chili to reach chili lovers across the nation with new and delicious ways to enjoy the product. In our first phase of the activation, we used Facebook’s geo-targeting and paid capabilities to reach fans within each state with customized messaging tailored to their palettes. During this phase we asked fans to share a state dish they would pair with Hormel Chili. To increase participation in the curation process, we incentivized responses with a Hormel Chili t-shirt giveaway – sparking further excitement around the Chili Nation movement. Once the paid geo-target amplification was live, responses flooded in, sparking debates as well as fans’ passion for their state and regional ways to enjoy chili. We listened and absorbed insights from these communities sharing their favorite chili recipes, chili moments with family and friends and ultimately their passion for Hormel Chili.
Bringing Chili Nation to Life
After deep social listening and engagement with fans in all 50 states, we moved into phase two of the program to bring our fans’ passion to life with beautiful, custom content featuring Hormel Chili in the shape of all 50 states. Alongside these images, we also included a local topping or food reference gleaned from fans that nodded to how they enjoy chili in their neck of the woods. As every post went live, fans immediately responded, thrilled to see their initial feedback and regionalism come to life on Facebook.
Uniting Chili Nation
Both phases of 50 states of Chili generated awareness, positive interactions and sparked conversation around chili usage and Chili Nation. Fans proactively came to the Facebook page to engage in content beyond 50 States of Chili, sharing their love for the product and how they serve chili in their homes. We provided chili lovers with new and innovative ways to enjoy Hormel Chili while gaining insight into how our target is consuming chili, which is continuing to inform the Hormel Chili monthly editorial content and social efforts. The social campaign reached more than 800,000 people, garnered 25,000+ interactions through likes, comments & shares, and reached almost 2 million impressions.
As the local conversations developed, we also created a Facebook gallery for fans across the nation to view the custom content and glean ideas from other state specific preferences. This customized effort allowed us to reach chili lovers with personal content that built on their love of home AND their love of chili to unite as one nation. A true Chili Nation.
– Hayley Gregory is an Account Coordinator at Zócalo Group.
The post 50 States of Chili: Bringing Chili Nation to Life on Social appeared first on Zócalo Group.
