I was scrolling through Facebook last week when I came across this post from Lexus. Immediately, I got excited! Granted, I wasn’t excited so much for the content but for the way in which Lexus utilized a customer post for their own genius marketing post. THIS is what good online marketing looks like!

So, first, let’s look at why this post is so good.

1. Lexus is watching its fans to see what they post. Now, granted this is a celebrity post, but it still equates to the same effect. Lexus noticed that Dwayne Johnson (aka The Rock) purchased a Lexus vehicle for his niece and they decided to share it with their Lexus audience.
2. By sharing this with their audience, Lexus is essentially using word-of-mouth marketing from its fans, for their own benefit! This is essentially a celebrity endorsement, without the endorsement deal! Now, that’s word-of-mouth marketing.
3. The Rock originally shared this on his page on Thursday but Lexus held off posting this post until Friday – the day that The Rock’s new movie Fast and Furious 6 was released. Now this is a perfect example of tying into trending media events!
4. Not only did Lexus share the image, but they posted it with a great marketing slogan: “She always had Rock. Now she can roll.” I mean, really? That’s just brilliant!

OK. So now that I’ve explained why this post is so great, how can you emulate it?

1. Showcase People Using Your Product

What if celebrities aren’t using your product or service? That’s ok – make your clients into your celebrities! When your fans tag your company or reference your product in their posts, share them to your page! Let others see what your fans are saying about you and your company! Your fans will appreciate that you shared their posts and I guarantee that will get them talking even more.

2. Use Word-of-Mouth Marketing

Word-of-mouth marketing is the oldest and most effective means of advertising. Who do you trust more, your peers or the brand throwing stats at you? Exactly, your peers, your friends, your co-workers, your family. So use those testimonials from others on your social media pages. You can set up alerts (Google Alerts or Talkwalker Alerts are my favorites) to see when anyone references your brand, your name, your products, or anything else online. Even if these posts are on other sites, you can screen shot or share the content to your social media sites. When other people are talking about all the great things you have to offer, make sure your fans know about it!

3. Use Trending Topics

In this Lexus example, they tied into the release of The Rock’s movie. This may not work for your company but find other trending events that do. Find special holidays, seasons, or celebrations that relate to your business. Use news events (locally or globally) that your audience can relate to. If you offer services related to a new major product launch, time your posts to correlate with those press releases. Find ways to interact your content with information that is trending online.

A note of disclaimer here: Do not hijack trending topics for your benefit and do not use unfortunate circumstances in an exploitative way. What do I mean? I mean, don’t use a hashtag or topic that has absolutely no relevance to your business just to generate SEO or traffic. And don’t use a natural disaster or other catastrophe to push sales of your products.

4. Be Creative

You don’t always have to create the most awe-inspiring titles and captions. But you should mix in a few of them. Don’t just share content or other posts. Add your own description before you share or retweet, etc. Take a few minutes to really think about what you want to say. Find something witty, creative, or even a little controversial to generate emotions in your readers. Make the content resonate with your audience and they will be more likely to engage with the content.

Your posts might not always incorporate all of these methods. But using even just one is a great way to increase the effectiveness of your posts. And while this example is from Facebook, these techniques are valid across all other social media platforms as well.

I hope this information helps spur some excitement for you and your social media strategy. Have you come across other great examples of genius posts? Please share them in the comments below!