Hopefully by now you’ve come across the famous blogging platform Tumblr- popular among teens and young adults alike. Memes, reaction GIFS and humour-based text posts are just some of the content you would expect to find on the site. What you wouldn’t expect to come across however are posts by well-known brands, especially restaurant chains.
Enter Denny’s, who are not only present on the platform but have reached ‘Tumblr famous’ status thanks to their legion of followers. Given Tumblr’s user demographics, one might scratch their head in confusion wondering what a brand like Denny’s could possibly be doing on a site like Tumblr.
Tumblr user sprawlerr found out the hard way when he posed this very question and received a witty comeback from Denny’s themselves:
Enter Denny’s, who are not only present on the platform but have reached ‘Tumblr famous’ status thanks to their legion of followers. Given Tumblr’s user demographics, one might scratch their head in confusion wondering what a brand like Denny’s could possibly be doing on a site like Tumblr.
Tumblr user sprawlerr found out the hard way when he posed this very question and received a witty comeback from Denny’s themselves:
A reply which garnered over 170k notes and prompted him to eventually delete his account (presumably due to playful user taunts- yes this a common occurrence on the site)
If you think Denny’s reply was a bit on the unprofessional side, then you would be absolutely correct. However, believe it or not- witty posts and comebacks are a prominent part of Tumblr’s culture. Denny’s know this and act accordingly, bringing us to the first reason they are doing social right.
1.They know their target audience and market accordingly
Denny’s have jumped aboard Tumblr’s culture of sarcasm, playful banter and general silliness in order to fit right in. Best of all, everything from their theme to the content they create markets their brand whilst remaining highly engaging and entertaining.
Since blatant advertising would not sit well with Tumblr users, Denny’s (not so subtle) marketing is done via the ever popular GIFS, images and text post format. In fact, their posts are reblogged thousands of times within minutes of being posted, vouching for how popular their content is on the site.
After all, who could resist the urge to reblog some of these gems?
Well, they certainly appeal to the tumblr demographic!
Despite advertising on the site, Denny’s are careful to avoid constantly bombarding their followers with one-way messages. On the contrary, they take the time to not only reply to questions but follow back and reblog content from users. Actions like these go a long way in making customers feel valued while make them realise there indeed is a face behind the name-which brings us to our next point.
2. They hired the right person for the role
At the peak of its popularity, Denny’s Tumblr was being managed by then 23 year old Amber Gordon (via a creative agency) Not only did Amber fit perfectly into the age group Tumblr caters to, she had the necessary sense of humour and content creation skills to make the job truly her own. It was clear that Amber loved what she did based on the quality and the level of creativity in her posts, proving that passion is integral to effective social media management.
Delegating management to the wrong person could end up hurting your brand in the long run as followers are quick to sense disengagement and do not respond to boring, predictable content. We’ve all come across Facebook pages that resort to posting those unrelated ‘inspirational quotes’, tired humour memes that have been around for ages or even worse, automate their Facebook page so their Tweets are automatically reposted on Twitter. Please don’t be that page, tweets belong on Twitter, no one wants to see them rehashed on their news feeds.
If you get the right person to run the right marketing channels, you’re half way there!
3. They cross promote and repurpose content
What do you do when you’re famous on Tumblr and the content you post goes viral within hours? You cross-promote your other platforms of course! And that’s exactly what Denny’s do on Tumblr.
Their tumblr page prominently features links to their website as well as their other social media channels.
From time to time, they post screenshots of their Tweets (many of which have gone viral) promotions on Facebook, as well as links to their Youtube channel. Expecting the same quality of entertainment, their tumblr fans are quick to follow them on other channels and Denny’s certainly don’t disappoint. One of their most famous Tweets, which spoke to the controversy surrounding cultural appropriation at the famous Coachella festival, garnered over 10k retweets.
The key to cross promotion however is finding the right balance. Different content works well on different social media channels, however if you can find a way to repurpose existing content, especially visual content, you can boost their reach through cross promotion.
So take a leaf out of Denny’s book, thoroughly research your audience, use each social media channel as intended, ensure the right people are running your accounts and if your audience love your content, feed them more great content from your other channels!
Publisher: Scriptable Solutions
Source: Teal Digital
