Knowing there would be tremendous buzz and social engagement around the re-release of Taylor Swift's album, Red, (and that our owned-content related to Ms. Swift outperforms other GoFundMe content by at least 10x), the GoFundMe social team constructed a full-day “takeover” in which the @gofundme Twitter handle would transform into a diehard "Swiftie" (aka her dedicated fanbase) for the entire day—tweeting out memes, topical content, relevant lyrics, and sharing historic interactions Taylor Swift has had with the GoFundMe platform.
Our main goals were: to build trust with consumers by showing Taylor as a long-time supporter of GoFundMes, and to build community within & engage with Swift's core demographic (18-34).
...And the campaign performed beyond our wildest dreams.
The GoFundMe social team relied on our own Taylor Swift knowledge, as well as trending REDTV content, to create unique media that was relevant to GoFundMe’s own brand and voice. We used humor, native language, and community interaction to bolster organic engagement and virality on the day of launch. All of this was done 100% organically, with no paid targeting or boosting.
In preparation for the “takeover,” the social team planned to change our Name (to GoFundMe Taylor’s Version), our bio (to “Giving back never goes out of style”), and our logo (to match the iconic Red associated with Swift’s new album)—all things we knew “Swifties” would notice and appreciate.
We also planned to execute the day before the album’s release in order to maximize our reach and share of voice, while also beating other brands that would jump in on social conversation. This strategy proved to be critical in our success as we were one of only a few brands receiving millions of impressions prior to the REDTV launch day.
In a period of 48 hours, GoFundMe's Twitter account received:
- 990% organic increase in daily impressions
- 3,687% organic increase in daily engagements
- 234% organic increase in daily profiles visit
- 156% organic increase in mentions
Our first tweet of the day, which simply announced "This is now a Taylor Swift Stan account" received tremendous support, ignited social conversation, and brought tens of thousands of Swift fans along on our takeover.
One single tweet that touched on Swift’s song bridges being “the strongest part of this nation’s infrastructure” received over 1M impressions on Twitter alone (10.5K retweets, 36K likes). This specific tweet was also reshared heavily across Instagram, with one reshare receiving over 200,000 likes on an account with +3M followers.
Over the course of this takeover, we were able to reach millions of people not typically in the GoFundMe ecosystem, while also reaching all the goals we set out to achieve.
