Growing ThriftBook’s Social Community and Deepening Brand Love
Prioritizing customer evangelism to drive brand loyalty
With a sizeable but unengaged audience, ThriftBooks tasked HOW with growing their overall social community, expanding share-of-voice, and driving meaningful engagement to ultimately increase customer retention and conversions.
To meet the goals and go beyond, HOW launched a strategy centered around growing “Brand Love” aimed at prioritizing social engagement, recognizing and empowering customers, and building digital brand advocates.
HOW implemented a variety of tactics and strategies to reach these goals including:
•Revamped look & feel of social feeds, with a higher posting cadence, original content, and prioritization of UGC and video content
•Introduced content around trending memes/stories in media to capitalize on engaging moments on social
•Launched engagement-driving campaigns including unique brand partnerships and giveaways:
•Initiated proactive community management program to drive UGC and brand love
•Launched TikTok page and corresponding community management campaign
•Created Facebook Group for top fans to converge and discuss a shared love of the brand
•Established a brand ambassador program to reward superfans and increase reach and content
•Managed “surprise and delight” outreach to key fans and influencers to increase loyalty
•Supported key segments such as collectors, educators, and homeschoolers with targeted campaigns
The online book marketplace is incredibly crowded, with large and long-established companies such as Barnes and Noble and Amazon spending millions to retain customers. Our strategy allowed us to intersect and gain share-of-voice through our use of content rather than dollars. We have developed a digital ecosystem with our fans, rather than our brand, at the center.
To meet the goals and go beyond, HOW launched a strategy centered around growing “Brand Love” aimed at prioritizing social engagement, recognizing, and empowering customers, and building digital brand advocates.
Target audiences are book enthusiasts (primarily in the US) who have an interest in purchasing used books because of the value or sustainability of second-hand books.
RESULTS (over an 18-month period):
Scaling authentic audience growth without utilizing any paid media ads was a challenge but we were able to overcome it with highly successful content campaigns that intersected with the right audience at the right time. We know the power of customer evangelism and hold this as the main goal of all our digital activities.
•Increased overall social community by 22%
•Reached 100k follower milestone on Instagram (platform growth of 47%)
•Increased average engagements by 25%
Our success metrics include the number of UGC images and videos submitted and growth in positive sentiment per month rather than just impressions as we understand that this is how we will continue to break through. Our success in using this approach to driving social engagement, community growth, and ultimately sales, is unique in the industry and a departure from today’s reliance on paid spend as a sole way to grow.
