CorpComms Magazine

Lisa Smart is a massive Bon Jovi fan. In fact, the 37 year old from Gravesend in Kent is so devoted to the American rock legends that she even got their images tattooed onto her body. So when the chance came to win two front row tickets to see Bon Jovi at London's O2 Arena, the optical assistant at Specsavers was determine to pick up the prize.

Smart had to suggest the craziest place where she would like to see the band perform as part of an online competition, and yes, she agreed: Bon Jovi should go to Specsavers.

Bon Jovi took up residency at the O2 Arena in June 2010, partly filling the void left by the death of Michael Jackson, and as part of its efforts to promote the concerts AEG recruited online fan engagement platform Fanshake to generate publicity.

Dana al-Salem, founder of Fanshake, who previously was a co-founder of Yahoo! Europe, launched a competition on O2 Arena's Facebook page inviting suggestions for the craziest place where Bon Jovi could perform. The suggestion that gained the most votes, or 'likes', would win a pair of tickets.

Smart downloaded a transparent GIF image of the band from the Facebook page, and Photoshopped them onto a photograph of Specsavers in Gravesend, which she uploaded onto the site, adding: 'My God, the customers would love it and the staff, especially me, would go crazy! Can you imagine the boys rocking on and singing Work for the working man! They could even model some of our sunspecs while they were there! BON JOVI AT SPECSAVERS! WOOOHOOO!!!!'

Her campaign caught the attention of Specsavers' corporate PR team, who created posters to display in the windows of the opticians' high street stores inviting customers, employees and passers by to vote for Smart. Even the media got in on the act, and perhaps unsurprisingly she won the coveted tickets.

But al-Salem is adamant that Smart's activities were more than just a publicity stunt for the O2 Arena. Fans had to register to enter the competition, and their supporters also had to register to vote for them. Valuable databases are created. Indeed, each competitor for the Bon Jovi tickets generated an average of 800 new leads apiece. 'Our application sits behind the client pages, so content generated by users appears on the client pages as an automated feed,' explains al-Salem. 'This obviously increases the overall activity and reach for the brand. The user submissions also appear on their personal pages, further increasing the reach. Finally, as users are incentivised to share their content submissions, they push and promote this through other social networks, email, YouTube and physical petitions.'

Advocates promote leads

In short, the most ardent advocates of a brand become lead generators in a cost effective and measurable manner. And by encouraging friends to comment and vote on their entries, fans create an interactive stream of content for brands' Facebook pages. Some brands' concerns about ceding control of their social networking sites have proved ill-founded, according to al-Salem. The fans actually act as a self-censoring mechanism. 'We had one competition to win tickets for a Metallica gig, asking where is the craziest place that they could play,' she explains. 'And one guy suggested My wife's ass.' Fanshake contacted him, pointing out that he was unlikely to win any votes. A Metallica fan, he was encouraged to resubmit his entry which ended up in the top ten.

It is clear that unusual competitions are grabbing fans' attentions. When La Roux set off on their Gold Tour, fans were asked, if the electropop duo were a drink, what should they be? The top two submissions with the most votes would win free access passes to the live event. About 80 per cent of the votes opted for Smirnoff Orange, which empowered promoters to approach the drinks giant with the suggestion that, as the fans already associated the drink with the group, it should consider sponsoring the tour. 'It is community voting,' says al-Salem. From the sponsors' point of view, Fanshake is able to provide immediate insight into the audience demographics and demonstrate how aligned they are to those of a brand.

Some brands merely want to extend the reach of their fan base. When Italian club Inter Milan played local rivals AC Milan in one of the football world's most hotly contested derbies last November, having won the previous four, it launched a competition on Fanshake for an official jersey signed by the winner's favourite player. Fans had to guess who former manager Rafael Benitez would choose for the opening line up. Every five days, Inter Milan aggregated more than 84,000 new fans - the most successful Fanshake competition to date. Inter Milan has since run several other competitions to continuously connect with fans, and extend its all important database.

Success at any price

'We consider a successful campaign to be when our client reaches their objective - is it ticket sales, increasing reach or registrations?' says al-Salem. 'They may want to grow the fan base with an objective to sell 5,000 tickets for a specific show, or they may wish to increase engagement from a particular demographic around a new television show. The success measurement is not necessarily an absolute number, but the factor of growth.'

When Starboy Nathan was announced as supporting act to JLS, fans were invited to suggest where the R&B singer might hold his next photo shoot. Starboy Nathan would perform live for 30 minutes at the winner's party. The premise was simple: here was a relatively unknown R&B singer who wanted to develop his own fan base prior to the tour and leverage off the opportunity to support one of Britain's biggest bands. The campaign reached the demographic required - about 83 per cent of 15 to 24 year olds are online spending an average of 53 hours per week in front of a screen. And more than half are on social networking sites, relying on the recommendations of friends before making purchases.

Similarly, the audience was also encouraged to listen to Starboy Nathan's music before submitting entries, further gaining fans ahead of his next album's launch. 'We help brands reach their objectives at a fraction of the cost of direct mailing or online advertising, and retain a qualified fan base they can continue to grow and engage,' says al-Salem.

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