How We Built a Community of 300K Engaged Fans in 3 Months

It's 2020, and the fact that an active social media presence is essential for a brand's online footprint is old news. Today, brands are more worried about how to grow their account with active followers that interact with both the brand and each other - in other words, an actual community.


Lifestyle audio device brand MPOW had already established itself as a leader in the electronics department of Amazon. With the foundation of their popular wireless earbuds, headphones, and gaming headset products – MPOW had decided to create an engaging, interactive platform for their fans.

In Q4 of 2019, MPOW approached us with an ambitious goal of gathering 300,000+ leads in a 3-month period. MPOW expressed their desire to build an engaged community of customers on their website – featuring a blog and forum where people can discuss products and trends, receive unique discounts, and participate in giveaways.

 

The Challenge

We started the project from scratch, meaning that we had 90 days to go from zero to 300,000 leads. With no existing MPOW platform, we had plenty to test and optimize within a short period.  

We decided to take a multi-faceted approach by establishing multiple channels for lead generation and interest testing. In this way, we were able to test a variety of methods to gauge customer retention and engagement.

We needed to deliver content that would sustain customer interest gained through lead generation until MPOW was ready to take the community forum live. To do so, we planned to create MPOW blog content to be circulated via Facebook Messenger push notifications and e-mail campaigns.  

 

What We Did

  • Community-Driven Marketing
  • Lead Generation
  • Blog Copywriting
  • Email & Facebook Messenger Marketing
  • Community Management

The Results

Through the implementation of best practices and rigorous testing, we drove the initial cost per lead down to just $0.25 - far lower than industry benchmarks. During the lead generation phase, we targeted different audience segments based on their interests and nurtured them with relevant content over the course of several weeks. By the time the community launched, there were already a significant number of users that had registered accounts to comment on the blog posts we'd previously sent.

Now, the community is active with daily posts, activities and discussions, and has been an important vehicle for MPOW to activate both new and existing fans.

 

Our Recipe for Success

Step 1 – Ad Testing

In the initial phases, we approached lead generation from multiple angles with Facebook Messenger, Facebook lead ads, and landing page signups.  

Leads can be generated using Facebook Messenger by having customers interact with custom question and answer flows. On Facebook Ads Manager, we set up a Lead generation campaign which creates ads that enable interested customers to conveniently interact with the brand via Messenger.

Facebook Lead Ads are a commonly used lead generation tool useful to many types and sizes of businesses. Implementing lead ads enabled us to discover customers with likes and interests related to our brand.

Facebook ad campaigns can also be set up to drive customers to your brand’s landing page. In MPOW’s case, we found this method had the highest cost per lead.

A sample of our ad creative for this campaign.

From our initial tests, we determined that we would prioritize both Facebook Messenger and Facebook lead ads, as they had a lower cost per lead than landing page signups.

Step 2 – Lead Generation

Audience Segmentation - After setting our goal of achieving at least 300,000 leads within three months, we began to target ads based on MPOW’s product offerings. We established three target audiences – Gaming, Fitness, and Lifestyle. This would later also help tailor content for each audience segment during the lead nurturing phase.

Through the power of segmentation, we were able to send leads through custom flows in order to gauge user interest and collect information about MPOW customer preferences. This helped us determine the types of content that would be relevant for each audience.

 

Adaptations - During the Lead generation phase, our data showed that a many people were interested in gaming topics and MPOW’s gaming headsets. Our Gaming audience ads resulted in a higher open rate and lower cost per lead, while the Fitness audience ads had a higher cost per lead. We swiftly adapted to this find and shifted the budget in favor of the Gaming audience.

Over time we noticed that MPOW’s Facebook lead ads became lower cost than Facebook Messenger ads. To combat the rising cost per lead on Facebook Messenger, we implemented a referral system using ManyChat, which resulted in over 10,000 leads at no additional cost. In addition to the cost per lead increasing for Messenger leads over time, Facebook had announced new policy changes for 2020. Due to the lower cost per lead and the coming Facebook Messenger policy changes in December 2019, we pivoted to prioritizing Facebook leads ads.

 

Creative Content - Based on information gained through user interaction with our custom flows, we were able to confidently focus our content in a more refined direction. We produced blog content based on the interests of MPOW fans and continually monitored community engagement via blog comments and Facebook Messenger responses.

With knowledge of the diverse interests of MPOW fans, we determined a variety of topics to cover which would continually enhance MPOW’s brand during the Lead Nurturing phase. We decided to tailor personalized content to each of our three audiences while maintaining high engagement with all MPOW customers.

{img: https://www.xmpow.com/blogs/news}

 

Step 3 – Lead Nurturing

In order to maintain interest in the brand, we created content which would appeal to each of our 3 diverse audiences. Fitness lovers were especially enthralled by content featuring MPOW’s Flame series earphones, while fashion aficionados were found fond of TWS lifestyle earbuds. All audiences took a particular liking to the “personality type” articles featuring the vibrantly colored MPOW H10 series headphones.

As 2019 came toward a close, we began tailoring content more specifically for our young American MPOW audience – featuring active lifestyle audio and holiday giveaway articles. At this juncture, MPOW fans were encouraged to join the newly established Facebook group and MPOW web community.

Once the MPOW Community launched in mid-December, we began driving users to the MPOW website, where we continued to nurture MPOW fans through holiday campaigns and discussions.

{img: https://community.xmpow.com/page/Home}

 

Key Takeaways

  • Seek out and test multiple channels for generating leads. During our testing period, we determined that Facebook Messenger ads had the best results. The optimal lead generation channels shifted over time and we had to adapt accordingly.
  • Test for interest with a variety of products and topics. Through our initial ad tests and asking MPOW customers about their interests, we were able to segment fans into three audiences – Lifestyle, Sports, and Gaming. We positioned our ads accordingly, to appeal to each audience with lifestyle earbuds, athletic devices, and gaming headphones.
  • Produce content that fits both the brand and customer interests. By determining the types of content MPOW customers are interested in, we were able to design content that would appeal to each audience while also staying true to MPOW’s brand.