Social Media Campaign Review: Federal Bank engages users with Photography contest #MomentofJoy

Federal Bank launched a Social Media campaign named 'Moments of Joy' on their various social networking websites on 25th July 2013. This campaign consisted of a photography contest which asked users to share their moments of joy by sharing pictures through an application. The campaign is scheduled to end on 10 September 2013. Winners will be gratified with prizes worth 1,10,000 /-

Objective:

This is one of the many initiatives taken up by Federal Bank to engage its users and spread awareness about the brand. A lot of banks have embraced Social Media lately and have been running successful Social Media campaigns as well; Federal Bank too has joined the race. They have been in the banking sector for a long time and through this campaign, are trying to increase their visibility within online users.

Execution:

The campaign started with an appealing pre-buzz activity on Federal Bank's Facebook page. They started off with a Facebook status where they asked users to share their moments of joy. A lot of users commented expressing their joyful moments and Federal Bank interacted with them through comments too.

The Facebook page, during the campaign showcased a cover photo which had a tagline, Joy is contagious. This cover has been constant throughout the campaign.

The pre-buzz was later followed by a declaration of a photography contest on 17th August. The contest created a recall value and well connected with the pre-buzz activity. Fans are asked to share a picture through an application called Moments of Joy, that defines their happiest moments in life.

The bank even created and used the hashtag #MomentsOfJoy created during the pre-buzz stage and continued using it with other hash-tags like Photography etc. This helps creating a consistent flow of posts in the mind of the user. The contest was based on a theme and the theme was monsoon.

They Facebook application which has a Like-Gate is used to get user database and register contest entries.

The application pulls in personal details from the Facebook profile of the user. It also features a slideshow of the already sent entries on the Photo Upload page. The slideshow helps the participant to understand the concept of the contest and offers a sneak peek into other contest entries.

The campaign was hyped on the Facebook page through regular updates of various posts. Federal Bank reminded users of the on going contest through theme based pictures and statuses.

Federal bank used Twitter to support the promotion of the campaign. Another contest was created on their Twitter account. Users were supposed to Follow the page, tweet their moments of joy and retweet the ones they loved the most.

The hashtag created for the contest #MomentsOfJoy, also trended on Twitter.

Positives:

Federal Bank has been receiving some great responses on their Facebook page with people responding energetically to this contest, uploading some amazing entries which are also visible to the other participants. Their engagement strategy includes liking their page before participating, which is also helping them increase their user base. The participation form shows you the other entries in the contest which encourages other users to participate as well.

The contest is launched during the monsoon season and the bank is leveraging this by creating topical content and marketing it very well with the contest hashtag. The hashtag is consistent across all social media platforms.

The cover photo is constant throughout the campaign, encouraging users to click on the contest application.

The contest is very simple to participate and the prize money is also very appealing.

Scope of improvement:

Federal Bank could have launched a better contest with an innovating approach. Currently, it does not have the scope to go viral which is the most important part of a social media campaign.

The posts which are showcasing featured entries from the contest simply have the contestants name on the image. Instead, the contestant could have been tagged to increase virality.

The contest is not promoted and has received very less engagement on the posts.

Federal bank campaign completely neglected Twitter. Though it launched a contest to support the one of Facebook, there was a severe lack of consistency in tweeting. The users were unaware of the hashtag or the ongoing campaign. The only proper user interaction on their #MomentsOfJoy was observed on the date of the campaign launch, i,e, 26th July.

Conclusion:

Overall, the campaign did not do justice to building a better brand image or increase massive reach of the brand in anyway. The idea of the photography contest was not very innovative either. Launching mediocre campaigns on Social Media while other brands doing incredible work, does not take a brand anywhere. Innovation and Conversations should be the end result of any campaign. Federal Bank failed to create either.