Luxury brands wanting to acquire new customers should make friend-get-a-friend promotions a priority.

Social media might be a luxury brand's best friend, especially when it comes to attracting new customers.  According to a new study from Unity Marketing, Affluent Consumers and How They Use the Internet, Social Media, and Mobile Devices, the number one reason affluents connect with brands is because they have learned something interesting about the brand or company through one of their social media friends.  

How two brands tapped social media to grow their followers virally

Using social media for friend-get-a-friend promotions has important implications for luxury marketers needing to grow their customer base in a competitive economy. 

Consider Audi.  The company used it Super Bowl advertising spot on this year to generate social media buzz through a contest.  Social media activists were asked to mobilize their community of followers in order to win $25,000 for the charity of their choice.  They were asked to use the Twitter hashtag tool #progressis to tweet a 140-character definition of 'progress.'  The result:  Audi's contest mobilized hundreds of thousands of social media mentions of Audi through Twitter, Facebook posts and YouTube mentions.  This marks one of the groundbreaking uses by a luxury brand of traditional advertising to drive social media activity. 

Or consider Canadian Club Whiskey.  This brand sponsored Canadian Club's Hide a Case contest, in which friends were encouraged to invite five of their friends to the brand's Facebook page.  For every five friends a user converted, they got a free Canadian Club t-shirt.  For the price of some t-shirts, Canadian Club nearly doubled its Facebook fan population from 16,000 to 30,000, and there is reason to believe these new fans are poised to become Canadian Club customers.

Friend-get-a-friend promotions have added dimension and reach through social media

"Friend-get-a-friend promotions have long been recognized as an effective and inexpensive way to attract new customers most likely to be interested in a brand," explains Pam Danziger, president of Unity Marketing and author of the new book, Putting the Luxe Back in Luxury.   "Logically, those most likely to enjoy a brand are the friends of those who are already brand loyalists, as friends tend to have certain demographic and lifestyle similarities.  Birds of a feather flock together to the same brands."

Social media takes this marketing truism to another level.  Through social media, users are already actively engaged in observing a real-time stream of their friends' likes and dislikes, viewing videos, following links, reading status updates, and "liking" content they find appealing.  If a friend indicates brand loyalty by liking a brand page or participating in a contest or promotion, it stands to reason that this user's friend will notice and give that brand their attention too.  After all, people are more prone to be influenced by their friends than by advertising and commercial communications.

"The new research study of how affluents are using the internet in their luxury lifestyle shows that social media is about forming connections and relationships, and this is true for brands as well as individuals," says Danziger.  "On a social media platform, the brand that gains one fan stands to be recognized by that fan's entire social circle.  However, setting the right tone in these friend-finding endeavors takes a different approach than that used in traditional marketing campaigns.  Setting this tone begins by understanding who is online, how they behave, and how they use social media; our new report points the way."

New trend report shows you how affluents use the internet, social media and mobile devices in their luxury lifestyles:

http://bit.ly/eidSQ4