CBRE, the property management company of the GM Renaissance Center, tasked Franco to develop a promotion to help building tenants garner more business during their slowest time of the year. Franco developed #GMRENCENEATS, a 3-month social media contest challenging tenants and visitors to eat at all of the restaurants in the GMRENCEN. To participate in the social media contest and compete for awards, patrons were asked to take photos of their food at each restaurant they visited and post a photo to or to the GMRENCEN Facebook page, Twitter or Instagram using the #GMRENCENEATS hashtag.
The campaign was much more than a social media push. Franco integrated the social media contest content through multiple communications channels including creating a #GMRENCENEATS blog, posting organic social media content and organizing social media advertising on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. Additionally, Franco built an email list of registered contestants and sent bi-weekly emails with leaderboard updates and encouraging participants to share the social media contest with friends.
In its first year, the contest was a success and has turned into an annual campaign. In the most recent campaign, leaderboard emails earned a 28.8 percent open rate and digital advertising garnered nearly 9,000 clicks, an engagement rate of 8.5 percent, and an overall reach of nearly 284,000 people. The program has earned year-over-year metrics increases across the board including a 69 percent increase in registered participants, 75 percent increase in the use of the #GMRENCENEATS hashtag and a 970 percent increase in #GMRENCENEATS blog traffic.
