3 Ways CPG Brands Drive Sales With Social Media
Consumer packaged goods (CPG) marketing is the promotion of common products, such as packaged foods, cleaning supplies, beverages, medications, clothing, or toiletries. Once a shopper finds products they like, such as a type of face cream or frozen dinner, they often become a household staple.
Because these products are so universal, social media is an impactful way to reach everyday consumers who are constantly tuned into their feeds. Below, we’ll look at a few tips to optimize your CPG brand’s social media presence and drive more sales.
1. Creating a highly-shoppable profile
Fifty-seven percent of Americans purchased a product via social commerce. Globally, the numbers climb to 67%. These are slight upticks from previous years, representing a slow but steady rise.
Your brand’s social media platform can serve as a shopping gateway, but it’s important to streamline the buyer journey. (Think about the last time you abandoned an online purchase due to extra steps or undisclosed costs.) With an easy-to-shop social media profile, you eliminate common barriers and encourage more purchases.
Brands like Vacation (which markets itself as the world’s best-selling sunscreen) excel at shoppable content, with straightforward navigation from post to purchase.
Anthropologie is another great example — users can view posts, reels, stories, and videos and buy without ever leaving the social platform. Anthropologie’s visual storytelling, user-generated content, and consistent branding also make for fun, fresh marketing!
Using Instagram and TikTok shopping is often the most impactful tactic during a product launch. An online shop is a direct-to-consumer approach that capitalizes on an audience that’s already interested. As you fine-tune your social media campaigns, you’ll also learn more about your customers’ purchasing preferences.
For example, some customers prefer to buy directly on the social media platform, while others prefer Amazon, the brand’s website, or even in-store purchases. The most engaging content meets customers where they are, so check out the comments, ask for feedback, and monitor conversions to understand your customers’ behavior.
How to make your social media accounts easy to shop
The best way to structure your shoppable social media accounts depends on your target audience. If your customers prefer shopping via your website, you might add links and tags to your company bio, photos, videos, and reels.
You can also leverage user-generated content (UGC) for social proof of your product’s value. For example, you might create a video montage of a bachelor, parent, and teacher all using disinfecting wipes in various environments to inspire customers to buy.
Pro tip: If your customers prefer purchasing off the platform, make product reviews on your website front and center!
There are over 200 million businesses on Instagram, with many using Instagram Shop to generate revenue from the 44% of Instagram users who shop each week.
In addition to adding links to your bio and tagging photos, here are a few tips for setting up a shop:
Link profiles: You’ll need to link your Facebook business page and Instagram business account. You can then link these to an existing platform, such as Shopify. (Linked profiles also make it easier to cross-promote anything from product lines to promo codes.)
Set up Commerce Manager: If you don’t have an ecommerce page, use Facebook Business Manager to set up Commerce Manager, then add Instagram as a preferred sales channel.
Create a product catalog: Add products and product details (e.g., descriptions, photos, etc.) to your catalog.
Submit for approval: Once Instagram approves your profile, you’re ready to activate your store.
TikTok
There are more than 500,000 merchants on TikTok. Compared to other platforms, users are 1.7 times more likely to discover products on TikTok. There’s even a popular hashtag, #TikTokMadeMeBuyIt, with billions of views.
To open a shop, access the TikTok Seller Center from your brand account and fill in your business details, such as pickup address, contact numbers, and EIN. Once you’ve agreed to the terms and conditions, you’re ready to go!
2. Building a library of user-generated content
User-generated content (UGC) is a digital marketing strategy where customers authentically showcase your brand. UGC is generally more trustworthy than paid endorsements and generates higher customer engagement rates.
Plus, UGC is more meaningful because your customers are already genuinely enthusiastic about your brand. Their content provides social evidence of product quality, which is immeasurably valuable to prospective customers.
Plant-based frozen meal provider MingsBings collaborated with various content creators to show how everyday people use the brand’s products. MingsBings reps chose people from all walks of life, including those with special diets, busy schedules, and picky eating habits.
This CPG influencer marketing strategy resulted in strong engagement levels, with many followers commenting that they couldn’t wait to try the meals out for themselves.
And when Thelma’s Treats (a Des Moines-based ice cream sandwich brand) wanted to expand into locations without in-store partnerships, they launched a slew of UGC in target markets to build demand and carve out a space on store shelves.
The brand also posted UGC in locations with in-store partnerships so users could point to Thelma’s Treats in the freezer section of nearby grocery stores — an absolute must for crowded supermarkets! Both of these tactics helped the brand create a sense of community and expand its regional footprint.
How to leverage UGC
The best way to leverage UGC depends on your customers and products. Below, we’ll look at some best practices to authentically incorporate UGC into your social media channels.
Encourage users to talk about your brand
To encourage UGC creation, you can create a special hashtag, set up a contest, or start genuine conversations with customers. For example, if you sell hand soap, you might ask customers to take artful photos of their unique soap dispensers, link content with a common hashtag, and give a case of the product to your favorite.
Whether you start a spirited debate or tap into trending topics, the goal is to foster relationships with your most loyal customers!
Get permission to repurpose the content
People are free to post about brands and products, but companies are not free to repurpose that content for their own gain.
To avoid potential conflict, you can send each user a short message on social media to thank them for their post and expressly ask for permission to reuse the content. Or you can create limited-time campaign partnerships with users or influencers who allow you to reuse their posts.
Here are a few tips to repurpose UGC:
Reformat: Turn videos into blogs, create photo montages for social marketing campaigns, or even run a series of engaging case studies.
Testimonial campaigns: String your positive reviews together for an overload of product proof.
Target specific markets: If you have a versatile product, you can separate UGC based on target demographics. For example, if a lot of millennial moms grab your brand’s sparkling water after a yoga class, you can use this as inspiration for your next campaign.
As you measure the results of your campaign, consider KPIs like click-through rates, conversion rates, impressions, video plays, follows, and shares. UGC should ideally trigger real engagement, as opposed to errant likes or passing views.
3. Partnering with FOMO-inspiring influencers
Influencer partnerships are mainstays in social media because they’re still an effective way to generate brand awareness.
Unlike UGC, influencer partnerships are paid endorsements rather than free shout-outs from pure brand loyalists. (This doesn’t mean your influencers can’t be genuine fans of your product, only that there’s more emphasis on compensation.)
Influencers are a great option for growing brands, but you need to choose the right type. The best CPG marketing campaigns highlight everyday consumer behavior, which usually means working with a micro-, nano-, or local influencer.
While a celebrity or mega influencer might introduce universal brand awareness, the conversion rates for these collaborations are typically lower than smaller influencers’.
How to launch successful influencer campaigns
The best influencer campaigns start with a solid plan:
Determine what type of influence you need
CPG brands tend to benefit most from smaller influencers who show how they use the product to solve a problem or streamline their routine. Before you narrow down your selection, ask if you want to drive engagement with niche or local audiences.
If you’re a national brand targeting remote tech workers, you might partner with one or two tech micro-influencers on LinkedIn. If you’re a regional brand selling artisanal goat cheese, you might choose local foodie influencers.
Local influencers are often the most cost-effective option for CPG brands. With the same budget, you can hire a small army of local influencers instead of one micro-influencer. This way, you can showcase an array of product uses to different audiences instead of putting all your eggs in one basket.
Plus, local influencers build their presence by having their finger on the pulse of their followers. They know how to genuinely relate to neighbors in ways that even the best brand marketers can’t.
Establish authentic partnerships
Establishing partnerships starts with influencer search, outreach, and negotiations. If you take a DIY approach, you’ll have to research ideal matches, set up communication channels, and build organic rapport with each partner.
DIY can lead to strong and reliable partnerships. However, most marketers simply don’t have the resources for this time-consuming tactic. Instead, you can use search tools that automate the pairing process with available influencers, so you can focus more on contract details and campaign creation.
Or you can hire a full-service influencer marketing agency for a bespoke experience from beginning to end. Full-service agencies charge appropriately for their services, but they can be a good option for fledgling brands that are struggling with content ideas and campaign launches.
See how brands like Thelma’s Treats have leveraged partnerships to drive engagement in local communities!
CPG companies and local influencer marketing go hand-in-hand, particularly if you’re prioritizing authenticity while scaling up. The more you tap into the pain points of a regional audience — whether it’s cost or convenience — the easier it is to convince customers of your value.
To learn more about local influencer marketing, listen to Nola Morris, the CMO of Thelma’s Treats, on the Local Marketing School podcast. She shares how she leverages 20+ years of experience to reach customers and generate sales.