5 Secrets Behind the LEGO Social Media Success
Over the past 6 years, the LEGO Group’s social media and YouTube presence has grown from being nearly non-existent, to a fun and engaging experience present on all relevant social platforms, connecting with millions of consumers and fans every single day.
Here are 5 key things I’ve learned from the journey that we’ve been on as a team and as a company.
1. Deliver an Experience every day, sell a product once month
Connecting with fans on social platforms isn’t about the ‘hard sell’. It’s very important to understand that even though we often refer to them as ‘channels’, they are still platforms for engagement and creation. Any company that fails to understand this, will struggle to leverage the full potential of digital media.
Ensuring you’re aligned with digital consumer behaviour, means focusing on creating a relevant and meaningful experience. The success criteria for us has been to ensure that consumers repeatedly have a positive experience with our brand – and not just to sell products. Any attempt to push a ‘hard sell’ will create brand detractors, and the long-term trade-offs will be far bigger than the short-term gains.
2. Don’t Craft a Message, Build a Stage
In traditional marketing and communication, the focus is on creating and delivering ‘One Message’. In my experience this doesn’t work for social platforms. Most people don’t really care about a branded message unless it is extremely relevant to them. As it is so easy to skip to the next piece of content, whether branded or user generated, or to an engaging and relevant conversation, it is critical to acknowledge that all social platforms must have the experience centred on its users. Long gone are the days where branded websites and portals were the only entry point to the digital sphere and engagement. Nowadays the picture is more diverse and fragmented, and users are increasingly taking over – making themselves the centre-point in their own digital universe.
This means consumer engagement is more about providing a stage or a prop that users, influencers and creators can use to create their own communication, and add positively to their own identity.
3. Focus on doing the Right things, instead of the Usual things
The Marketing and Communication industry was originally built on Radio and TV advertising. It’s still (mostly) structured in a way that separates Creative, Media and Business Strategy. A lot of processes, disciplines and even the way that our marketing vocabulary has been developed is based on legacy perceptions of user behaviour.
Our experience is that it’s always critical to question yourself. You need to ask questions like; ‘are you doing the usual things’, such as following existing ways of working, processes and ways of thinking, just because they have been institutionalised. Or; ‘are you doing the right things’, meaning that you are working in a way that’s aligned with how consumers use digital media and the way that the platform development is going. Naturally, being mindful that it is aligned with company values.
We are all creatures of habit and the moment we get lazy, is the moment when we stop being relevant and up to speed.
4. Embrace Diversity
Becoming successful on digital platforms globally means embracing diversity. No one can understand all the existing cultural nuances, cues, language, history and trends. And it’s not just a matter of gender diversity in teams. If your entire team has the same background, grew up in the same place, graduated from the same business school, then you will still run the risk of being blindsided by the lack of cultural and professional diversity. In the LEGO Group we actively embrace diversity and believe it is one of the keys to our future success.
5. Don’t just invest your money, invest yourself
A final learning is that success on digital platforms doesn’t just come with a financial investment and commitment. You cannot buy authenticity and you cannot buy the ability to create meaningful relationships between brands and consumers. Across the entire LEGO Group, as well as in the social media team, it requires people that are hugely committed to the brand, and lots of team-work to fulfil the expectations from kids, families and fans of the LEGO brand.
To round up, it’s been a journey that has taken a lot of personal commitment and investment from the whole team. Every time we experience success in inspiring more people to bring their imagination to life through LEGO bricks, we know the challenging work is worthwhile.
