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Gearing Up for the Social Media Ride
- 1. K. Clark-Howison, MSU Class Assignment r e v v ing Up “Women Rid ers ” Social Media
- 2. Wharton School of Business, 2007; CurvesAhead.net, 2008 Women Account for 83% of U.S. Consumer Spending and ~25% of U.S. Motorcycle Riders
- 3. HD Year-End Report Women Want To Motorclothes’ Sales the Least Look Nice Have Fun and Too
- 4. HD Strategy: To improve products & experiences , global expansion, demographic outreach & commitment to core customers Women Riders “Club” Facebook Women Motorclothes Pink Label Collection Rider Stories Roadmap to Riding Garage Sales S O C I A L M E D I A HD Web Site
- 5. BUT YOU CAN’T SEE THE WOMEN FOR THE TREES
- 6. “ Hopping Up” Women Riders WOMEN RIDERS
- 7. BLOG Biker Babes; Tips & Trends; Retail Coupon Club; Make a Diff Contest; Calendar Contest SHOP ‘N RIDE GOING FULL THROTTLE On-Line Promotion
- 8. HITTING THE ROAD in 2010 … MAY-JUNE Prepare JULY LAUNCH! SEPT-OCT Calendar NOVEMBER Make a Diff MEASURE, MONITOR & IMPROVE SEO, Social Mention, Google Alerts, Ad Clicks, # Subscribers, etc.
- 9. PREPARING FOR THE RIDE … Budget Allocation
- 10. CRUISING AHEAD … Sales Women Riders Communities Differentiation
Editor's Notes
- Crew Team Formation Instructor Guide Welcome to a short presentation that ‘s all about gearing up for the social media ride. More specifically, this is about why and how we should “rev up” the Women Riders segment of the Harley Davidson customer base. re vving Up “Women Riders” Social Media
- According to the Wharton School of Business, women account for 83% of U.S. Consumer spending. What’s more, they account for nearly 25% of U.S. motorcycle riders. Women riders, in fact, have increased from 9.6% in 2003 to 12.3% in 2008. Bottom line, is that women – and women riders – are a critical demographic that can’t be ignored. What’s more – all age groups are involved in riding motorcycles – from the very young to the older and more mature group – the latter which often has more money – and more time – to ride.
- Women not only want to have fun, but also want to look nice, both on and off the bike. That means a nice-looking bike and stylish yet functional clothes. It’s been a tough economy, but it’s interesting to see – based on 2009 year-end results for HD, that HD Motorcycle sales are down 22.7%. Yet Parts and Accessories are down less – 10.7%. And Motorclothes declined the least – at 10.1% -- signaling that while people might not be able to afford new bikes, they still are buying the namebrand HD clothes.. It’s also interesting to note that industry-wide – which means across the competition -- U.S. retail heavyweight motorcycle sales declined 36.7 percent in 2009 vs 2008 … 12% worse than the HD decline. This lower rate of decline indicates the loyalty of consumers to Harley Davidson vs other brands.
- HD recognized several years ago the need to transform its strategy – to one that is highly focused on engagement and customer loyalty – one that’s all about improving conversations and relationships with its customer base … and personalizing the experience. Well that’s what social media is all about, and HD has implemented numerous tactics to drive results. It has ridden this road much farther than the competition with relationship marketing that makes it more approachable, human, and accessible. One key tactic is its growing focus on women riders. … and on building that very important community. The HD Web site features everything from Women’s Motorclothes and a Pink Label Collection for breast cancer awareness to Women Rider stories (e.g. Why I Ride My Harley, Why I Want To Learn, and How I Learned To Ride). It also has a fledgling Facebook page , Garage Sales events to bring women together at local retail stores, and a really cool Roadmap to Riding to encourage and train women to ride – which hopefully will expand bike sales among this demographic. You could say HD is experiencing a “nice putt” down the road when it comes to using social media for women.
- HD has a great start, but quite frankly, you can hardly see the women for the trees! Like most social media campaigns and websites, HD is suffering somewhat from growing pains, and it’s hard to find where the women are on the current site. Women Rider information is buried and somewhat scattered … and it takes some digging to find it. For that matter, the links to other HD social media vehicles like Facebook and YouTube are also buried – or nonexistent.
- To “hop up” the Women Riders social media engine, we are proposing a Phase I integrated campaign to: expand HD’s reach, build a positive image – including corporate social responsibility, generate excitement and increase loyalty in the growing women rider’s market. We need to kick-start this activity by adding “Women Riders” as a main button on the HD website home page. By the way, we also recommend adding a direct link to Facebook – as this is currently buried too.
- Next, we recommend going full throttle on the Women Riders page, adding the following integrated tactics – all of which are inter-connected. Biker Babes Twitter account – to reach an expanded audience of all ages. Note: 80% of Twitter users are over 25; 80% of activity is on mobile devices. Great way to promote news and events. Women Riders Blog from Karen Davidson, the great-granddaughter of HD – tips and trends. Can also be used to promote events, contests, etc. Also start a blogger outreach campaign. Note: More than 200 million blogs tweet or post content daily; 34% post opinions about products / brands. Shop N Ride club … similar to Victoria’s Secret Pink Nation. Women who join this club get special on-line retail coupons for Motorclothes. Can also promote Shop N Ride deals via Twitter. Annual You Tube contest to “make a difference for women” in the world. Via the existing HD YouTube Women Riders site , women would be asked to submit video ideas for charities to help women succeed. By year-end, 10 winners will get grants for $5,000 each. Can then “follow” how grant is used and brings value. Note: YouTube is 2 nd largest search engine worldwide. 24 hrs of video are uploaded every minute. - Link to an improved Women Riders Facebook page, which – like this website – should also include links to Twitter, Blog, ShopNRide, YouTube. We can launch this page with a fun annual Women Riders Calendar contest in which women submit photos to FB wall. HD would pre-select 50 photos by year end, and put s up on FB for voting for the best 12. Calendar sales are available by November. Proceeds go to funding the following year’s Make a Diff YouTube contest. On-Line promotion of the above activities via on-line news releases (promoting further via Digg, etc.), blogger outreach (including media packets, Technorati), Google Ad Pay-Per-Click campaigns, YouTube ads and Facebook ads.
- Our “hit the road” schedule is as follows: May-June, prepare (design/write) the agreed-upon tactics; obtain approvals. July – launch the tactics, including the contests, and promote on line, and via traditional media outlets as well – also through dealerships/Garage Sales. September/October – deadline for calendar contest winners is end of October, so that calendars can be printed and sold by November for 2011. November – deadline for Make a Difference contest; winners are notified by week one of December … prior to holidays. Throughout the year, measure, monitor and improve upon these social media tactics (including content) by using various tools of social media measurement, such as search engine optimization, Social Mention, Google Alerts and Analytics, number of Adwords / Facebook clicks. Also track # of YouTube subscribers, contest participants, Shop N Ride members.
- Expected budget for this campaign is between $2000,000-$250,000 depending on agreed-upon tactics and contest scope. Includes Make a Difference grants totaling $50,000. % Budget breakout would be as follows: Twitter/Blogs, 20%; Contests, 35%; Web/Facebook – including ShopNRide set-up, 25%; Promotions/Advertising, 20%. This campaign would require dedicated resources at HD, along with agency resources to assist with more in-depth strategic planning, content development, and tactical implementation. We recommend using “interns” to manage the Twitter Biker Babes account. Note: According to Forrester Research, U.S. companies will increase spending on social media advertising alone by 34% / year between 2009 and 2014. That’s just for advertising -- not other activities. As a leader, HD should continue to lead the way as well.
- So what does success look like? Cruising ahead , we can expect to see: More sales More women riders A stronger global community Differentiation for HD