birddog

Birddog was appointed to build a dynamic, engaging, creative awareness campaign to protect RingGo’s position as the premier supplier of car-parking support services whilst influencing industry decison makers and regulators alike. Following significant revisions to major contract allocations immediate action was required, to minimise misleading third-party information surrounding the changes to parking payment service provisions in the South-West of England.

The Strategy:

Within 24 hours, Birddog created and launched ‘The Yellow Lines’, a blog-based user community sponsored by RingGo, but managed and run independently. The urgency of the campaign required a hard-hitting launch, utilising the speed of both email marketing and Twitter to support its messages. Central blog articles became the focus for user comment, concerns and discussion.

The strategy was to focus users of the RingGo brand into a single online community where customer opinion could be shared, thereby influencing business decision makers. Core content would direct the conversation, but the social and transparent functionality (comments/feedback) allowed contributors freedom to both redirect the conversation and, more importantly, provide the right of reply. Community response, positive or negative to the RingGo brand, was permitted.

With only 2 weeks before planned service changes, any attempt to overturn decisions that had already been made was unrealistic. It was therefore essential that the strategy offered long term value beyond the initial launch period. Value would be achieved from the strategy by creating a community of active, passionate (and independent) RingGo users who would not s imply complain about changes to car parking support services, but advocate RingGo’s mobile parking solution generally.

Establishing the best social channels was imperative to the success of the campaign. With extremely tight time and budget constraints it was essential to develop a campaign that could resonate and engage with the community on various levels.

The social aspect of the campaign allowed users to engage with the blog content and share posts and comments through other associated channels (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn). This helped content reach new audiences quickly, widening campaign reach and overall engagement. Working alongside the blog and Twitter, email marketing was used to activate the initial core audience and throughout the campaign as a call-to-action channel.

The Results:

Within 14 days ‘The Yellow Lines’ had received over 22,000 unique visits, over 800 comments, and had achieved a positive sentiment value of 99.8%. Birddog had created a community based marketing asset that continued to grow, clearly distinguishing and highlighting RingGo’s unique product offering and competitive advantage.

Community building/ Raising awareness

• Over 22,000 unique visits and over 800 comments
• Over 800 comments in the critical first two weeks
• 99.8% positive sentiment
• Local Media Newspaper Coverage
• BBC Radio Coverage

Long-Term

• Independent searchable customer reference site
• Ongoing/ growing digital asset
• Proven competitive advantage on key elements of operations: trust, innovation, service support and security

What did Birddog do?

• Social Media Consultancy
• WordPress Blogging Platform Design & Creation
• Twitter Profile Design & Creation
• Content Strategy & Planning
• Blogging & Content Creation
• Cross-Platform Community Engagement and Management
• Analytics Measurement & Reporting
• Digital Asset Transfer (end of project)