Things 4 Strings: Social Media Case Study

February 19, 2011
Filed under: Blogs - Thought Leadership
By: Marc Galmoud-Aziz

Ruth Brons was a violin teacher, who developed a product to help beginners learn better bow technique and promoted it using social media.

To promote her products and her company Things 4 Strings, she reached out to every string instrument player she could find on facebook and “friended” them. When she got to the 5,000 friend limit, she created Facebook fan pages for her products to add more contacts. She used all her Facebook pages to report about her products, conferences and everything relevant to her field.

She got involved in more than 100 online fora, and - instead of spamming - she commented where appropriate, and mentioned her product only if relevant, but always attaching a link to her website.

She also registered with Google Alerts to keep taps on mentions of her products, and keepign any eye on areas to address negative comments as well as find opportunities for promotion.

Making face-to-face contacts was an important part of Ruth Brons strategy. She attended music conferences, where she was able to demonstrate her products’ benefits, and she used many musical and educational engagements to promote her products.

After laying a firm foundation through her networking, she started to advertise in print journals, music-related websites, and Facebook. And as the networking and advertising did their job, Brons would spend quality time listening to people, and when needed, addressing criticism or sometimes correcting misrepresentations of her products.

Brons’ campaign placed emphasis on the importance of conversation. Brons saw bumps in website visits after engaging in forum discussions or addressing product issues, and she counted conferences as her most important channel of marketing.

The Results?

She saw a 23% plus increase in sales in the first six months of the campaign, and a 29% increase in the following 5-month period.

The above is a summary of a case study from the MarketingSherpa’s Top 5 Facebook Case Studies From 2010.

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