If you haven’t heard about the viral campaign, Kony 2012, you MUST be living under a rock or not use the Internet, watch TV, read the papers or listen to the radio..
Kony 2012 is a campaign started last year by “Invisible Children” an organization that tries to help African children caught up in wars in their continent.. They created a video in the hope that if they could make just one of the ‘bad guys’, in this case Joseph Kony, famous around the world for being a human rights criminal the politicians would have to do some thing about him AND start a world wide movement against any of these kind of atrocities!
If you haven’t seen the movie you can view it here: Kony 2012
The campaign has been an overwhelming success in so far as it has gone viral – just do a search online and you will see.. One of the clever things the guys have done, apart from creating a very good viral movie is to make it super easy for people to share.. You can share with your Facebook friends and your Twitter friends, you are encouraged to do so in the movie. They have also made it easy for you to share it with 20 celebrity types (culture makers) and 12 politicians (American policy makers), by twitter. You can also buy a kit with posters and wrist bands to help spread the message (they are currently sold out!). On the night of the 20th April people are asked to plaster their towns and cities with the posters – they hope to have enlisted enough people to the cause that we will ALL notice the posters on the morning of 21st & if the ‘sold out’ signs are anything to go by they may just achieve this 🙂
What can we learn as marketers from the Kony 2012 campaign?
- Engage with your audience
- Give your customers a reason to share your stuff
- Make it easy for your audience to share your message
- Build a tribe in your niche
- Empower your clients/customers to be a part of the solution
There are literally millions of people hanging out in social media spaces – your business should be engaging with them… But you need to be smart about it, you need to build a tribe and become a market leader.. If you approach social media in this way – contributing to the community – your business will not look back and you will love engaging with your audience/customers because they will feel looked after and you will feel appreciated!
Go make your own movement around things that are important to you and your customers/clients!