Any multinational brand invests millions every year to develop, sustain its image, and ensure that all operating-in markets are following & implementing the brand updates. Aiming to appear rock solid and unified to achieve global impact in a local flavor.
So Why brands have different names on social media instead of keeping it unified as it should be?
Adding the country/region to the brand name on social media was the solution to help consumers find the brand’s local page/account, such as “CocaCola UK, CocaCola Brazil, Samsung UK, Samsung Egypt, Vodafone Italy, Vodafone UK, etc…
What are brands losing?
- The brand identity: the different names (i.e., country or region)
- The brand equity: popularity across markets isn’t at its best
Facebook’s global page strategy helps brands effectively.
Facebook, unlike any other social network, invented the global page feature, where brands can merge all their markets under one global page with a unified name, while the content is in the local flavor.
Many brands have already moved to the Facebook Global Page Strategy. It unites and combines all fans in one place, yet each country has a separate sub-page where the local team can manage to talk to the local fans with relevant content and tone. This gives the brand more authority and power globally.
This topic is specifically for those who already work on Facebook’s global page strategy. For those who still don’t, please read it, then convince your team that it’s about time to do so.
Brands with Facebook global page strategy usually either:
1- Share global initiatives or global projects to their full fan base through global posts
This strategy improves overall reach and feeds the content “Virality” aspect, making it easier for the asset to fly across borders. It also combines all engagement under one post, which will always remain a statement of quality and success of the asset.
2- Send out the content to local teams to post and promote per market with relevant targeting and tailored messaging
This strategy increases the potential reach and engagement on the content per market. It does gate each post to its own country yet allows more room for local conversations between the brand and consumers, which could be tailored based on each market’s business objectives.
3- Kick-off the content activation campaign with a global post for a specific period of time, then passing it on to each market to localize
This strategy is the most ideal as it hits both objectives: Massive global reach and local engagement. Yet, it’s very tricky actually to achieve those objectives effectively.
The easiest and most commonly used technique by markets after receiving the content is “translating” it to the local language then posting it again. Well, yes, it’s locally understood now, but not necessarily relevant yet!
A more complex and effective technique would be introducing the local language content and local insights as well. You basically study the content asset, think, or research until you find a local link. This link could be historical, serious, or even sarcastic. You are just trying to grab attention and to increase the share-ability potential. Don’t worry. Your main asset will remain as serious as it originally is.
Example (1): “DC Shoes” Pipe Dream
“DC Shoes” did a project recently titled “Pipe Dream” where they made the Red Bull Athlete “Robbie Madison” dream come true by surfing the beach in Tahiti over his Dirt Bike! Yes, they did.
Red Bull Egypt wanted to capitalize on the fact that Robbie Madison is a Red Bull athlete and that Red Bull globally is proud. However, they figured that the “proud” tone of voice and the sense of achievement should solely go to “DC Shoes” who did the project. So, they decided to take a more “Sarcastic” tone of voice using a local insight: Food delivery in Egypt is as important as the national anthem.
So they posted a picture of the athlete on his dirt bike in the middle of the sea with a caption: “Does this mean the beginning of beach delivery?” and included a link to the original story and clip.
The reach and engagement organically in 24 hours was massive, so they decided to spend a couple of hundred dollars on promoting the post, and check below the INSANE results in 72 hours:
Results: 1Million Reach – 39K Likes – 1.2 Shares
Example (2): Chelsea FC
Chelsea FC launched its Arabic existence on Facebook when Mohamed Salah joined the team. Their digital agency has ensured translating and localizing content about Mohamed Salah and the team generally. It has increased its reach and engagement in Egypt and the Middle East drastically. Below are some examples and for the full “Chelsea FC” case study
Thanking all fans for wishing Mohamed Salah a Happy Birthday. Selection of Fans’ posts included in the visual.
Results: 20K Likes – 473 Shares
Chelsea thanking their 1 Million Fans in Cairo!
Results: 17K Likes – 764 Shares
So what’s the most beneficial and effective technique?
Now the most beneficial and effective technique should be re-working the content itself “if applicable” and rewriting the original story or message from a completely different perspective to tailor specifically for your local audience and local market trends! This will re-born your content piece with a totally new identity, allowing it to appeal to the same and broader audiences with even higher success potential than the original one. You’ve successfully done two projects out of one and doubled your ROI on production. Oh, in the case of global production, you did all of this for free.
Example (3): Red Bull Heli Drift
Red Bull Poland did a video asset project that combines Red Bull Athlete Felix Baumgartner (Yes, the guy who jumped from the edge of space) and a car drifter in a head to head challenge. Felix driving a helicopter, had to drift in Sync with the car’s drifter in a specific track they both agreed on.
The content was first shared globally through Red Bull’s global Facebook page, then locally in Poland, then finally in Egypt (targeting English users) and redirected to the original English story that includes the full clip.
Red Bull Egypt wanted to try and re-work the content to make it more locally sharable. Their research found that:
1) News, first time, watch before anyone else. Titles for the most shared content in Egypt, right?
2) Sharing something new before anyone else before it’s deleted (as some unethical editors claim to make you click) is a high driver for content virality in Egypt.
3) Extreme sports are not necessarily the highest engaging topic vs. the above.
Red Bull Egypt then decided and re-worked the clip and its music, changing the whole perspective of the action sports clip into the first time “First Dance” between a car and a helicopter and reposted the content in Arabic this time, with the catchy title: “Would you dance with me? Watch for the first time a car dances on music notes with a Helicopter” (Targeting all Egyptian Fans)
The engagement and results on the second tailored story were much higher than the original.
Results: 2 Million Reach – 13K Shares
The above are just selected examples from the market, yet there are many other successful ones out there, and yours should be next!
P.S: to create a global page, you need to contact Facebook via this content form, ask them for a global page, and provide you with the needed documents and details to create yours.