Crocs Gets Creative With 'Facebook Collect' Campaign

PROBLEM: Crocs, the popular shoe retailer, sought to increase its number of email subscribers through its Facebook fans and vice versa.

SOLUTION: Launched a social media campaign that encourages its Facebook fans to sign up for Crocs’ email messages and encourages its email subscribers to become Crocs’ Facebook fans.

RESULTS: Since the start of the campaign in September 2010, Crocs’ Facebook fan base has grown from 123,000 to 344,693 (as of press time) and its email list has grown from 1.5 million to 2.2 million.

Crocs was putting more and more emphasis and attention on its corporate Facebook page than it had in the past, which led to an increasing number of fans "liking" the brand each day. Crocs sought to take advantage of this growth by turning these "likers" into more than just your average fans.

"We had a growing fan base on Facebook and we wanted to take advantage of that growing fan base and convert them into email subscribers," says Andrea Stow, senior global e-marketing manager for Crocs. "We want to take those Facebook fans and convert them into purchasers."

Crocs treats its Facebook page primarily as a community forum — a place where its customers can get exclusive footage, dialog and interaction with the brand. "It's all about conversation," says Stow, "like-minded customers engaging with one another, engaging with the brand, getting behind-the-scenes footage, sharing videos and pictures that they wouldn't normally get in any other form."

So if Crocs’ Facebook fans are mainly interested in exclusive content and dialog, isn't that enough? Not for Crocs — it wanted more.

"These are people who are already highly interested in the brand," says Megan Theis, account manager for Digital Evolution Group (DEG), which teamed up with Crocs to help power this campaign. "We've also found that email subscribers are worth more than Facebook fans in the long run. We definitely want to start converting some of those fans into subscribers which, in turn, makes dollars for the brand."

In order to convert Facebook fans into email subscribers, Crocs’ email messages are where the discounts and deals are. For example, one promotion offers the brand's Facebook fans that sign up for its email program a 20 percent off welcome offer. Thanks to DEG, a tab called "Facebook Collect" was created just for Crocs.

"Other retailers include links to their homepage to sign up for email, so the Facebook user has to click away from Facebook to actually sign up, which is a barrier to entry," says Theis. "The beauty of the [Collect] tab is that it lives right on the Facebook page, so as consumers and customers are cruising through Crocs’ Facebook page they come across this tab and they can sign up for email right there instead of being directed to an outside page."

There's also a tab on Crocs’ Facebook page called "Hi," where the company asks its fans to sign up for email communications. If consumers have questions about a particular product or style, the social media team responds in a timely manner and directs them to email communications for further information.

So far the results have been pretty good. On a weekly basis, nearly 12 percent of Crocs’ new email subscribers are coming from Facebook. Since the launch of the campaign in September 2010, Crocs’ Facebook fan base has grown from 123,000 to 344,693 and the retailer's email subscriber list has grown from 1.5 million to 2.2 million. Sales figures are currently unavailable but Stow assures, "With the integration of ‘Facebook Collect,’ our email metrics have increased and, in turn, our email conversions have grown."

Based on the success of this campaign, Crocs’ future plans include launching a storefront on Facebook, but the company is just in the beginning phases of that process.