Retail Social Spotlight: Michaels, Chico’s, Dick’s Sporting Goods

By Carolee Sherwood

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Takeaways from this month's Retail Social Spotlight include the following:

Write copy that works hard for your brand. It's not only photos that need to be captivating in social media. Fans/followers need to feel momentum behind your copy as well. Write status updates and captions that showcase your brand personality. Action verbs in DSG's posts are great examples — "Dig," "Push," "Burn," "Haul," "Explode." Michaels Stores’ status updates, in contrast, do little to represent the spirit of the brand (e.g., May 2: "Mother's Day is less than 2 weeks away. Visit our Mother's Day Pinterest board for inspiration and product ideas"). The copy in Michaels’ "You Know You're Creative When" sweepstakes comes much closer. Think energetic and descriptive in a way that's particular to your brand
Have a plan for interacting with fans/followers. Of the three brands, Michaels Stores engages in the most conversation with its fans. As you can imagine, interaction and sharing is big for this brand (as a creative-based community). Chico's responds to fans mostly when there's a specific issue to address or a question to answer. DSG pipes up maybe once per thread with a variation on this: "Thanks for the comments, everyone." (Note: DSG's copy in its replies isn't nearly as engaging as the text in its posts.) Whatever your brand's strategy, be consistent and be prepared.
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I've written before about examining low-performing posts for insights about why they failed, but you should also take a look at posts with high engagement to understand the reasons behind their success. One of Michaels Stores most popular posts (2,544 shares and 3,117 likes) was its "May the Fourth" post. On what is known as "Star Wars Day," the brand published photos of crocheted Star Wars characters and offered the patterns. It would be a mistake to attribute the engagement only to the buzz related to May 4. In addition, the project was suited to the audience, therefore unique fans were unlikely to see anything like it elsewhere. Other factors to consider: What day/time was it published? What did the brand do to promote it? How much other content did the brand publish that day?
Don't make it (too much) about you. There are a number of recommendations about how often brands should post about themselves, and they all have one thing in common: post less about the brand than you do about other things. In other words, give more than you take. There are other ways to look at that balance as well, and even if it was serendipity, Chico's accomplished a kind of equilibrium this month. Its Liker promotion (which typically feels very me-focused) and its support of the Children's Miracle Network (which is an act of generosity) helped the brand keep its content in proportion.