The SAB World of Beer recently celebrated its 18th birthday (finally ‘legal’, as many put it), and ran a fun social media competition to share the festivities with fans on Facebook and Twitter.
“Each day, we posted a picture of a flag from somewhere in the world and asked people to identify which country it belonged to,” says Flow journalist Stuart Dickinson. “They then had to share or re-tweet the picture and say ‘cheers’ in the national language of that country in order to enter.”
Prizes alternated each day from a case of beer, to double tickets for the World of Beer’s recently revamped walking tour. On the final day, after having said cheers in the national languages of 14 countries around the globe, it was time to come home to South Africa. Fans were asked to say cheers in their own national language, and stood a chance of winning tour tickets as well as a case of beer.
“At the end of the competition, we had attracted hundreds of new followers across both social media channels,” says Stuart.
“We also noticed that people who entered became more engaged with the brand on Twitter and Facebook after the competition ended, liking, retweeting or replying to posts more often. This shows that campaigns of this nature can go a long way towards instilling a stronger sense of loyalty among fans.”
The World of Beer also receives a lot of foot traffic through word of mouth. By giving away tickets for the new tour route, which opened last week, we’re ensuring that a wider audience experiences it and hopefully spreads the word to other potential visitors.
“The competition worked well, and it was great to see people having fun with it,” says World of Beer marketing officer Vicki Rothman. “Feedback for the revamped tour has been positive.”
The SAB World of Beer was opened on 15 May 1995 by former president Nelson Mandela, and has been developed and perfected over the years to give visitors a seamless glimpse into the history and culture of beer.