All your votes are belong to us
So now that we have all that media attention, people will read the articles, empathise with a small company fighting Google, give their votes and stick it to the Man, right?
Wrong.
If a PR article is not published on the news site homepage, premium position (waaay above the fold, just beside the newest ‘shocking’ news about politics, football or a reality show with goats), people just don’t bother. Scrolling down is hard work and not many are up to the task. On average, PR articles that don’t make the ‘homepage’ usually have a few hundred opens, often much less. We needed an extra push.
Come in, Facebook.
We wanted to share all the PR articles through our Facebook page with mild but convincing ‘call to action’ and measure everything from article hits to clicks on the Webby voting page. Next step - target everyone, boost the hell out of everything and get those sweet sweet votes in.
Everyone? Seriously?
Of course not. Don’t be silly. We made a bunch of custom audiences and prepared certain PR articles for certain audiences. First in line, there was the ‘struka’ audience - all the people that have jobs similar to ours. Fellow digital peers fighting the Goliath? Vote! Peer support - check.
Then, we made an ‘avid readers’ audience that included everyone browsing through certain news sites (Jutarnji PR was served to Jutarnji audience, etc.) because even in 2020 people still equate their identity with the news they read. Small digital company from our beloved Croatia fighting silicon valley imperialists Google? Vote! Relevant content to relevant audience - check.
We also had the interview with our COO Ivana published on zena.hr and targeted women only. A strong and independent female COO fighting Google? Vote! Women power - check.*
*Disclaimer: as much as we would have liked to believe that all stereotypes are just that (after all it’s 2020), every time we create a campaign and do target research, we are left in awe at how much stereotypes are still relevant and usable in performance. That makes our jobs easier but crushes our soul.