Local Posts Increase Reach for Brands - We’ll tell you how!

Recently, brands have been putting more emphasis on local marketing to improve the reach and awareness of their brands. Marketing is extremely important at a local level to convert local shoppers into loyal advocates of a brand. Brand loyalty is particularly important when you consider customers moving habits in Ireland and the UK.  New research from a flatshare site, SpareRoom, suggests 25% of Generation Rent have moved home 10 or more times since they left their family house. In fact, just 1% of Gen Z and millennials are currently living in their long-term home. Ensuring brand loyalty for these age groups can increase the likelihood of repeat customers, no matter the location. While posting branded posts that showcase brand values and ongoing campaigns on local store’s pages is a step in the right direction; ensuring that local stores are posting local content will allow audiences to create deeper relationships with a brand and increase the engagement and reach of that store’s local social media page. 

There are multiple things that a brand can do to consider local marketing in its social media strategies. For more on this visit our blog on How to Make Local a Priority in your Brand’s Social Media Strategies. Today, I'm going to focus on how local posts created in-house by local store owners can increase the reach and awareness of store’s social media page. 

We will take a closer look at Daybreak Dungarvan, a local store that has used our platform, SocioConnect, for the last 10 months to help grow its social media presence and therefore increase its in-store traffic. We will also show how posting hyperlocal content increased their page’s reach by +125%.

‍

Our experience in SocioLocal has shown us, time and time again, that a mix of brand and local posts gives the best results. Forde's Daybreak Dungarvan is a great example of how utilising the SocioLocal software can maximise the impact of social media by a central brand team and a local store. 

Forde's Daybreak Dungarvan receives brand posts from their central brand team. They also post regular local posts to promote in-store objectives and increase relationships with their local community. This combination of brand and local posts gives a rich variety of content to their audience and keeps them engaged consistently. 

We took a deep dive into Forde's Daybreak Dungarvan’s social media account to showcase how local posts have increased the reach of their Facebook page substantially. Let’s take a look! 

Who?

Daybreak Dungarvan has used SocioLocal to receive brand posts and create hyperlocal posts since July 2022.  

They post daily about their goings on in the shop such as deals they wanted to shine a light on, staff updates community shoutouts and behind-the-scenes action. They also receive weekly brand posts from their central brand team.

How? 

One of the sales assistants from Daybreak Dungarvan has taken control of the shop's social media and manages it every week with the support of the shop owner. Social media is at the forefront of their mind and they know how much impact it has on their sales. 

On a weekly basis, Katie spends 2 hours once per week managing the content that will be posted on their social media pages for the week ahead. Katie uses a skeleton calendar to plan the week ahead. This ensures that they capture the right photos of the staff and promote the deals that need to be pushed for the week ahead. For example, each week, Katie knows that she has to mention the deli twice, she has to post about their big night in deal on a Thursday and about breakfast options available at the shop on a Saturday morning.  On average, they post 5-6 local posts per week. That is on top of the 3 brand posts they receive from their brand team. This means that, on average, they post 7-9 posts on their social media pages. 

What? 

Daybreak Dungarvan often post team photographs which have continuously proven to drive more engagement on social channels. They use a combination of graphic images and in-store photography to promote ongoing promotions. They have seen a huge increase in engagement whenever they show faces in their social media posts. If you compare a graphic of a deal versus a photo of a person showcasing the deal - the latter always wins!

They use copy that echoes the conversational tone of the local community. This copy isn’t overthought or too constructed. They speak to their online community in a similar vein to how they would speak to them in-store.

‍

What They Think:

“Social media is very important for a business and we have seen the effects of this; our loyalty card enquiries have increased and we always see an influx of traffic from social media competitions.”
Katie, Sales Assistant - Daybreak Dungarvan

‍

And The Results? 

A look at the average results local and brand posts get on Daybreak Dungarvan Facebook page:

We examined 20 brand posts vs 20 local posts, posted in January 2023, and have found that local posts have grown the reach and awareness of Daybreak Dungarvan’s Facebook page exponentially. 

‍A look back before Daybreak Dungarvan started posting hyperlocal content on SocioLocal:

Daybreak Dungarvan received brand content externally prior to opting for SocioLocal. Though they received the same number of posts as now, by injecting hyperlocal content into their social media, they have doubled their reach and their average engagement per post has grown by 10. 

Over the course of 3 months, they posted 116 posts on Facebook, on average 39 per month. 12 of these were brand posts and 27 of those were local posts per month. Some of these hyperlocal posts greatly increased the reach of their Facebook Business page. The next slide shows 4 of the top-performing posts over the 3 month period. Because of these posts, more eyes could see brand promotions on Daybreak Dungarvan’s page.

Lessons Learned

• Posting hyperlocal content increased Daybreak Dungarvan’s reach substantially (+125%)

• Online audiences react positively to community posts - photos of staff and store achievements. Show off those pretty faces! 

• A posting frequency of 7+ posts per week is optimum for Daybreak Dungarvan.

• Ensuring brand promotions are being posted on your social media pages ensures your already engaged online audience sees current in-store offers.

• Keep your audience up to date with new products that have arrived in-store. They love to be in the know. 😉 
  

Daybreak Dungarvan prioritise social media for their store and they reap the benefits. They have utilized social media to turn their online customers into advocates of their shop and of Daybreak’s brand by connecting with them on a daily basis. They are a great example of how utilising both brand and local posts can boost the reach and awareness of a store’s social media. If every store was like Daybreak Dungarvan, connecting a brand with hundreds of thousands of eyes on social media would be as easy as pie! 

“I think SocioLocal is easy to use and very handy, I am only in the office 1 day per week so it’s great to plan all of my content for the week ahead on SocioLocal. I find getting seasonal branded content from Daybreak Head Office very useful.”
Katie, Sales Assistant - Daybreak Dungarvan

‍