BACKGROUND:Just about everyone loves candy. Dylan’s Candy Bar, the colorful and artistic chocolate and candy brand, was looking to connect authentically with their audience. The brand chose to do so by launching two Instagram photo contests, since that network is a key social platform for the brand.

Launching a photo contest on Instagram is the fastest way to grow your brand’s followers on the network. Well-executed photo contests also drive engagement around your content and humanize your brand. Instagram photo contests are also fun for people to enter becuase they enable participants to be creative, and share a photo of their own.

Dylan’s Candy Bar kicked off their first Instagram promotion around Valentine’s Day 2014. To enter The Sweetest Kiss photo contest, participants were asked to follow Dylan’s Candy Bar on Instagram and submit a photo on Instagram of their “kissy face” or smooching their friend, significant other or pet with the hashtag #thesweetestkiss. The brand’s second Instagram photo contest was during summer vacation & travel season. To enter The Sweet Escape contest, participants were asked to follow the brand and share one of their travel-inspired ‘sweet escape’ photos, including the #sweetescape hashtag and tagging the brand on Instagram. Both promotions were simple to enter and allowed participants to have fun, whether through a photo of the participant kissing someone or embracing the spirit of wanderlust and summer vacation.

Learn How the Delicious Brand Connects with Sweet-Tooth Followers in Creative Ways on Instagram

INSTAGRAM PROMOTIONS AND USER EXPERIENCE:

Dylan’s Candy Bar Drives Sweet User-Generated Content with Instagram Photo Contests

CASE STUDY:Dylan’s Candy Bar Drives Sweet User-Generated Content with Instagram Photo Contests

CASE STUDY:

RESULTS:

CROSS-PROMOTION WAS KEY:

CONCLUSION:

Dylan’s Candy Bar already had more than 85,000 Facebook Fans prior to launching their photo contest and wanted to bring this audience over to Instagram. They curated user-generated content from both Instagram promotions onto landing pages, but also onto their Facebook page. This allowed them to peak the interest of their Facebook audience and encourage them to share their sweet photos on Instagram. The brand’s The Sweetest Kiss promotion also aligned with Valentine’s Day promotion in-store in three cities. There were marketing materials in store highlighting the campaign and store visitors could enter a kissing booth to snap a photo of their smooch and share directly to Instagram to enter the contest. Both promotions were also amplified in email blasts and other marketing materials.

Dylan’s Candy Bar’s first Instagram promotion, The Sweetest Kiss, generated exceptional results during the important Valentine’s Day period. The photo contest garnered over 2M impressions from just 75 photos - showing the virality of authentic user-generated content on Instagram. The brand’s second Instagram promotion, The Sweet Escape, lasted all summer. This promotion garnered 1.9M impressions from 2,700 photos and the promotion directly generated a 240% lift in follower growth during the promotion period. The two promotions also contributed to a strong uptick in Instagram followers. In January 2014 before launching any Instagram promotions, the brand had 18,000 Instagram followers. As of November 2014, they have 42,000 followers, a 133% increase in less than a year.

Instagram Photo Contests are the best way to grow your followers, generate user-generated content and drive engagement on your branded content. By launching two simple and fun Instagram promotions, Dylan’s Candy Bar was able to grow their Instagram audience and invite their audience to join the brand conversation through creative user-generated content. The brand was also able to curate all of the UGC content on their landing page and Facebook page - super sweet way to celebrate their followers!

At this point, our Instagram audience is by far the most engaged of our social networks. People are excited, they like seeing our content and are very open to sharing their own. Launching an Instagram promotion with Piqora was seamless and the set-up was simple.

- Rachel Schneer, Marketing Manager at Dylan's Candy Bar