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Social Media Analysis & ReportFresh Summit 2013

Introduction71 percent of all U.S. adults are online. 72 percent of online adults are social networking site users1. Social networking is a part of everyday life and a part of the social fabric of modern society. It is also an increasingly important part of every marketer’s toolkit. Whether it’s a retailer inviting consumers to Like them on Facebook, a brand retweeting a loyal fan’s recipe on Twitter, or a producer connecting with growers through a group on LinkedIn, people are constantly interacting with brands on social media. Furthermore, the common refrain that social media only works for consumer-focused companies is misguided at best, and irrational at worst. B2B companies are made of people – people that engage in social media, people who develop relationships

– people who make business decisions.

Social media is an increasingly important conduit for businesses to get found by and engage with potential buyers on the web. 93% of marketers plan to maintain or increase social media ad spending in 2014.2 When broken down by channel, 47 percent of advertisers say that they will be increasing their spend in social media ads, with 46 percent maintaining current budget levels. On the fl ip side, this means that just seven percent will be decreasing their spend on social media advertising, which is a strong testament to the perceived value of this medium. The produce industry continues to lag behind in the adoption and integration of social media platforms and tools, even as grocery retailers turn in ever increasing numbers to social media to fuel connections with consumers.

At this year’s Fresh Summit conference session Creating Fruit and Veggie Passion, Bolthouse Farms’ CEO Jeff Dunn called on the produce industry to recognize that its primary competition is junk food, and the failure to fi ght that battle is having a drastic effect on the health of America. To compete, fresh produce needs to start marketing at a high

sophistication level equal to that of the CPG brands, as well as increasing their marketing spend to gain the attention of the consumer. Harnessing the power of social media for marketing and business intelligence will be a critical component to winning that battle.

– Bradley FitzhenryBrand Manager, MJR Creative GroupNovember 21, 2013

1 Joanna Brenner, Pew Internet Project, Pew Research Center, August 5, 2013.

2 Emarketer: Social, Video Sites Will See Big Boosts in US Advertiser Spending, http://www.emarketer.com/

Article/Social-Video-Sites-Will-See-Big-Boosts-US-Advertiser-Spending/1010300, October 15, 2013.

This is the second Produce Industry Social Media Report powered by Relevance by MJR™.

In this report we offer a snapshot of the impact of social media infl uence on the recent

PMA 2013 Fresh Summit Conference and Expo in New Orleans, Louisiana. We explore the

key social channels and chart the velocity of the social universe surrounding the event. We

indexed, fi ltered and analyzed hundreds of thousands of social media conversations on Twitter,

Facebook, blogs, and industry and mainstream media during the 30 day period of October 4–

November 4, 2013.

MJR Creative Group continues to document the growing infl uence of social media on the

produce industry through the release of periodic reports and presentations at industry events

around the country. We are excited at the opportunity we see for the brands, producers, growers,

and trade organizations of the produce industry. We see tremendous advantage in creating

deeper connections with consumers and suppliers, and we help our clients capitalize on the

transformative effect of data analysis on produce marketing and corporate decision-making.

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sophistication level equal to that of the CPG brands, as well as increasing their marketing spend to gain the attention of the consumer. Harnessing the power of

Fresh Summit Topic CloudAn interesting look at the topics that were fueling the most infl uential conversations around Fresh Summit.

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Fresh Summit Social Channel VelocityAcross all the social and online media channels, October 18 was the peak for Fresh Summit 2013 social activity, refl ecting pre-expo excitement by exhibitors, trade media and bloggers.

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Fresh Summit event period

Social Channel Velocity ComparisonComparison: 2013 versus 2012, total daily mentions. 2013 showed far more activity in the days leading up to the actual event versus 2012. In the days before and after the event period, we also see an uptick in 2013’s conversations, however the difference was not pronouced.

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Fresh Summit event period

Fresh Summit Social Channel SummaryLike last year, Twitter was the dominant social channel for conversations around Fresh Summit. Facebook showed a bit more traffi c, with trade publications making up the balance of the online conversation.

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Fresh Summit VoicesBrands dominated the Twitter conversation at Fresh Summit. Twitter infl uence is all about impressions and Sunkist took center stage with nearly 400,000 impressions. The main event hastag #freshsummit was widely used, garnering just over 2 million impressions.

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Top 20 Most Infl uential Twitter Accounts

Top 20 Most Used Hashtags

ACCOUNT IMPRESSIONS ACCOUNT IMPRESSIONS ACCOUNT IMPRESSIONS

1. @sunkist 399,175 8. @publix 80,277 15. @bayonasusan 28,650

2. @marriottintl 233,312 9. @jennatelesca 74,217 16. @lilitheats 27,171

3. @pgrocer 195,735 10. @wegmans 58,124 17. @oceanmistfarms 21,387

4. @friedasproduce 133,074 11. @thepacker 38,900 18. @breauxart 20,040

5. @shockinglydlish 116,656 12. @melissasproduce 33,777 19. @lizwebber 20,040

6. @freshsummit 107,853 13. @ca_avocados 32,626 20. fruits_veggies 19,215

7. @sn_news 80,307 14. @greengiant 30,376

ACCOUNT IMPRESSIONS ACCOUNT IMPRESSIONS ACCOUNT IMPRESSIONS

1. #freshsummit 2,076,368 8. #pma 15,257 15. #pnid 2,854

2. #nola 243,565 9. #goveggie 11,662 16. #apples 2,747

3. #freshproduce 30,115 10. #powerofpurple 10,916 17. #goodtaste 2,684

4. #contest 28,650 11. #fruitsvegetables 10,183 18. #freshfoodrevolution 2,480

5. #teamfreshsummit 25,010 12. #innovation 5,969 19. #breastcancerawareness 2,004

6. #hellofuture 22,048 13. #produce 4,293 20. rdchat 1,798

7. #packaging 17,439 14. #ifps 3,896

Fresh Summit VoicesBloggers and the trade are other contributors to the social conversation around Fresh Summit. This year PMA’s fi eld-to-fork bloggers themselves were far more engaged and top our list. Fresh produce marketing agencies MJR Creative Group and DMA Solutions returned in the top 5 this year.

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Top 5 Infl uential Blog Authors Top 5 Infl uential Trade PublicationsAUTHOR SITE

1. Lee Mannering fi eldtofork.pma.com

2. Kathy Means fi eldtofork.pma.com

3. Megan Zweig thecore.dma-solutions.com

4. Bradley Fitzhenry mjrcg.com

5. Amy Sung smartblogs.com

AUTHOR SITE

1. Grocery Headquarters groceryheadquarters.com

2. The Packer thepacker.com

3. Supermarket News supermarketnews.com

4. The Produce News theproducenews.com

5. Progressive Grocer progressivegrocer.com

Fresh Summit Global Mentions MapUnsurprisingly the U.S. contributed the most to the conversation, but there was a broad international presence overall. Due to location identifi cation limitations, the numbers seen here likely underrepresent social participation outside of North America. Italy and Germany were second and third, respectively.

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United States 1,063

Italy 109

Germany 49

Ecuador 23

Canada 10

United Kingdom 10

Netherlands 9

Switzerland 6

Australia 5

New Zealand 3

Mexico 2

Brazil 2

France 2

Hong Kong 1

People’s Republic of China 1

Sweden 1

Ukraine 1

Summary

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Twitter was again the dominant force behind the social conversation around Fresh Summit and by a substantial margin. The dramatic activity spike in the two days before the show demonstrates the brand, blogger, and event host enthusiam for the event leading up to the opening of the expo fl oor. Conversations take a precipitous drop once the show fl oor opens, refl ecting the divided attention of both exhbitors and attendees.

Fresh Summit defi nitely has an international audience but we don’t see a proportional social media presence by the international exhibitors and attendees. Part of this is likely due to technical limitations in determining location. We suspect the actual numbers of international volume to be in the range of 10-15 percent higher than is being reported.

The Top 20 Twitter infl uencers are ranked using the Relevance by MJR™ algorithm that weighs post frequency, follower count, engagement, and content relevancy. Brands were the big winners this year aided by their often large follower counts. We are encouraged by the increased participation in social media by fresh produce brands, and feel that this trend will continue and fresh produce begins to follow the lead set by retailer and CPG enthusiasm for social media’s connections to consumers.

The other ranking lists in the Report also used the Relevance by MJR™ algorithm for evaluation. There was a change this year in the infl uencer makeup of industry publications. Fresh produce trade publications found themselves having to share attention with the grocery retail trades, refl ecting the coninuing rise of importance of fresh produce to the retail chains. Blog

infl uence ranking results saw the PMA push to the top, refl ecting the success of their determined efforts to gain more share of voice around their own event. SmartBlog, the blog from Smart Brief who partnered closely with the PMA this year made the top fi ve as well. The other two spots were held by marketing fi rms MJR Creative Group and DMA Solutions whose client portfolios include many fresh produce brands and associations.

We expected more. While there was more social media activity around Fresh Summit 2013 over the prior year, with over 1,100 exhibitors and 21,000 attendees, the potential exists for a truly phenomenal exchange of information, opinion, images, and video that can transform the Fresh Summit experience and push the industry forward into the future of marketing. The PMA invested more in social media activites around the show with mixed success. The PMA successfully brought the #freshsummit hashtag to the fore, scoring over two million impressions, a big improvement over last year. In contrast, their contingent of food bloggers (#teamfreshsummit) did not create much in additional lift, lacking any obvious support from PMA themselves to draw people towards the blogger activity online. Brands performed slightly better overall, but we saw the bulk of the activity coming from the same voices – who also tend to be the most successful consumer brands. We hope 2014 is the year fresh produce makes its voice heard in the social media conversation around Fresh Summit, and we challenge the fresh produce industry to accept the challenge put forth by Jeff Dunn of Bolthouse Farms: adopt the marketing methods and sophistication of junk food competitors, and truly connect with consumers.

TM

MJR Creative Groupmjrcg.com

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