The Power of Social Media

The power of social media is something of a scary thing. Just ask poor Steve Hofmeyr. It has the power to either make or break you as can be seen in a recent stunt pulled by an overseas marketing company that used a fairly attractive guy that worked at a certain institute using the twitter hashtag #alexfromtarget. The stunt proved the legitimate ability of the power of ‘word of mouth’ that has transformed into a simple push of the button and the results are nothing short of amazing.

Looking at the recent opening of the Magnum pop-up Store that welcomed customers through its bronze gates on the 1 November 2014 we see another company taking advantage of the power of social media as they use next-to-no advertising save for that of social media outlets such as twitter, Facebook and Instagram.

Johannesburg Branch

The store encourages you to design your own magnum and then ‘snap’ a photo of it and share it with all your friends and followers. It’s practically free advertising for the company. The response has been extraordinary as people rush to get a taste of the exclusive ice cream at this one store as it remains the only one open in Johannesburg so far, as well as other international branches.

And people keep coming.

The lines keep the average person waiting close to two hours in line to pay R40 for a smaller than normal Magnum ice cream they saw in their newsfeed on one of their various social media streams.

Of course the reason for this is that it takes up to three minutes to fill out a single order per customer. The workers behind the counter, though smiling politely, does nothing to explain the different toppings set randomly out before you nor do they even give out any suggestions on any sort of combinations for you to choose from. Instead, they wait patiently on your order to scoop away and move along to the next customer.

Once the process is done, the photo shoot begins and the store even provides the frames in which to place your creation in.

No Frame...Just Because O.O

And the word spreads like wildfire as the lines extend seemingly into infinity, all thanks to a push of a button.

I can only imagine what their cost model looks like if you look at all this free advertising their customers basically pay them to have. It’s insanely brilliant. Honestly, it’s no wonder a brand like them found it comfortable enough to open one store here and there and be totally okay with it, even if it was a temporary one.

It makes for an interesting idea as to how future advertising will be as more and more companies are most likely to take to social media in ways that engage the customer while promoting their brand at the same time.