Social Media Marketing Example #11: Kraft Foods

Lisa Braziel | March 30, 2009 | View Comments

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Continuing with the series, 26 Social Media Marketing Examples in Detail, I will cover one of my personal favorite brands: Kraft Foods. Coincidentally, just this weekend I interacted with many of these social media marketing efforts so I’m excited to share my experiences with you.

Here is what they are doing:

• My Recipe Box – This is a section of KraftFoods.com that answers a consumer need: a better way to find and organize new recipes. Just this weekend before I went to shop, I browsed the website for new recipes I would like to try, saved these to “My Recipe Box”, and was able to export the contents of my chosen recipes to a specific shopping list. If I already had the items in my pantry, I was able to delete and save the updated shopping list. As more people discover this feature, I see the need to build out easier ways to share/swap recipes between members – but for now I was pretty impressed with the feature. Also having the shopping list organized by category saved me from making laps within the grocery store.

• iFood Assistant Application – Kraft has also developed an iPhone application that helps you research new recipes on the fly, or help you access your recipe box or shopping list that you created within their site. For 99 cents you get access to 7,000-plus Kraft-tested recipes, nearby store recommendations, iPhone-ready video demonstrations, and content sections which are updated on a daily basis, such as Dinner Tonight and Recipe of the Day. Instead of creating an iPhone app just to create one, it appears that Kraft has tried to create a useful tool that aids the shopping experience. Here is a great review of the application in case you are interested in learning more.

• You Tube Channel – One of the most engaging parts of the Kraft Foods site (in my humble opinion) is an area that has quick 2-3 minute cooking tutorials that coincide with many of their popular recipes. Though I was disappointed that these videos didn’t have embed codes, I was very pleased to find the very active You Tube channel, KraftCookingSchool. Within this channel, Kraft hosts many of the same videos that are on their website, and also pulls in user-generated videos from their fan base. With over 2,500 subscribers, it appears that Kraft is keeping the page active and populated with engaging content.

• Social Networking -
  • Facebook – Within Facebook, it appears that many fans have generated successful fan pages on behalf of Kraft that actually have more users than Kraft’s official page (currently with a little over 1,500 fans). This is probably because the Kraft fan page has very little activity generated on a regular basis. Recipe contests could be held here each month to drive fan interaction and help populate more content for the page (it’s looking like a ghost town).
    
  • Message Boards – Within Kraft’s site is a forum where members can discuss recipes, have questions answered by other members, and share tips like how to shop on a budget. This is a useful area, but the organization of the posts themselves make it difficult to easily find a specific discussion topic.

• Blogging – I couldn’t find a primary blog for Kraft Foods in my search (let me know if there is one!). In my opinion, they shouldn’t start one just to start one, but to help them build stronger relationships with cooking bloggers, or even mom bloggers who write about their cooking explorations. Building these connections would help populate useful content and recipes that would better resonate with their target audience.

Do you have any other examples of Kraft’s efforts within social media marketing?