Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups
Social Media Content Program

Challenge
Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups wanted to grow a committed fan base through sustained engagement programming across all of its social channels. The end goal was to raise its profile online, use data-driven insights to connect with the right consumers, and create real brand advocates. 

Approach
Hershey’s brought on W2O Group as its social media agency for Reese’s. The team conducted extensive analytics research to learn who was talking about the brand, where the conversations were happening, and what was most important to the customer. Using insights from our research, the brand team was surprised to learn that more than 40% of the online brand conversation was related to recipes, unusual for a fast-moving consumer packaged goods like Reese’s. 

The research provided a framework that allowed the team to develop a communications strategy that included things like user-generated recipes and led to optimized reach and serious engagement. My role as lead copywriter was to concept and write all social media posts, keeping consumer insights in mind. I also selected user generated content to highlight, developed individual promos like Reese’s Summer of Love, and developed seasonal content, including weekly highlight posts, based on an editorial calendar that I developed for the brand.

Results
Over a 9-month period, as a result of these targeted social media efforts we nearly doubled the number of Reese’s Facebook fans from 6 million to over 11 million — all without any ad spend. A selection of autumn highlight posts can be viewed below.

A Note On Likability

One of the keys to the program’s success was the relentless focus on engaging social post copy (as shown below). Being relatable, posing questions, and amplifying the message in the image — without being repetitious — encouraged sharing. The high number of shared posts, in turn, led to more page likes and aided in the success of the overall initiative.