Nobody talks about your product online
Challenge users to share their results with a branded hashtag. Creates a stream of user-generated content and social proof.
When to use
Your users achieve shareable results. They're active on social media.
Hypothesis template
If we create a [hashtag challenge] where users share [results/achievements], we'll generate [target] social posts because people love sharing wins.
Method
The problem: Users achieve great results with your product but never share them publicly.
How to do it:
- Create a branded hashtag: #MyGrowthExperiment, #ShipAndTest, etc.
- Challenge users: "Share your latest experiment result with #[hashtag]"
- Offer an incentive: feature the best posts on your site, give extra tokens, or create a monthly prize
- Repost and celebrate user posts from your brand account
- Create a gallery on your site showing community posts
- Track: hashtag usage, impressions, signups from social discovery
Key insight: The challenge works because it gives users permission and a format to share. Most people want to share wins but don't know how to frame it.
Success metrics
- •Hashtag post count
- •Total impressions
- •Engagement per post
- •Signups from social discovery
Prerequisites
- A memorable branded hashtag
- Social media accounts to engage from
- Incentives or features for participants
Common pitfalls
- •Choosing a hashtag that's already in use
- •Not engaging with participant posts
- •Making the challenge too complicated
- •Running it once instead of making it ongoing
Source: Common social marketing pattern. Branded challenges create ongoing streams of user-generated content.
Suggested ICE scores
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