Imagine a group of kids coming together to build a treehouse. One might be good at designing, another at using tools, and another at finding materials. Because of this, they can create an excellent treehouse — something none of them can easily achieve alone!
Similarly, in collaboration marketing, brands contribute their unique strengths to reach a common goal. 💪🏻
In this article, you will learn all about brand collaboration and the benefits of implementing it in your business.
What Is Brand Collaboration in Marketing?
Brand collaboration in marketing is a strategic partnership between two or more brands that want to work together on a marketing activity.
For example, two brands can come together or join forces when sponsoring or co-hosting an event. It can also involve a shared cause or charity.
Collaborative marketing can also look like featuring each other’s products in their marketing materials in a cross-promotional strategy. It is also possible for brands to come together for the purpose of creating a new product or service.
Let’s look at the Starbucks and Stanley collaboration as an example.
Starbucks is a global coffeehouse chain known for its espresso-based drinks and wide range of other beverages.
On the other hand, Stanley is recognized for their Tiktok-famous stainless-steel tumbler, which is called the “Quencher.” These brands offer products that complement each other — coffee and a reusable cup.
The two brands collaborated to release a limited edition Stanley Quencher for the holiday season! The Starbucks-exclusive red tumbler has become a hit and people are reselling them for hundreds of dollars online. 😲
The Benefits of Collaboration Marketing
Have you ever wondered why it’s good for businesses to team up? What is the purpose of collaboration in business?
Although some hold the misconception that brand collaboration is only reserved for big corporations, it’s not always the case. Moreover, brands from different industries can also join forces.
Some may view this marketing activity as a fleeting trend, but the reality is there are many reasons for businesses of all sizes to consider it.
Here are the benefits of collaborative marketing:
Increases your exposure, which helps drive new leads
For your brand to be successful, potential customers need to know that it exists.
Through exposure, your brand is able to reach a wider audience, which increases your chances of acquiring new customers. Exposure is also key to brand recall —the more frequently consumers come across your brand, the more likely they are to remember it when they decide to buy.
Brands that collaborate are also able to tap into each other’s existing audience. This allows both businesses to gain access to a new set of potential customers who may not have been aware of them before!
Higher social media engagement
Higher engagement on social media is key to your brand’s online presence and success. This is because a higher number of likes, comments, and shares, boosts your exposure and encourages more engagement.
When brands get together, it often leads to the creation of interesting content that captures the attention of the social media audience of both businesses. Both sides can then cross-promote each other’s content on their social media channels.
Brand collaborations can also help encourage social media engagement through giveaways, contests, and other referral campaigns.
Drives more conversions
A conversion occurs when a potential customer completes a specific action your brand desires, such as making a purchase, filling out a form, or signing up for a newsletter.
Since brand collaborations can expose the businesses involved to a broader audience, the potential customer base can expand, which increases the chance of conversions!
Potential customers are also more inclined to convert when they see that a brand they trust is collaborating with another reputable brand. (As you can tell, there’s also social proof involved. 😉)
Lastly, brands that collaborate often offer exclusive promotions, which helps create a sense of urgency for people to convert. This includes discounts, contests, and giveaways!
How to Put Collaboration Marketing Into Action
If you’re new to brand collaboration, there are best practices to keep in mind to make sure that everyone benefits from the partnership. Here’s a guide on what to do when venturing into brand collaboration:
Identify like-minded businesses
Compatibility is essential for creating a collaboration that resonates with the customers of both businesses.
When you choose to partner with a brand that shares similar values, the collaboration will be more authentic and credible. It also helps create a more consistent brand image. Moreover, when you work with like-minded businesses, it can increase the likelihood of your collaboration reaching the right people.
Look for businesses that share a similar mission, support the same cause, or cater to a similar or complementary audience. If possible, review the previous collaborations of potential partners to gain insight into their approach.
Set mutual goals
Goal setting helps ensure that you are on the same page with your partner regarding the objectives of the collaboration. This also helps establish each side’s role in achieving the shared goals.
When discussing goals with another brand, you both need to define the purpose of the collaboration. It could be increasing brand awareness, expanding your audience, or launching a joint product.
Create a timeline for achieving these goals to keep your partnership on track.
🤓Read more: Running a Contest Will Help You Reach These 8 Marketing Goals
Choose the collaborative product or service to offer
Offering a joint product or service with another brand can be beneficial because it brings together the expertise of both businesses. Combining knowledge, technologies, and design techniques can result in a product that stands out in the market.
To give you an idea, some beauty brands work with a celebrity to create a limited edition lipstick. Another instance is when food and beverage brands collaborate with restaurants to offer special edition food products.
Conduct brainstorming sessions to help you learn where each brand excels and how these strengths can complement each other. Look for an unmet need in the market or research popular trends to help you create a product that can capture the attention of consumers.
Also, make sure that the product or service you develop aligns with the identity of both brands!
Plan how to market the collaboration
Marketing can generate curiosity and excitement around the collaboration, and this can lead to increased engagement from potential customers. The right marketing strategies can also influence consumer purchasing decisions, leading to increased sales.
You can attract attention by communicating the unique value proposition of the collaboration. For example, it’s helpful to emphasize what makes the product or service special. It’s also important to leverage both brands’ channels, including social media accounts, websites, and email newsletters.
Consider hosting virtual events, launch parties, and live streams. You can also build anticipation by offering exclusive pre-sale or early access. Another idea is to run contests or giveaways to incentivize engagement and participation.
Do a contest or giveaway
Speaking of a contest or giveaway, this type of campaign has the potential to go viral on social media platforms. This is because participants are encouraged to share the contest with their friends and followers, leading to increased visibility and engagement for the collaborative product or service.
Additionally, a contest or giveaway can drive traffic to the social media profiles, websites, and other online platforms of both brands.
Lastly, it provides an opportunity to capture valuable data — because participants need to provide their email addresses and contact information to enter. This information can be used by both brands to build their email lists.
UpViral is a marketing platform that specializes in creating and managing successful marketing campaigns. It is designed to help you utilize referral marketing to create viral giveaways! To give you an idea, here are collaboration marketing examples using UpViral:
Tickets for Good’s Case Study
Tickets for Good is a UK-based platform providing unsold event tickets to NHS workers, saving them an estimated £5,000,000. This benefits the event organizers because they can attract new fans, and the NHS workers can save money on tickets.
To make the campaign possible, they collaborated with the Eastern Electrics music festival.
Tickets for Good offered 35 pairs of tickets to the music festival and held a £250 random cash draw. To enter the contest, entrants had to sign up with an NHS email. They were also encouraged to share the contest on different platforms.
To promote the contest, collaborative posts were made on social media, which helped increase reach. Here is an example:
Tasha Mayberry Case Study
Damask Digital decided to run a multi-brand giveaway event for Order Out of Chaos, a business specializing in back-to-school planners. They used UpViral to conduct the giveaway and boost traffic, generate leads, and increase sales.
To give you an idea, multi-brand giveaways involve collaboration with other brands to offer substantial prize bundles to winners. This is beneficial for the host, the prize contributors, and the winners. By participating, sponsors could benefit from brand exposure in the contest.
Tasha Mayberry strategically chose brands with products that would attract Order Out of Chaos’ audience.
The giveaway resulted in 10,000 visits to the landing page. Order Out of Chaos’ email list grew significantly and one partner achieved $1,500 in sales because of a thank-you email with a unique discount code!
Siddharth Pal Case Study
Siddharth Pal, an e-commerce drop shipper, decided to run a giveaway through UpViral to increase brand awareness.
To do this, Siddharth Pal reached out to beginner and intermediate-level businesses to offer prizes. These included accounts, licenses, consultations, and services related to online tools, software products, and business resources.
The giveaway resulted in 4,691 leads, of which 3,713 were referred! It was a mutually beneficial collaboration because the sponsors gained exposure and Siddharth increased brand awareness without spending on prizes.
Outline your collaboration terms
To ensure accountability and prevent misunderstanding for both brands, it’s important to clearly define the roles and responsibilities of each party. For example, specify who is responsible for what tasks, deliverables, and contributions.
It is also necessary to define a timeline for the collaboration, including deadlines and key milestones. This helps both businesses to stay on track so the partnership leads to success.
Remember to discuss how the collaboration will be promoted. Both parties could promote the collaboration on their respective platforms for a broader reach.
Review the results
To assess the impact of a brand collaboration, you need to make time to review the results. This can help both sides to learn from the experience and make informed decisions for future partnerships.
Circle back to the initial objectives and goals set for the collaboration. Then collect relevant data and metrics, such as website traffic, social media engagement, sales figures, or customer feedback.
Identify the trends, patterns, and correlations between the collaboration efforts and your objectives. Compare before and after metrics to see if there is an improvement after the collaboration.
Finally, identify what worked well and what could be enhanced next time.
UpViral as a Marketing Collaboration Tool
Now that you’ve learned about some marketing collaboration ideas, the next step is to start your partnership with another brand! If you want to create a buzz around your collaboration and make it viral online, take advantage of UpViral.
Our team has also released a Multi-Brand Giveaway template for giveaways involving several brands. If you want to learn about how more businesses use UpViral, click here!
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