Potatoes, Taters & Spuds Facebook Community Quickly Approaches 13,000 "Likes"

DENVER — The United States Potato Board (USPB) is celebrating a fan growth of nearly 50 percent and significantly increased consumer engagement on its “Potatoes, Taters & Spuds” Facebook page, an indication of the USPB’s increased online visibility and growing level of direct engagement with consumers, specifically “Linda.” At the end of FY11, the USPB’s Facebook page had 6,723 fans. Today, it has 12,739.

The most recent promotion on the page, a giveaway of the USPB’s new kid-and-mom-friendly Chef Solus Potato Party Coloring Book, was a driving force behind much of the recent page growth. As a result of the promotion, as well as a lean yet effective Facebook advertising buy targeted at moms, the community has grown by more than 3,000 since the promotion launch on February 14, 2012.

In addition, this promotion sparked a rush of conversation on the page wall, an opportunity for the USPB to engage directly with fans. One of the metrics that best showcases this increased engagement is referred to on Facebook as the “People Talking About This” number, which is a seven-day count of all user-initiated activity related to a page, such as likes, comments and shares of page content or the page itself. As an example, the “People Talking About This” number on the Potatoes, Taters & Spuds Facebook page was 58 the day before the coloring cookbook giveaway launched and skyrocketed to more than 2,000 by the end of February!

In addition to the coloring cookbook promotion, two additional promotions in FY12 also contributed to increased consumer engagement and fan growth. A Labor Day Potato Salad Sweepstakes resulted in more than 1,500 consumers voting on their favorite potato salads and brought 2,000 new fans to the page. A “Holly Jolly Potatoes Photo Contest” in December 2011 was a fierce but festive competition for prizes including cash, a slow cooker and a potato prize pack. The contest received 1,871 votes, and the winning potato recipe photos were mouth-watering, to say the least: Citrus & Herb Oven Roasted Potatoes, Holiday Roast Paprika Potatoes and Truffled Twice-Baked Baby Potatoes.

Another essential element to the success of the USPB Facebook page success is the ongoing coordination between the public relations agency team and the foodservice, advertising and retail agency teams to ensure the page features relevant material to keep fans engaged. Among the favorite content pieces, potato grower spotlight posts have garnered extremely positive feedback, showing the USPB’s Facebook fans enjoy learning about the farms and families behind the potato industry. In addition, “Tater Tuesday” posts coincide with distribution of the USPB’s popular weekly recipe e-mail, while practical nutrition and potato cooking tips have also resonated with fans.

For more information, and to see the complete USPB Domestic Marketing Public Relations Long Range Plan for Fiscal Years 2012-2016, please visit http://www.uspotatoes.com/downloads/Public%20Relations_NEW.pdf.

For more information on the USPB as the nation’s potato marketing organization, positioned as the “catalyst for positive change,” and the central organizing force in implementing programs that will increase demand for potatoes, please visit www.uspotatoes.com.

David Fairbourn is Manager, Industry Communications & Policy, at the United States Potato Board in Denver. The mission of the USPB is to increase demand for potatoes and potato products through an integrated promotion program, thereby providing US producers with expanding markets for their production. David can be contacted at 303-369-7783 or david.fairbourn@uspotatoes.com. For complete information about the programs, ROI results, resources and tools available to all members of the industry through the USPB, please visit www.uspotatoes.com. The United States Potato Board—Maximizing Return on Grower Investment.

Source: United States Potato Board