How 10 Brands Use Reddit for Marketing

Did you know that the most downvoted comment on Reddit was from a brand?

And surprisingly, that comment came from the major video game company EA.

为什么这么令人震惊？如果您曾经浏览过Reddit，这是一个鼓励用户开始讨论线程的平台，您会发现其大部分用户群对游戏非常感兴趣。

WhenEA replied to a comment在讨论游戏他们创建一个线程,用户quickly pressed the down arrow symbol to downvote it. This moved the comment lower and lower in the thread until it was buried under other posts from users.

Here's why that happened. Ahead ofEA's Starwars: Battlefront IIlaunch, fans who got to test out the pre-release version of the game were annoyed that they needed to complete a certain number of playing hours or buy extra features in order to play their favorite characters.

他们中的许多人都参加了游戏的subreddit，讨论了他们认为这是多么伪造。EA抓住了这一点，并对一个评论发表了很长的答复。

该公司解bob全站app释了为什么他们做出这些决定并在不提供特定修复或解决方案的情况下站在他们身边，而不是说他们会调整价格调整。

While this type of response might be acceptable on platforms like Facebook or Twitter, Redditors have no time for comments that offer them no value. Although the company stood up for its product and quickly responded to feedback, the comment may have made it seem like EA didn't care to make improvements based on what fans were saying.

根据redditors的回应，似乎他们并没有爱上EA的社区管理方法：

但是，对于Reddit上的品牌而言，这场斗争并不少见。实际上，几乎是预期的。甚至Digiday也将社交媒体网站称为"trickiest platforms to crack."

Redditors might be less likely to connect with branded content than users on other major platforms -- like Facebook or Instagram. So, why is it that companies have a much easier time promoting themselves on other social networks?

This might be because, by nature, Reddit's platform encourages users to create subreddits and communities around specific topics. The idea is to bring a variety of different people together to chat about something they have in common. These users, often called Redditors, are interested in reading tips, life-hacks, product criticisms, and other information from humans, rather than seeing branded content.

If a post isn't valuable or interesting to them, they will downvote it. If a topic is interesting to them, they'll upvote comments related to it and join in on the discussion to learn more.

To put it plainly, this social media network puts discussion first, rather than just focusing on content. While other networks offer comment threads, their feeds highlight content first and discussions second. Meanwhile, Reddit's feeds highlight active threads, discussions, or subreddits, and most of the platform's best content exists within those threads or subreddits.

尽管公司喜欢百威are beginning to test out paid native ads on the platform, marketing on a budget, or just using community management strategieslike EAcan still be tough.

为什么Reddit对营销人员如此棘手

As mentioned, the social network focuses on community building and online discussion rather than highlighting individual profiles or specific content. Posts and comment threads, called subreddits, move up and down on feeds based on upvotes and downvotes from users.

As you might expect, upvotes are like Facebook likes which signal Reddit algorithms to move content up. Downvotes do the opposite by moving less engaging content down.

Posts that engage hundreds of others will get moved up and seen by more users. Meanwhile, content that bores or annoys many users get moved down where it might not even be seen. This causes users to see a feed that might be more engaging to them. But, this can also mean that non-promoted branded material that feels like a generic advertisement could get downvoted or marked as spam.

Another thing that makes Reddit challenging is that you can't easily search for legitimate company profiles or official business pages. In fact, according to posts从这个线程, you cannot verify a profile on the platform, and "anyone can be anyone" on Reddit.

是的。这有点可怕。

There is a search filter for "Users and Communities," but you'll primarily see results for the most active subreddits -- which could be created by anyone.

这与Facebook，Twitter和LinkedIn有很大不同，您可以轻松地搜索人员和验证的业务页面。

如果一个客户is looking for information on a product and searches a brand, they might see unofficial community pages that host more specific subreddits about the company. However, almost all of this content is usually created by fans or customers.

这是您在Reddit上搜索麦当劳时发生的情况：

虽然你看到许多社区相关的to McDonald’s, none of them say they're official or run by the restaurant chain. When you click into them, their moderators seem to be Redditors that aren't affiliated with the brand.

Although they aren’t brand affiliated, these communities can still be helpful to users and even companies. A prospect searching Reddit to learn more about a specific product might find great customer-posted chatter about the item they're considering.

Gamers, for example, flock to the platform to discuss new launches, pro-tips, and issues they might be having while playing a popular video game. Similarly, users might create a subreddit or community about a restaurant, like Burger King, to talk about the weird or interesting things they've seen at the chain.

Since threads show positive and negative feedback, users might even recognize that positive feedback is more legitimate since the product would be destroyed by user comments if it were bad quality.

常见的Reddit的营销策略

If you really want to get your content front and center quickly, you might want to considerpromoting your posts.

Promoting your posts will allow you to keep them prioritized higher up in subreddits as well as target them to specific groups of users. Like promoted posts on Facebook and other platforms, there will be an icon on the post that says its promoted. So, although the posts will be higher up, users will still know that it didn't get to the top of the thread they're reading on its own.

Here's an example of what one of these posts looks like:

For brands who don't want to pay for native ads, there seemto be two major promotional strategies at the moment. The first, and most prominent, is hosting an "Ask Me Anything" thread. The second strategy involves starting or participating in a subreddit discussion about your brand, product, or industry.

当“问我任何东西”（或AMA）线程现场时，公司的影响者，执行人员或工作人员会创建一篇帖子，宣布他们是谁，并鼓励Redditors向他们提出问题。bob全站app

This type of promotion is best when you have an influencer or interesting person affiliated with your brand who can answer questions quickly and in an engaging way. However, it can be difficult to pull attention to these types of promotions if you don't have an interesting host in mind.

The other major marketing strategy involves creating or participating in relevant subreddits. Creating a discussion gives prospective or current customers a place to talk about what they like about your product, or give you feedback. If they use your thread or a user-created thread to point out issues or compliment your product, you can respond to them accordingly to show that you're interested in what they're saying.

One downside to starting or participating in a thread is that you might need to keep a watchful eye on comments. If you receive a lot of negative feedback, you'll want a community manager or team member to address it quickly and in a way that doesn't feel like a fake PR-styled comment.

You cannot delete other people's posts, even if they’re on a subreddit you created.

由于Reddit是一个这样的利基平台，可能需要额外的实验和头脑风暴，因此我们不鼓励小型企业将所有时间和精力投入其中。

But, if you do want to test out a few posts -- or even start a subreddit -- here are a few examples of brands that creatively marketed themselves on the platform.

Examples of Brands on Reddit

Promoted Content

丰田

丰田recently promoted a video-based post in the一级方程式subreddit. Because this subreddit discusses everything related to Formula 1 race cars, Toyota's video of two drivers racing Supras fit well within the stream of posts.

Even though Toyota’s content is promoted, the brand still focuses on telling Redditors an action-packed story about racing, rather than forcing a more traditional ad on them.

Additionally, by promoting a post specifically in a Formula 1 subreddit, they are leveraging an audience that has already shown a strong interest in cars and the video's topic.

If you do promote content on Reddit, take a note from Toyota by picking out a few subreddits that really fit your brand. Then, make content that entertains or gives value to those audiences, rather than just promoting a post with a generic ad.

Ally Bank

While Toyota made content for a specific subreddit that aligned with its brand, Ally Bank got creative by making and promoting content specifically for thePlaystation subreddit.

A banking ad seems like a stretch for an audience that loves video games. So, to connect the two topics, Ally created an ad with an interesting analogy: "You wouldn't settle for a 1-star controller, so why settle for a 1-star bank?"

This is pretty clever. While gamers might not respond well to a standard banking app advertisement, they might identify with buying a bad controller or heavily researching game-related purchases. This type of ad might make them question why they haven't put the same amount of interest in a bank.

Later, when they go to make a banking decision, they might remember the bank a bit more than others because it related itself to a good gaming controller.

This is an interesting example of how you can experiment and think outside the box to create content that still fits in a subreddit which doesn't immediately align with your brand.

Lemonade Inc.

Lemonade, an insurance app, created apromoted post这是针对的快餐店. This video highlights how insurance payments which cost as much as fast food items could help you cover property losses later on.

如果您在金融或保险行业中，可以创建和共享内容，以表明人们的价值和负担得起的投资是很棒的。该广告专门通过向快餐迷们展示将购买在购买保险或储蓄计划中的资金中受益多少来做到这一点。

AMA Promotion

日产

日产是2015年在AMA格式进行试验的早期公司之一。在晋升期间，他们的首席执行官在Subreddit“ IAMA”中创建了一个线索。在主题的第一篇文章中，他介绍了自己，谈论了日产的发射，并邀请人们问他问题。

While some people asked him about the product, others asked deeper questions like "What's your rival brand?"

While the questions might not always be product-specific, this type of content can be interesting to car fans who want to learn more about the business or its new products.

此外，日产忙碌的首席执行官给时间回答问题的事实可能会使客户更信任他和品牌。

Redditors并没有将他视为业务主管，而是开始将他识别为脚踏实地的企业主，他想为客户创造出色的产品。

The Economist

While Nissan leveraged its leadership for an AMA, The Economist, a London-based news publication, regularly has staff writers host these threads.

Recently, they had an obituary writer answer questions about her life and her job.

尽管您可能不会立即认为与itu告作家的问答可能是推销新闻出版物的有效方法，但Redditors涉足该线程，并提出了许多有趣的问题。bob官网官方网站

Because The Economist does this regularly, Redditors can get an inside look at what motivates the publication's writers. After reading a few of these, users might relate to and trust The Economist's writers. Because of this trust, they might look to this paper when they're in search of a credible source.

The publication highlights a wide range of writers, users could also learn a little bit more about why each section can be fascinating.

For example, someone who's never read the obituary section of a paper might want to take a look at it after learning about some of the unique life stories covered by the writer.

Audi

Using Reddit's streaming feature,Audi posted AMAswith a visual twist. In a series of live streams, celebrities sped around in Audi's newest car on a test track. As they hit high speeds, the celebrities answered questions from Redditors.

While most AMAs are text-based, Audi leveraged one of the platform's new features to do something interesting and unique. Although people might not be drawn car brands, or to a thread that uses only text, they might be interested in watching an action-packed celebrity AMA.

如果您不使用Reddit，但想展示您的产品，则可以通过拥有公司的领导者或行业中的有影响力的人来做类似的事情，进行Facebook，Twitter或Instagram Live视频，他们在其中进行基于评论的问题bob全站app使用该项目时。

SpaceX

为了促进其BFR火箭的推出，SpaceX让CEO Elon Musk主持AMA。马斯克不仅是对自己的产品非常了解的首席执行官，而且他还是一位主要的技术行业思想领袖。

Rather than posting this thread on a SpaceX subreddit, it was actually hosted on a broad subreddit called r/space.

This can be a great way to gain awareness from all space fans, rather than just Redditors who already follow SpaceX subreddits.

Because he's regularly in the news for his work with space technology and autonomous vehicles, Musk might be incredibly interesting to people who follow r/space -- even if they haven't heard of him yet.

While you might not have someone of Musk-level fame on your company's team, this is a good example of how SpaceX identified a subreddit where its biggest possible pool of Reddit fans could be. Then, they contributed to the community in an interesting and engaging way.

如果您是一家想尝试Reddit的企业，则应考虑在广泛但与您的品牌相关的subreddit中发布与您的产品或品牌相关的有趣内容。

For example, if you're in the fashion industry, you could have your company's clothing designer host an AMA in a fashion-related subreddit. Or, if you don’t have a team member who can host an AMA, you could ask a question in a post, such as, “What’s your favorite fall fashion?” and then respond to replies.

Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation

Bill Gates is no stranger to Reddit. According to the post screenshotted below, he's already hosted a number of AMAs on various subreddits.

But, in this same post, he decided to focus less on products or technology and more on his nonprofit foundation. To do this, he posted in the broad r/IAmA subreddit with a blurb about what he was up to with his charity. He also included relevant links that users could click to learn more. Then, he asked Redditors to ask him anything.

盖茨（Gates）在轻轻插入基础方面做得很好，因此所有redditors都会看到它并在深入探讨问题和答案之前了解更多信息。

Even when AMAs are over and archived, they're still public and the first post is always at the top. This means that including light, but interesting, information about your mission in this post can be helpful for brand awareness, even after your AMA isn't live.

Branded Subreddits

Nordstrom

In 2014, Nordstrom推文that they'd launched a new Nordstrom community. Since then, users have posted on the subreddit to discuss new products, share experiences related to being a Nordstrom employee, and to ask customer-service or product-related questions.

If you’d like to create an online community of fans, Reddit could be a great platform to do that. However, because the platform prioritizes engaging user-generated content, you’ll also want to promote the subreddit on other social platforms as Nordstrom did. Otherwise, you might be relying on users to stumble upon your branded subreddit or search for it on their own.

Because the channel doesn't feel censored and you see both good and bad comments about products, consumers can do solid research on a product or two before deciding which they should buy.

如果您在此子雷迪特上看到积极的反馈，您可能会更信任它并购买产品，知道诺德斯特罗姆的客户如果不好的话，在这里可能会糟糕透顶。

XboxOne

Sometimes, brands don't need to create and grow their own subreddits. If there are enough fans, Redditors will start one. However, even if a brand doesn’t create one, it might still leverage it and contribute content to it.

Xboxone就是一个例子。在某个时候，用户创建了一个巨大的Subreddit，他们可以在其中谈论Xbox游戏，提出技术问题并提供专业提示。但是，在相当定期的基础上，Xboxone Game Developers开始在Subreddit上托管AMA。这是如此规律地发生，以至于Developer AMAsTAB被添加到SubReDdit的顶级导航中。

In this example, Xbox rewards loyal fans with exclusive content and finds a low-hanging-fruit opportunity on a niche platform.

While Reddit isn't for everyone, the brand realized that many of its die-hard fans were there and had already created hundreds of discussions about its products. Rather than spending time on creating a new subreddit, Xbox reps and developers added to communities that already exist.

If you have a brand or product that is getting a lot of web chatter on any platform, it can be great to chime in and boost discussion about it. This can make your fans feel like you're accessible to them if they have any questions or feedback.

Additionally, if you join the discussion with a piece of interesting content or a brand-related announcement, fans also might feel like they're being rewarded for being a great customer. All in all, this might make them more loyal to your brand.

如果您不打算将Reddit的一部分成为策略的一部分，则可以替代注意并回应在Facebook，LinkedIn或Twitter上讨论您品牌的正面帖子或评论主题。

Navigating Reddit

Reddit is still a mystery to many marketers. And, if you don't have an advertising budget, you'll need to get creative and strategic to engage audiences.

Right now, the brands that will transition most easily onto the platform are companies that would benefit from community management.

For example, gaming is a major topic on Reddit because gamers are always using to ask for tips, tricks, and cheat codes. Because of this, gaming companies might benefit from joining in on video game discussions with posts or threads that provide value or helpful information.

如果您确实想通过测试一些线程开始了解有关该平台的更多信息，请记住以下一些技巧。

1. Don't post content that feels like an ad or press release. The Reddit community is very quick to down-vote advertise-y posts or mark them as spam.
2. This audience will respond more to content that gives them value, even if it's branded. So, whether you're creating a tip thread about your product, responding to users, or hosting an AMA, make sure you're giving Redditors valuable information or interesting content that they'll upvote or share.
3. Identify the best communities for your industry and find unique ways to engage with them. For example, if you sell gardening products, you might want to host an AMA on gardening in an agriculture subreddit.

If you're still struggling with the platform and have a budget to play with, you could also considersponsoring a post或购买更传统的本地广告块。

At the moment, Reddit is still a pretty niche platform, and you should only consider paid content there if your mission or content aligns with Reddit audiences or various subreddits.

However, Reddit ads arestarting to gain steam来自更大的品牌。由于该平台旨在提高其营销功能，因此中小型企业也可能能够在不久的将来实际预算这一策略。

如果Reddit不喜欢您的营销策略的正确平台，查看本指南to see if any of the newest social media platforms pique your interest.