Reddit Case Study by branding expert Joseph Plazo: Successful Reddit Marketing Strategies (With Actual Data Results)
Every. Single. Week.
I hear exactly the same nonsensical statements…
“You can not promote a company on Reddit.”
“Reddit traffic doesn’t convert.”
“You can not *sell* on Reddit.”
It is totally preposterous.
Almost always, it comes down to a lack of understanding the way the community works.
Today I’d like to clear up some of the confusion:
Advertising On Reddit, Surprisingly Clear-Cut?
First, let’s deal with the common misconceptions:
My target audience does not use Reddit.
Reddit is one of the largest, most diverse communities that are online. The reddit seo website is filled with millions of individuals that have divided themselves into person subreddits based on interest. Quite literally, there is a subreddit that applies to every and any business demographic that is possible. Unless you sell products to people without access to the internet… you must think about joining the conversation with your market.
Reddit traffic is low quality and won’t convert.
It is accurate — you’ll end up with a lot of — or very little — traffic that doesn’t convert, if you don’t understand how to effectively use the site. Generally, this is because you are posting the wrong sort of content, or posting to the wrong areas. After in this post I Will prove the above statement bogus with hard evidence. (Tip: The first four-figures of revenue for ViralBlogContent came from posting non-promotional content on Reddit.)
Reddit Promotion (Or Was That Advertising?) Best Practices
There are a few key points to keep in mind when marketing on Reddit:
It is about value.
Just as with any other station, efficient advertising happens when you provide the readers with serious value. Think of the folks behind the *click.*
It is also about relevancy.
The subreddit’s audience identifies what is or is not appropriate to post. This occurs directly through subreddit-particular rules, but also indirectly through voting. (Hint: Research the subreddit you’re targeting thoroughly, and figure out what works and what doesn’t.) It is best to simply observe for a few days — without posting — to comprehend the “character” of each subreddit. You’ll see they are all significantly different animals.
No gimmicks. No tricks. No underhanded tactics.
Recall, Reddit is not your average social media website. Viral marketing on Reddit is a VERY different process than that of Facebook or Twitter.
The basis of successful Reddit promotion, in a nutshell, is creating and encouraging content that is amazing. Wonderful being defined as content that your audience love, share, and will happily consume. If you are getting tons of negative comments on your own posts, you are doing something wrong.
There are just two different marketing alternatives on Reddit. One is promoting your own content, adding the discussion and your unique point of view, and creating traffic through free content advertising. The other choice is “pay to play,” where you are able to choose a targeted subreddit and have your ad (which seems just like a reddit marketing digital regular submission) appear right on top of the forum.
There are advantages and disadvantages to both…
The Free “Adding To The Discussion” Position
Doesn’t cost any money. This allows you ample time to test methods, see what works and what does not… and therefore becomes more powerful overtime.
Could potentially lead to a bad reputation for your business.
Allows you to engage with your audience, through the comment section.
In my opinion: Creates a more personal — and hence valuable — connection with any traffic that is new. (Compared to an advertisement.)
The Paid Advertisement Course
More measurable, more repeatable, more scalable.
Needs an upfront investment. (CPM bid at a cost of $1 per thousand beliefs now.)
I have noticed less involvement through the comments on posts that were sponsored.
Has a substantially more *ad -y* believe to the traffic. No data to support this, but I consider this causes lower-conversions when compared to an equivalent quantity of complimentary exposure.
For most instances, when you get the hang of things, your best option would be to begin with the free angle, and then shift into paid promotion. Pro-Hint: The most effective paid efforts on Reddit are those which would have succeeded as regular submissions.
Finding The Correct Community
First off, you should know which subreddit(s) to target.
This is quite straightforward… I would http://spinsucks.com/social-media/reddit-marketing-guide/ start with coming up with themes that fit into your specialty or a few common key words, and see if there is subreddit that is applicable. The site is set up like so: http://www.reddit.com/r/__________ (fill in the blank with a subreddit name).
Whether there are any communities etc., like /r/wholesome, /r/paleo, for example, in case your site is based around eating healthy, I’d see If you operate a cloud computing service, you may have more luck at /r/android, or /r/technology… etc.
Now, you really desire to niche down into a community that is small but applicable. It takes some experience to pick out the most effective ones… but for the large part you need a community with around 10,000 to 100,000 subscribers. The idea here is the fact that you’re attempting to balance the size of the community with your capability to get content on the front-page.
Larger communities have more traffic, but it is more challenging to garner the upvotes required to reach on the front page, while it is extremely simple to encourage content on smaller communities but there might not be any readers to see and click on your own post. Do not worry if your market that is specific only has smaller or larger communities, it merely means you’ll need to place in a bit more work.
Occasionally a subreddit will have a bizarre and unusual name (even if it’s very popular), which will help it become even more difficult to locate. In cases like this, you may simply learn about it when it’s linked in the opinion section of a distinct subreddit. (Key example: /r/loseit, a weight loss subreddit with over 200k subs).
Create Share & The *Right* Content It
Now we’re getting in the more varying part of content marketing. What is considered unbelievable content in a single community, may be down voted into oblivion in another. This really is where your deep marketplace and subreddit research comes into play.
You must get a first hand understanding of your target audience:
What type of content do they tend to upvote (humor blog posts, informative Youtube videos, self-posts…?)
What content issues are well received… which ones cause controversy?
What type of post would work for YOUR wanted result.
It really depends on your end goal. Are you really trying to drive traffic to your site? Subscriptions to your newsletter? Social media shares and connections?
A couple things to bear in mind when putting together a post:
Headline must invoke interest, or convey some advantage for clicking. Normally you ought to stay away from “Buzzfeed” sort titles. They are typically seen as annoying and will cause individuals to downvote or report you as site spam.
Do not ever ask for upvotes.
Do not offend people with title or your content. (Tip: Controversy = upvotes. Bad = downvotes.)
If you’re interested in attempting the Reddit paid advertisements, I’ve discovered that my normal-looking titles and links received the finest CTR, CPC, and conversion rate. Your best option is to assemble a killer piece of content, analyze it out with a few different titles by posting it to a couple of different subreddits and see what garners the most booking. Subsequently, after you understand what works, use the post that performed best as your starting advertisement creative. That way, you’ll at least be starting off with sponsored posts on the right foot.
By Marcus Wakefield
On the Expert Joseph Plazo Reddit Masterclass
The Post Chain 