Month: September 2021

“We’re starting from a place of what’s already happening with the brand, what are consumers doing to associate themselves with the brand,” explained Jarrett, adding that the chain doesn’t want content that’s too “manufactured.” “We’re trying to build our [social] capability as fast as possible to increase our relevance with Gen Z, as are so many other brands.”

The chain’s focus on fan-generated content and influencer marketing to increase engagement and grow followers across social channels comes as marketers face a more challenging paid social landscape due to iOS 14. Over the last year, brands like GameStop, Sephora, Wendy’s, Dunkin’ and more have leaned into influencer marketing and social media content to get the attention of younger consumers. 

Aside from the music video, 7-Eleven is also looking to find “aspiring social media influencers who are trying to grow their audience” via a sweepstakes program called Fuel Your Fandom, explained Jarrett. The program helps 7-Eleven highlight various products that people would purchase for football viewing parties, as it is tied to the football season, while also spotting potential influencers to work with.

7-Eleven will “invest in [winning influencers] and help build their credentials via a social media influencer training camp as well as a spot on our social media influencer team where they will be able to participate in all of our influencer activities going into the 2022 year,” said Jarrett. “It’s a way for them to get real work as social media influencers and build their presence, space and work with a big brand.” 

It’s unclear how much 7-Eleven is investing in the strategy as the brand did not share those figures or immediately respond to follow-up questions. However, Jarrett did note that for the “fourth quarter of 2021 you’ll continue to see investment stepped up versus what we started with” and that in 2022 the chain sees “influencer and social as opportunity for increase[d investment].”  Per Kantar, 7-Eleven spent 4.5 million on media during the first quarter of 2021, up from $2.2 million on media during the same time period in 2020.

Investing in organic content and fan-generated content could work for “an established brand like 7-Eleven,” said Duane Brown, founder of performance marketing shop Take Some Risk. “Everyone knows the brand.” 

That said, Brown cautions against relying too much on the strategy. “Just relying on organic/earned media or just paid ads or just SEO to run a business isn’t great as you put all your eggs in one basket,” said Brown. 

The chain isn’t relying solely on fan-generated content. As previously reported by Digiday, the chain returned to TV advertising this year after a five-year hiatus.

Overall, 7-Eleven is looking to create “more complex campaigns, not just one and done posts,” said Jarrett. “We want to drive longer-term for brand equity, awareness, consideration and be the first choice with customers. We’re keeping our eye on the long game.”

The New York City-based company has been around since 2019. But after last year, the company says more advertisers have looked to it in hopes to reach multicultural audiences. Earlier this year, Canela Media hosted its first-ever Upfront presentation and has recently acquired clients like McDonald’s, Lexus, Amazon, Verizon and Nissan. According to a Canela spokesperson, Hyundai and Target have already committed to brand partnerships in celebration of Hispanic Heritage Month.

Digiday caught up with Canela Media founder and CEO Isabel Rafferty, to talk about being a young, Latinx-founded media company and why holding advertisers accountable to their diversity commitments matters.

This interview has been edited lightly for clarity.

After 2020, a slew of advertisers made diversity and inclusion pledges. How did that impact Canela Media?

Canela Media got the chance to be part of the two biggest forces happening in the market. One was the pandemic, where streaming grew rapidly. The other way is the social justice movement that has changed advertiser’s investments in multicultural communities forever. Our business boomed from having to beg advertisers to now being in a situation where we have all these brands that have never done multicultural work are saying how do we do it? Although it’s positive to see that change, there’s still not enough of an investment [compared] to the audience. When you start digging with some of these brands with huge press releases advertising multicultural [efforts], you start seeing the numbers. Percentages look amazing, but the reality is the dollars are not where they need to be. 

Why do you think that’s the case?

The first thing that always got cut was advertising to minorities if you have budget cuts. But now, advertising to Latinos is not what they’re cutting. They’re not willing to.

Over the last year, how has that been remedied? How do you keep advertisers accountable?

When you dig into it, a lot of these companies say things because it looks good, but they’re not investing. Sometimes there are good intentions at the CMO level, but they don’t have the infrastructure below to make it happen. It gets lost and they go for whatever is easier, like putting money in Univision and calling it a day. It’s not being very authentic in their strategy. However, it’s going to take time. We’re going in a good direction. 

As we see more advertisers and brands willing to have minorities and people like me at the table, that are willing to be outspoken and hold them accountable, that’s the only way to make change. You need to have minorities at the table having those conversations. We should not be an afterthought when they make those decisions. We need to be there ahead of structuring their campaigns. 

What’s the importance of advertising with minority-owned media companies like Canela Media?

We’re built by Latinos for Latinos. To grow in the Latino community, authenticity is required. We can always tell when a brand is trying to reach us authentically. The expertise that we bring to the table on how to connect with us meaningfully and create content that resonates with those audiences (and subsets of it that’s not putting all Latinos in one bucket), that’s the difference.

You go to any other service and they’ll say, ‘Here’s a bucket full of Latinos. I don’t know who they are, but I can target them.’ No, let’s think about which audience, messaging, content and how we’re going to connect with them authentically with culturally relevant content. Working with a platform that is built by Latinos for Latinos, it doesn’t get more authentic than that.