A presentation that David Armano, global strategy director at Edelman/Edible, made at the Florida Citrus Mutual annual conference this summer focused on marketing via social media. His company is the Florida Department of Citrus’ (FDOC) consumer marketing agency. Following his presentation, he and FDOC Executive Director Shannon Shepp discussed the use of social media for marketing Florida citrus.
“We found that that’s (social media) the space that we can compete in today … We’ve noticed that the marketing environment has changed,” Shepp says. “It (social media) is mostly where folks are marketed to today.”
Armano says that about half of all people who are online use social media. He says audiences get some information through search engines such as Google. “And then the other way is the information coming to them through things like social networks,” he says.
Armano says people like to be told stories about products, and Shepp says the FDOC has been doing that. “We started with grower stories a couple of years ago, and we’ve started introducing our consumers to who actually grows what goes into their orange juice in the morning,” Shepp says. “They do want to know where it comes from. They do want to have that personal connection.”
Shepp adds that “it’s time now that we know that we’re going to have a stable crop and we know that we’re going to have plenty of orange juice to take a look at how we get back to the Department of Citrus that once was. And the actual mission was enhancing demand.”
For decades before HLB drastically reduced Florida citrus crops and the FDOC marketing budget, the agency marketed Florida citrus products heavily via television advertising. The FDOC now conducts most of its promotional effort via social media.
Hear more from Shepp and Armano:
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