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Andy’s Answers: How Scripps Networks used social media to launch Cooking Channel

2 min read

Brands & Campaigns

What began as a simple question for Jeffery Kissinger and his team at Scripps Networks — “Would it be possible to launch a brand through social media?” — became a reality May 31 when Cooking Channel went live.

It didn’t happen overnight. It took nearly a year of planning and community building to make it happen. But the results paid off, as on launch day the channel had more than 30,000 Facebook fans and was No. 5 on Google Hot Search.

At our recent BlogWell event in New York City, Kissinger shared the details behind how they pulled this off. His tips:

  • Find a brand voice. Scripps picked a community manager who was internal, passionate about food, connected to the brand, connected to the team and passionate about social media.
  • Create a brand destination. By launching a Facebook community before the official launch of the brand, Scripps had the benefit of having a place to direct people. Every ad, cross-promotion and news release pointed people to this community.
  • It’s worth the risk. This whole concept was a risk. Not only were Kissinger and his team launching a brand, but they were also doing it in social media. They considered hundreds of scenarios, mostly on whether consumers would like what they were doing. But in the end, they decided that either way, it was worth it to find out.

Watch Kissinger’s case study.