How social media influencers enabled a B2B company to drive awareness and engagement with their target consumers

Abstract

In the autumn of 2016, TE Connectivity (TE), a global engineering business to business (B2B) leader in connectivity and sensor solutions, launched its first social media influencer campaign to increase brand awareness, change perceptions and grow the contact database. The influencer campaign was launched in conjunction with its sponsorship of the Andretti Formula E team, and was paired with an incentive — a sweepstake to win a trip to Andretti Autosport to see the engineering behind motorsports and an exclusive lunch with Michael Andretti, team owner and former champion race car driver. YouTuber Jason Fenske, creator of the channel Engineering Explained, flew to the United Kingdom to learn and film three videos about TE’s involvement in Formula E, the first all-electric international street car race series, and its parallels to the increasing consumer electric vehicle trend. With over 100 TE products in a Formula E car and a major player in the automotive industry, the racetrack-to-the-road thematic videos were concepted and produced to attract engineers from diverse industries and across the business spectrum. The success of Engineering Explained led to influencer programmes with TE’s sponsorship of rLoop, a crowdsourced team of engineers participating in Elon Musk’s SpaceX Hyperloop Competition. Leading up to and during the first competition, TE produced a five-part documentary chronicling the formation of the team, the technology and the excitement of the challenge to create the fifth mode of transport, which was amplified to an engineering audience through a multi-influencer distribution strategy. During the second competition, a YouTube influencer, Linus Tech Tips, travelled to California to film a 20-minute Facebook Live segment the night before the competition to capture the tension, nerves and excitement as the rLoop team put the finishing touches on their prototype, and produced a post-competition YouTube video on the technology of the Hyperloop. This paper comprises a practitioner’s insights into and lessons learned from activating B2B influencer programmes.