The Born and Bred Awards, and how they failed to use social media

After last night’s Born and Bred (could-have-been-better) Awards 2015, I noticed not much has changed from the previous shows. Twitter and Facebook were ‘lit’ as viewers of the Awards ranted away, less than pleased, about the event. Just search the hashtag #BnBAwards2015 on Twitter right now.

For digital marketing, it sold, seeing as the hashtag trended yesterday, but what was it trending for? Organizers, listen up! Here’s how social media will teach you a thing or two.

If there is any one time you will see a country, and in some cases others too, come together to talk about one thing, it’s when awards shows around music are on. What are you trying to get them to talk about?

1. There seemed to be no official hashtag for the awards from the organizers themselves and the one that trended was started by Tweeple. If you’re planning an event of this magnitude, create your own and let the people follow it. It helps with feedback collection after the show if you want to plan better for the next event or if you want to know how much hype your event raised.

2. The tweets / statuses from last year were clearly not taken into consideration. Once again, many were disappointed in the nominees that won. Whether it was based solely on votes received via SMS portals remains unknown, but Zed Twitter could not believe their eyes, offering suggestions on who could have won and why. The venue was changed so that’s a change, but what lessons did they learn from the advice that was put out on social media platforms last year? I’ll wait…

3. There was no live tweeting from the Awards account itself! There was no backstage or audience shots taken to hype up the event for people who were ‘twatching’ (watching/reading tweets about event) the event like myself so we were stuck on vague knowledge from other people’s statuses/tweets like ‘WTF is he wearing?” to “Who is this amazing singer?”.  We had to imagine the event :”( It would have been a great platform for Award event managers to let the people not watching who’s winning what, in real time. They could have hired someone to do all that if there was no one else to so it (take a lesson from Ellen Degeneres here).

On their Facebook page there was very little action, with status updates about winners and performances totalling to exactly 9, when we all know there was so much more action than that in the over 4 hours the show was on for.

The Born and Bred Zambia account on Twitter was last updated in November 2012!!! The app gods mourn…

Rule of social media marketing: Do NOT create official social media pages and leave them without content!

4. There was no on-screen integration of messages: tweets/statuses about the event could have been scrolled at the bottom of the screen for viewers not on social media to feel like their thoughts are being echoed. It could have been done at intervals if they like. That gives any event being broadcast on TV a sense of magnitude, that people are actually talking about it. It also helps show messages from the events organizers and may help with showing celebrities Twitter Handles or Facebook page names that some fans, somehow, may not have known before.

5. If the budget’s too tight, relocate: this has nothing to do with social media but if the constraint was on how much was allowed to be spent on the event, bring in creatives. They know how to create anything with anything. Third party assistance may cost a little bit, but may be way less expensive than winging it. Sure they had help in setting up, but the end result? Again, follow the hashtag #BnBAwards2015.

I will not talk about the music video winners and who should have won in their categories. That’s for TV directors and producers to judge. If you know any who would like to explain the technical/technological aspects of it all, I have extra plenty space for  a new blog post.

I doubt there is an Instagram account even just for pictures taken throughout the event, or a YouTube channel for viewers who missed and may not catch the possible repeat show. Please let me know if they exist though.

I’ve broken down how the ZMA Awards of 2013 should have been better tech-wise in a previous blog post so there are useful tips in there too. Click here to read.