DUKKY

Love it or hate it, Valentine’s Day is just around the corner. However, this year, saving money is a big concern for consumers, and coming right after Christmas, they may be less willing to make major purchases for Valentine’s Day than in previous years.

To combat this new frugal streak, marketers are becoming more creative and relying on technology to keep customers engaged and encourage them to make purchases.  For example, this year Macy’s is hosting its first promotional contest through Twitter.

The Sweetest Tweets contest, which officially kicked off on February 1st, encourages consumers to interact with the brand on Twitter by tweeting short love notes (less than 140 characters) and attaching the #sweetesttweets hashtag. The winning Romeo or Juliet gets a three-stone diamond ring.

As Martine Reardon, Macy’s executive vice president of Marketing, explained to the New York Times, “Twitter happens to be where people are today, so we thought it would be fun to feature it in the campaign.” The hope is that the promotion will go viral, keeping customers thinking of Macy’s as they head out to do their Valentine’s Day shopping.

Despite the Valentine’s Day theme, Reardon also claimed in a press release that the contest is not limited to couples, saying “Valentine’s Day is all about expressing love and devotion to friends and family. There isn’t a better way to express those emotions than connecting with the people in your life in fun, unique and modern ways. The Sweetest Tweets can be about a declaration of love or about thanking your loved ones for always being there. The possibilities are endless.”

So, how are people responding to the contest? Tracking the hashtag at WhattheHashtag.com, we see that today, 5 days after the contest started, 1,014 people have tweeted the hashtag. The contest appears to be picking up steam, too, with more and more people tweeting it every day.

Unfortunately, not all of those Tweets are legit. The contest seems to have fallen victim to hashtag abuse, and the most active Twitter user to tweet the hashtag today is merely attaching  it to random tweets and tweets about other contests. Still, it’s a good start, and the momentum is building.

But will the contest attract shoppers to Macy’s stores? That’s the million-dollar question, and we won’t know until after the holiday.

Dukky can help you harness the power of social media for your Valentine’s Day promotion by enabling you to quickly and easily create viral promotions that can be shared via email, SMS and social media.