This article first appeared in Digital Edge, The Edge Malaysia Weekly on April 25, 2022 - May 1, 2022

Last year was filled with uncertainty, but many brands in Southeast Asia rose above the challenge and delivered stellar campaigns that captivated audiences in Malaysia. These brands were recognised at the #BestOfTweets 2021 Malaysia Awards for their efforts to continuously push the limits with sincerity that benefited society and strengthened their relationships with their communities while being creative.

Entering the third year of the pandemic, social media continues to be the prime spot for people to spend their time looking for information and the latest updates on topics that interest them. Screen time will still be as high as ever, providing an opportunity for marketers and advertisers to showcase a wide range of new ideas this year, helping their brands secure a place under the spotlight.

Before we learn the techniques to win in this arena, let’s take a look and give a round of applause to the winning brands of #BestOfTweets 2021 Malaysia Awards. They successfully made us laugh, cry, reply and retweet, leaving a lasting impression on all of us.

Last year’s winners raised the game on Twitter by tapping insights from the talk on the platform. They were not afraid to lead the conversations and not just to follow but to dial up their innovation through experimenting with new features, as well as exploring bold and creative ideas.

If you are a brand or agency looking to join the arena, here are four tips from the Twitter Next Team that will help you deliver a knockout campaign.

Understanding the value of Twitter: It is crucial to understand the medium and how to best use it to your advantage. When we observe brands that won #BestOfTweets this year, they have a good understanding of the value of Twitter and how to best use the platform to get the most out of their campaigns.

Understanding that Twitter is a broadcast medium: Tweets are viewable, searchable and shareable by anyone. To which we saw winning brands coming to Twitter to scale their message to a wider audience.

Understanding that Twitter is conversational: Conversations are Twitter’s currency. We observed winning brands using conversations to plan for their campaign or to inform marketing decisions. Twitter was used as a litmus test to understand consumers’ preferences and reactions before, during and after campaigns. Such practice is true for Axiata (@axiata) with the launch of the #AdvancingToZero campaign in 2021 that won them the Best Campaign for Driving Positive Change in Society by tapping the climate change conversations.

Understanding that communities gather on Twitter: We have seen communities on Twitter growing stronger through the years and fans gather on Twitter to discuss what’s happening and to talk to one another. Tapping the value of Twitter and understanding how your audiences use the platform will allow you to plan well and get the most out of your campaigns.

Develop a campaign that aims to win: Every year, Twitter’s #BestOfTweets awards brands in many categories and each category is unique. The best way to win the fight is knowing which category you are competing in.

Leveraging Twitter to launch something new: In this route, the winning brand must demonstrate how it strategically designs a campaign based on the Twitter Launch Formula, sequencing a series of Twitter creative formats to perform impact.

Leveraging Twitter to connect with cultural moments: To win in this area, brands must understand, implement and act on notable cultural events such as Chinese New Year, Ramadan, Deepavali and Christmas.

Using Twitter as a purpose-driven marketing tool: A spotlighted brand must leverage the strong belief and authentic voice and use Twitter to take a stand for societal issues and drive impact consistently through a combination of paid and organic campaigns.

Leveraging video solutions on Twitter at its best: A shortlisted campaign must demonstrate how you embrace the best practice of using a video solution, while also diversifying a mix of video formats to drive an ultimate campaign impact.

Ideate the campaign that extracts a unique creative value of Twitter: A selected brand can go deep into human-centric insight through conversation and turn the finding into creative ideation that starts on Twitter and becomes worth talking about. This is what Milo Malaysia (@MiloMalaysia) did by tapping the nostalgic element for many Malaysians that left them wanting to reminisce about the good old days.

Leveraging Twitter best practice: After you know the game you anticipate entering, do not forget to embrace the best practice in using Twitter for your campaign. Twitter has the best practice to “Launch and Connect” with your audience, including tips to tweet like a pro for video, image or even going live.

Best practice for launch: Whether the campaign launch is a new brand, product, feature, positioning or promotion, super charge it with these tips:

• Do not launch and forget. Launch and continue by dividing your campaign phase and maximising results by following a Twitter Launch Formula — tease, reveal and reinforce;

• Feature three to five video creatives to drive a bigger launch impact; and

• Aim for a campaign of at least seven to 10 weeks to drive higher intent and favourability.

Best practice for Connect: If your aim is for performing the best by using Twitter to connect with cultural moments, here are some notable thoughts you should embody:

• Select the right connection moment that resonates with your brand voice, whether it is an event, occasion or trend;

• For a moment that you are trying to connect, tell a compelling story with three types of content — hype, participate and react; and

• Drive purchase intent by having multiple formats in your Connect campaign.

AikenMY (@AikenMalaysia) may be a newbie on Twitter but it aimed to launch a big splash that converts Twitter fans and won the Best Campaign from a Newcomer. Knowing that younger audiences turn to social media to find solutions for their skin problems, AikenMY (@AikenMalaysia) came up with a plan to drive sampling for its anti-acne skincare range — Aiken Tea Tree Oil — on Twitter. The simplistic idea of the campaign, in mixing up the languages along with local lingo, resonated well with the audience and generated conversations across the country.

While there are customised tips for each creative format — image, video and text — the universal recommendation to help you win in the arena is based on these mindsets:

• Be short and focused;

• Win with strong visuals; and

• Be explicit with your branding.

Avril Chua is the brand strategist for Twitter Next, Southeast Asia. Twitter Next is the microblogging behemoth’s brand strategy unit.

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