Discover South Lake Union
The Project
To promote the Love, South Lake Union Valentine’s Day scavenger hunt, Fearey asked influencers to preview stops on the hunt leading up to the event. Fearey selected a range of influencers to appeal to SLU’s diverse Instagram following, including SLU’s first experience working with a dog influencer. Photos shared showcased shops, restaurants and art installations and provided followers a sense of connection after nearly a year of a global pandemic. The impact of these posts was undeniable: Fearey’s strategy resulted in SLU’s Instagram engagement rate increasing by 189% over the week prior and gaining 100 new followers, all in just one week.
Our Results
In the weeks leading up to the event, Fearey reached out to local influencers whose audience overlapped with that of South Lake Union. Once finalizing several influencers’ participation, Fearey coordinated with the South Lake Union retailers to let them know when each influencer would be stopping by, to ensure each visit went smoothly. Fearey primed the impact of each influencer by promoting the event on social media before, during and after the event.
On its own social accounts, Discover SLU posted teasers and information on the scavenger hunt. Fearey created a Love SLU overlay for retailers to use to increase participation in the scavenger hunt. On the first day of the hunt, SLU posted a sneak peek Instagram/Facebook story showing what to expect when followers began the hunt on their own.
Despite a major snowstorm that weekend, Discover SLU saw approximately 130 new followers from 2/8 (the first influencer post) through 2/15 (conclusion of the Valentine’s Day scavenger hunt). Instagram engagements for the week also skyrocketed to 1,383, up 189% over the week prior and nearly half of all engagements for the month. The engagement rate during the week 4.7%, for comparison the engagement rate for the entire month of February was 2.1%. Though only two days, the scavenger hunt was the most attended hunt hosted by the Let’s Roam app in the Seattle area, with nearly 173 teams, made up of 283 individuals, participating.