Facebook | Choqoa

So it’s been one month at Choqoa.com and what happened? At first I’m really happy myself to finally have created a place to share my passion. I really should have started this earlier, but speaking with hindsight is always easy. Blogging takes time and energy, though passion fuels the fire, so let’s rock on to make the story pay off. It’s a great after all to synthesize my addiction in words that I can easily share with you.

At present the site is gaining visitors from all continents, which very nice to spot and also the main reason for me to blog in English. In the map below you see where visitors come from and I indicated for fun the growing zone of cacao, which is about 20° up and down the equator. See for yourself:

Next to direct traffic and already some interesting Google search results, I also get a good amount of visits through my Cacao Aficionado photos on Flickr. It’s encouraging to see that both hobbies strengthen each other. The Choqoa on Twitter account also helps a little to drive int’l traffic. It’s pleasant to spot some people here that are equally into (digital) marketing and share the curiosity and passion for chocolate (jacksonbr, jomarbr, timwillems, Emakina). Stats are picking up slowly, there definitely is still work to do for building more extensive traffic, so I also created a Choqoa Facebook FanPage to which I invite all of you to join too!

And also off line in real life, a lot of encouraging things happened. On my chocolate safari in Düsseldorf I discovered new brands like Hussel, Coppeneur and Maglio, and also the Neuhaus bars bought later on in Antwerp seem interesting. I went behind the scenes at chocolatier Goossens, and all of the people whom I had taste from ‘my’ chocolate reacted exactly as I hoped, though most of the time I was rather nervous awaiting their first impressions.
I went networking on the Max Havelaar FairTrade Colloquium and was very enthusiast meeting the people from Callebaut over there. They were charmed by my story and invited me to share more about our passion. In return I learned a lot from them too, and above all they were really helpful in providing a lot of new information on the cacao market. Their Account Manager was even so friendly to provide me with the origin samples for that other great offline experience: my first wine & chocolate pairing.

As for actual business resulting from this blog, I’m excited by getting a freelance job for one of the world’s most famous chocolatier brands, and I’ll be helping to develop their online & digital strategy. Next to that, it’s still about exploring various opportunities for how we eventually really may get into cacao business: whether it is venturing in a self-owned project or by joining the industry at a marketing related position, that is still open. Next milestone will be the Salon du Chocolat, next week in Paris!

The new Belgian brand Zaabär has not much ado with dark origin cacao, they mainly focus on flavoured bars, tempered chocolate with a variety of herbs and spices, very similar that other relatively new brand Newtree. However here’s a nice social marketing story worth a blog post for me.

A while ago I got invited to join a Facebook group from Zaabär chocolates lovers. Not sure how they found me, but most likely they must have been searching on location and interest. Wich is already interesting by itself.

Accepting the invite I discovered Zaabär is a new Belgian chocolate brand, launching from a shop in Brussels. Clicking along brought they have created a profile for ZaaBär, and also group “Zaabär chocolates lovers“, and even a fan page. This brand was not just getting on board and creating merely presence, but it also gave the impression that they knew what they were after: “Zaabär is new on facebook and would like to communicate with you.”
I was glad to discover this new brand, not only because of my addiction to chocolate – so they were spot on inviting me, but since I got to know the brand through a social network. Their recurrent activity on FaceBook kept getting my attention and soon I was wondering how far I could push this brand in reaching out to their people.

By inviting people to become fan, or friend with Zaabär on Facebook, the brand was continuously trying to enhance visibility and reach a.o. in the profile news feeds from people joining. After a couple of days when the fan groups started to get some base, I thought that in helping them to get this visibility the first members would deserve to be rewarded. So I posted a message on their wall asking to reward the Facebook members who are thriving their awareness by joining Zaabär. For instance by sending coupons or sample bars. In the end we got to know the brand, but it’s all about the product isn’t it?

Now that you’ve invited people to the “Zaabär chocolates lovers” group, why not send us a coupon or sample bar to really convince us why we should love Zaabar?

To my surprise (well, they had no choice …) they listened instantly to my suggestion, and posted an answer back on the wall:

You are completely right, Evert. Have a look on our events. We have created a special offer for our first Facebook movers. Be aware, first meeting tomorrow at 3.40pm to get 25€ free chocolates.

Isn’t this just wonderfull? Not only are they reaching out and listening to what people are asking. In their response they are clever enough to create the “Zaabär offer for first Facebook movers” event. Another Facebook tool allowing for another way to push trough the feeds. Spot on. This is how they are setting it up.

Saturday, at 3.40 pm, we offer 25€ of free chocolates bought at our Factory Shop. To get this offer, come exactly at 3.40 at our Factory Shop with three of your friends.

This offer is only aimed to our group members. Print the page of Facebook where you figure and give it to the shop seller or simply give you name.

Not sure if this isn’t too restricting but anyway that’s exactly what I did. Got down to Brussels, and discovered this brand and their bars in real life, collecting 25€ of free chocolate. And off course checked the secret of their potential success, with a very helpful and friendly shop manager showing me around – he even added me as a friend on Facebook, off course. He mentioned several people really reacted on their online Facebook announcement and came down to the store, a small step, but it was a first effective step! The Zaabär group now counts some 240 members and keeps updating its page with news, pictures and events, like the recent Zaabär Megastore opening.

As mentioned in the beginning of this post, Zaabär is offering sweets rather than chocolate, and that’s not really my cup of tea. But do check out Zaabär on Facebook, and share your comments on what you think or like about this.

(Note: I posted this story earlier on another blog, but re-edited it for Choqoa.com)