Improving LEGO’s Social Media Engagement
Company Values
The iconic Danish toy company, LEGO, is guided by a set of core values that lays the foundation for its corporate culture and business practices. At the heart of LEGO's philosophy is a profound commitment to fostering imagination and creativity. LEGO’s emphasis on instilling creativity can be seen through their mission statement: “to inspire and develop the builders of tomorrow”. Central to the LEGO experience is the pursuit of fun, with the understanding that play is not only enjoyable but also an essential element in the holistic development of individuals.
Learning through play is a fundamental part of LEGO's values. The company designs its products not only for entertainment but also with a focus on aiding the development of crucial skills including problem-solving, teamwork, and fine motor skills. Quality is another integral piece of LEGO's brand identity, as LEGO consistently delivers high-quality, durable toys that adhere to safety standards. Additionally, LEGO demonstrates care for the environment. The brand institutes responsible and ethical practices, aiming to minimize its environmental footprint. Furthermore, inclusivity is a guiding principle for LEGO, as the company strives to create products that resonate with a diverse range of children and adults. The company actively seeks to be inclusive, ensuring that its products appeal to individuals from various backgrounds, identities and interests. Collectively, these values have played a pivotal role in LEGO's enduring success and its reputation as a socially responsible and innovative brand, providing joy and learning through play to generations of individuals worldwide.
Social Media Analysis
Between a 3 week period of analysis starting on October 18, 2023 and ending on November 8, 2023, LEGO posted on Instagram 28 times, which is about 1.3 posts per day. 18 of these posts were videos and the other 10 were images. LEGO’s Instagram is the most interacted with social media page of theirs, with 9.6 million followers. The largest number of posts (32%) were creative demonstrations; which were videos or pictures of completed lego sets, showcasing the products LEGO offers and capturing the creative and fun spirit of the brand. This next largest category is collab post, coming in at 25%. These posts showcase LEGO sets, characters or cartoons of another brand such as Marvel, Disney, and Nintendo. 14% of the posts fall under the “holiday” category, as the brand was showcasing Halloween themed posts leading up to the holiday. Another 14% of the posts were described as fan builds; as the company shared sets sent into them and built by real LEGO fans. Posts regarding social advocacy made up 7% of the total posts. The final two categories, behind the scenes and humor content each make up 4% of LEGO’s posts during this time period.
Out of all these categories, the collab posts gained the most engagement. This was calculated by examining the average amount of likes and comments under posts from all categories. The high rate of interaction from this category is most likely attributed to fan bases from these other brands who don’t often interact with LEGO’s content, but are being shown it due to the algorithm. For example, if someone who is not interested in LEGOs is a Star Wars fan, they may be shown content of LEGO’s that involve Star Wars and like the post because it has to do with an area of their interest. The category with the next highest interaction rate is creative demonstration. This is most likely due to these posts being the most visually captivating out of all the content on LEGO’s Instagram. The third most popular category is holiday. Similar to the rationale of the collab posts, people who don’t typically interact with LEGO’s posts but have been interacting with Halloween content may be shown LEGO’s Halloween themed posts.
LEGO’s Tik Tok account is their least interacted with social media page with only 276 thousand followers. Within the three week time frame, they posted 16 Tik Toks which is about 1 video every 1.3 days. During the three week evaluation period, LEGO was running an event where “master builders” would compete to create the best botanical LEGO display, to advertise their new botanical garden and flower LEGO sets. 25% of all tiktok videos were coverage of this event which was the second largest category behind “takeovers”, which are video-diary style videos where individual builders in the contest would produce their own content to be published on the LEGO tiktok. The third largest category is creative demonstration posts at 19%, followed by holiday posts at 13% and behind the scenes content at 6%. Unlike the other two platforms evaluated, each category generated about the same amount of interaction. This may be due to the overall lack of interaction across their Tik Tok, or the small quantity of posts. It is important to note that LEGO’s Tik Tok produces the most unique content across all their social media pages; the botanical garden challenge made up the majority of their posts, and was not covered at all on their Twitter or Instagram.
LEGO’s Twitter page has 1 million followers and the most posts out of all their social media accounts throughout the three week period of analysis as they posted 29 times which is about 1.4 posts per day. During the three weeks, LEGO’s Twitter is composed of 13 pictures, 5 videos, 6 text posts, and 5 polls; and additionally has the largest number of post categories, the largest being collab posts at 20%. This is followed by polls (17%), humor (14%) and creative demonstration (14%). Also at 14% is the category “LEGO masters” which are tweets about the reality TV show on FOX where pairs compete to build the best LEGO structures. Social advocacy posts make up 10% of the Twitter feed across the three weeks and holiday, question and fan build categories each make up 3%.
Perhaps the most striking statistic from the analysis of LEGO’s Twitter is that the category with the most engagement was the question category. Although it was tied for the smallest category, on average it generated the most interaction from users. Thousands of LEGO enthusiasts responded to the open ended question asked; one question generated 4 times the amount of comments as the post with the second highest comment count. Unsurprisingly, collabs and creative demonstrations are the next leading categories for engagement, as most of these posts were the same exact ones posted to LEGO’s Instagram that also generated high engagement. The final noteworthy statistic on LEGO’s Twitter is that posts in the humor category generated higher averages of interaction on Twitter than Instagram, most likely attributed to the different ways consumers use these platforms, as humorous posts appear more on Twitter.
Increase Engagement Plan
To improve LEGO’s social media and its engagement, the brand should start with their weakest social media platform: Tik Tok. LEGO’s Tik Tok is a strikingly struggling platform in comparison to LEGO’s other social media accounts, as their Instagram has 9 million followers and generates thousands of likes and comments per post, while their Tik Tok only has a few hundred thousand followers and often only gets hundreds of likes and comments per post. These statistics alone illuminate the need for a separate and specific plan to improve LEGO’s Tik Tok by itself.
Tik Tok relies on an algorithm to show users content they are interested in, and is the social media platform where brands have the largest chance of having their content organically placed in a user’s feed, even if they don’t follow the account. The best way to increase authentic viewership and interaction between Tik Tok users is to collaborate with influencers. The influencer industry is worth $16 billion as of 2022 (Wies et al.), and LEGO is missing out by not curating influencer content. Posting videos made by influencers on LEGO’s Tik Tok page will increase the chances of users who don’t follow LEGO to come across their content organically. For example, if popular influencer Emma Chamberlain were to appear in one of LEGO’s Tik Toks, this video would appear on the “For you page”, or feed, of her myriad of fans because Tik Tok’s algorithm shows users content that it knows they will enjoy based on their past activity. Although users may not necessarily enjoy or interact with LEGOs, they will be shown this video because of all the Emma Chamberlain content they interact with. Although LEGOs Tik Tok is producing creative and captivating content, the people in these videos are LEGO master builders who nobody knows, cares about or trusts. “Followers are willing to trust in influencers’ opinions even if they know that the respective post was sponsored. They do so because they expect influencers to be sincere, truthful, and autonomous even in collaboration settings” (Borchers and Enke). Even commissioning influencers to create sponsored content on their own accounts using LEGO products and tagging LEGO will help improve interaction on LEGO’s Tik Tok because it will generate people’s interest in the brand which may lead to them authentically receiving content from LEGO’s Tik Tok page, if they don’t seek them out on their own.
To enhance engagement on LEGO's social media as a whole, a tailored symmetrical communication plan is proposed. The two-way symmetric model relies on honest and open two-way communication and mutual give-and-take rather than one-way persuasion (Girsang et al.). At the forefront of this plan is a dedicated social media team assigned to actively monitor and respond to comments, messages, and mentions, fostering direct and meaningful interactions with LEGO enthusiasts. In general, LEGO is producing captivating and engaging content, but an increase in fan interaction via social media will increase engagement and improve brand reputation by showing customers their opinion is listened to and values. In addition, regular user-generated content (UGC) campaigns will be initiated, encouraging fans to share their unique builds and creations. Selected UGC will be featured on LEGO's official platforms, acknowledging and celebrating the vibrant creativity within the community. LEGO already features fan builds on their social media pages, but in a noninteractive way. UGC campaigns will generate more excitement around these fan creations to drive engagement. Some of these campaigns will be competitions, where the individual with the best build wins a prize to encourage more fans to participate; while other campaigns will be holiday themed, as the analysis found that holiday posts already generate decent engagement. Interactive polls and surveys will be conducted to solicit feedback on existing products and preferences for new releases, with transparent sharing of results and potential implementation of community-driven ideas. Based on the analysis of LEGO’s Twitter, consumers have a high engagement rate with questions, which is something LEGO should use to its advantage by producing more interactive content. Live Q&A sessions with LEGO designers will provide fans with direct access to the creative minds behind their favorite sets, fostering a sense of connection and openness. Through these initiatives, LEGO will create an interactive and more engaged online environment, establish a positive brand perception and strengthen its relationship with the LEGO community, ensuring the brand's continued success on social media.
Works Cited
Borchers, Nils S., and Nadja Enke. “‘I’ve never seen a client say: “tell the influencer not to label this as sponsored”’: An exploration into influencer industry ethics.” Public Relations Review, vol. 48, no. 5, 2022, p. 102235, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pubrev.2022.102235.
Girsang, Chyntia Novy, and Dorien Kartikawangi. “Two-way symmetrical communication pattern: Company strategy to build engagement through social media.” Jurnal Komunikasi, vol. 13, no. 2, 2021, p. 271, https://doi.org/10.24912/jk.v13i2.11191.
“The LEGO® Brand - about Us.” About Us - LEGO.Com, www.lego.com/en-us/aboutus/lego-group/the-lego-brand?locale=en-us. Accessed 22 Nov. 2023.
Wies, Simone, et al. “Finding goldilocks influencers: How follower count drives social media engagement.” Journal of Marketing, vol. 87, no. 3, 2022, pp. 383–405, https://doi.org/10.1177/00222429221125131.