Wakefly BlogHow to Integrate Reddit into your Marketing Strategy

Reddit is an immensely popular social media site, ranking #10 in the US traffic (according to Alexa). Reddit provides funny, helpful, and informative content to a unique, passionate set of user personalities.

Reddit is considered to have a complete culture of its own. Reddit users aka “Redditors” have a complete democracy of their website’s content. By utilizing a user-based vote system, the community decides what is popular and what is not. Users can then decide further topics that should be discussed by separating their website into individual niches called sub-reddits.

The website’s users have a habit of weeding out bad content and making sure the best content rises to the top. Unlike Facebook and Twitter where you see all content from all friends and followers and your wall or feed, Reddititors will most likely only see the best content from the subreddits they subscribe to on their feed.

Reaching out to a unique and focused set of users is a marketer’s dream. To be successful in doing so, you must first understand the culture of Reddit.

1. Understand the Culture of your Audience on Reddit

The first part of understanding your audience is finding your niche. As said before, content on Reddit is organized into sections called “subreddits”, each with its own unique rules and followers. The overview of each subreddit can be viewed on the right-hand side. It will go over information like the subreddit’s rules, amount of subscribers, and users currently online.

Once you have read through the rules section, read through a few of the posts on the “hot” section. It’s important to understand the information a particular subreddit is focused on. The comment section perfectly encapsulates the humor and discussion style of Reddit. Comments that are not constructive and lack in content such as “Great post!” are voted down, whereas jokes and well-formulated opinions are voted up.

2. Post engaging Content

After understanding the culture of the subreddit you appeal to, the next step is to create engaging content your audience will enjoy. There are many strategies to create content based on what is already popular. It is considered a best practice to keep creating content that you think is quality, the only risk is the possibility that your post is voted down or not voted on at all.

It is also suggested that submitted content between 9 am and 1 pm EST is ideal. This study has its variables and many will argue that it is entirely random. Personally I believe it comes down to each individual subreddit’s user base and a little bit of luck.

3. Analyze the Results

After your first post, be sure to record the time of day for future analysis. The more data the better, so be sure to monitor the results. The main tool of analysis is custom social metrics:

Custom Social Metrics – Record brand perception in a notebook, word document, or excel spreadsheet. As a lot of data analysis is subjective, this tool can prove to be more valuable in the case of understanding Reddit’s unique demographics.

Understanding the vastness that is Reddit is a daunting task. The best way to learn from scratch is to identify the culture, post based on your perceptions, and learn from your results. By following these steps, you can create a completely different style of a marketing campaign for your content.