Free Burritos And Pride: How Chipotle Leveraged Twitter, SMS And Instagram

Chipotle is busy with marketing initiatives this month. The brand is giving away $1 million worth of free burritos for their mobile promotion during the NBA season close and celebrating pride.

Free Burritos Result In Rapid Texting

Chipotle coined the verb “freeting,” which the brand describes as the act of tweeting “free Chipotle during the 2019 men’s professional basketball championship series every time an announcer says the word ‘FREE’ on air during a game.”

🚨 Free Burrito alert 🚨Text FREEZBYK9 to 888222. #ChipotleFreeting TERMS: https://t.co/02TnDt1ykH Msg & data rates may apply. Privacy Policy: https://t.co/q4YJ6L1KhM

— Chipotle (@ChipotleTweets) June 6, 2019

During the NBA Championship series games, Chipotle tweeted a unique keyword every time “FREE” was said on air. Each keyword unlocked 500 free entrees during the first half of the game and up to 1,000 free entrees during the last half of the game, which means the first 500 and then 1,000 fans to text each keyword to 888222 received codes for free entrées.

500 burritos called and they want you to text them: FREEWQ34U to 888222. #ChipotleFreeting TERMS: https://t.co/02TnDt1ykH Msg & data rates may apply. Privacy Policy: https://t.co/q4YJ6L1KhM

— Chipotle (@ChipotleTweets) June 6, 2019

In addition, the Chipotle campaign waived the delivery fees for orders placed through the mobile app and through DoorDash during the NBA finals.

Leveraging The NBA Social Following Without Partnering With The NBA

Chipotle is not partnering directly with the NBA, but is still leveraging their event and specifically the concept of second-screen viewing. Mobile Marketer defines second-screen viewing as “the time people spend commenting and checking in on mobile apps like Twitter while watching destination live TV.”

Twitter has reported the NBA is the most talked about professional sports league on the social network, and by promoting free burritos during the NBA finals, Chipotle tapped into the enormous NBA following.

Chipotle CMO Chris Brandt said, “We know that basketball fans are some of the most passionate fans in sports, so we're putting even more, about one million dollars more, on the line by ‘freeting’ through these final games.”

Celebrating Pride Through Shoppable Instagram Posts

Chipotle tapped into another niche audience and launched limited edition Pride apparel through their Instagram account with the brand’s new slogan, “Love What Makes You Real.” Supporting The Trevor Project, a nonprofit providing crisis intervention and suicide prevention services for young LGBTQ individuals, Chipotle is donating $10.50 for every shirt and $7 for every hat sold.

Chipotle is taking multiple initiatives to go digital and target niche audiences. When the brand partnered with DoorDash, it saw a 667% increase in weekly delivery orders. Plus, Chipotle has been updating and promoting their new app and celebrating pride with shoppable Instagram posts. As consumers go digital, Chipotle follows closely.

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About the Author

Victoria Pallien is a Marketing Communications Writer at Digital Media Solutions (DMS), the fastest-growing independent digital performance marketing company. DMS helps its clients accelerate growth by deploying diversified and data-driven customer acquisition solutions that deliver scalable, sustainable and measurable marketing results. DMS performance marketing solutions connect the right consumers with the right offers at the right time to achieve the marketing objectives of our clients. DMS is continually innovating to provide new and emerging media and technology solutions that minimize waste and maximize results across the most competitive industries. Since its inception, DMS has demonstrated incredible year-over-year growth which has earned recognition on the Inc. 5000 list in 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018.

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