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Briana Chen

Beyond Meat

Launching the first Beyond Ambassador Program @ USC

Overview

I worked with the Brand Marketing team at Beyond to create a C&U strategy focused on capturing all parts of the funnel through NIL athletes and student ambassadors. The pilot Ambassador Program launched at the University of Southern California (USC) in the fall of 2022 following a student advisory group program in September.


I led the execution of both the student advisory groups as well as the Ambassador Program—this included the creation of an Ambassador Program playbook from scratch, meeting weekly with each ambassador to discuss deliverables and next steps, and planning/initializing key brand moments on and off campus.


This led to 500,000+ impressions, 18 new strategic food service leads, 25 student-led events, 6 micro-influencer connections, and numerous student organization activations. The program will be returning in the fall of 2023, and will be scaled nationally to other campuses in the U.S.

ROLE

Digital Marketing Intern (co-owner of Ambassador Group project)


COMPANY

Beyond Meat


TIMELINE

Oct - Dec 2022


SKILLS

Brand Marketing

Food Service & Outreach

Executive Communication

Influencer Marketing

Multi-Channel Marketing

Problem

Before Fall 2022, Beyond Meat did not have a marketing strategy on how to best reach college & university (C&U) students despite it being a large consumer segment with great potential for spearheading the climate- and health-related change Beyond Meat is all about.

Solution

Create a grassroots marketing campaign at USC to drive awareness and increase trial. Ambassadors would execute this via social media posts, B2B small business leads, and support of existing brand-led initiatives.

Goals

  • Brand Awareness: Social media content creation
  • Trial & Consideration: Blind taste tests, Beyond The Original Orange Chicken (Panda Express) promotion, student-led events sampling Beyond products
  • Conversion: New food service accounts

Tactics

Upper Funnel: Brand Awareness

Middle Funnel: Trial/Consideration

Middle Funnel: Trial/Consideration

Each ambassador was responsible for creating and posting content on Instagram per month. These included event highlights, product taste tests, and everything in between. Our main goal: let the ambassador have the creative freedom so that their content is as authentic as possible.

Middle Funnel: Trial/Consideration

Middle Funnel: Trial/Consideration

Middle Funnel: Trial/Consideration

We had students contact student organizations to introduce Beyond into USC conversation. We saw Beyond at fraternity/sorority traditions (i.e. Row Cup), residential events, and school-wide get-togethers such as the farmer's market and even a sustainable fashion show.

Lower Funnel: Drive Purchase

Middle Funnel: Trial/Consideration

Lower Funnel: Drive Purchase

We measured conversion through the number of new food service accounts added. Our ambassadors conducted outreach to on- and off-campus restaurants/QSRs that didn't carry Beyond. Once successful, these leads were passed to our food service team for execution.

They loved it. They totally loved the fact that we were giving away Beyond Meat Jerky at the event.

USC Ambassador

Results & Key Learnings

  • 500,000+ total impressions
  • 18 new strategic food service leads
  • 25 student-led Beyond sampling events
  • 6 micro-influencers connected
  • 3 student-led giveaways executed
  • 150+ Change.org signatures for Beyond on menus

  1. One semester is not enough time to fully make an impact. Many events are year-long; maximizing on campus requires an approach that captures students throughout the seasons.
  2. Ambassador management is time intensive. New specialized roles within the company are ideal to ensure efficiency.
  3. Ambassadors have a lack of experience with FS B2B lead generation. It's difficult to do cold outreach to restaurants/QSRs without adequate training beforehand.

As an athlete, I’m always aware of what goes in my body. Beyond Meat is a brand I trust.

USC Student Athlete

Next Steps

Based on our learnings, we established the following future steps:


  1. Create a  new position to manage student ambassadors on campus.
  2. Shorten to a 1-week advisory group to identify opportunities.
  3. Develop retailer audit checklist for ambassadors.


The Ambassador Program will return in Fall 2023 as a year-long program.

Copyright © 2024 Briana Chen - All Rights Reserved.

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