The Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, USA-headquartered National Frozen & Refrigerated Food Association’s (NFRA) consumer public relations campaigns achieved significant results in 2014, the trade group reported on February 18. With the use of storytellers, media relations programs and partnerships, plus an aggressive digital and social media strategy, the association was able to amplify its voice across traditional, online and social media platforms – increasing the frozen and refrigerated food conversation by 18%.
NFRA’s Real Food. Frozen campaign, which told the story of real ingredients and chef-inspired recipes, generated over 610 million campaign impressions. Meanwhile, the Dairy Aisle…Beyond Cool PR drive provided culinary inspiration to expand shoppers’ definition of dairy “staples” as it generated more than 407 million impressions. Both campaigns produced over eight times the number of impressions realized in 2013.
Among accomplishments were:
- A successful Easy Home Meals blog grew NFRA’s social media audiences significantly. The blog provides timely content that supports campaign messages and serves as a hub for sharing member and partner contributions. The Easy Home Meals Facebook page generated 300,000 likes through optimizing content to coordinate with search trends, and using paid advertising to drive more traffic.
- NFRA fueled positive consideration for the frozen category on the Huffington Post media platform. A new infographic encouraging consumers to “Make Mealtime Magic in the Frozen Food Aisle” depicted tips, trends and statistics while a visual slideshow titled “10 Recipes You Can Whip Out to Impress Unexpected Guests” served up recipes for common entertaining quandaries. The placement was one of Huffington Post’s top ten most successful content integrations of 2014.
- Partner blogger Chef Billy Parisi represented NFRA in national media by sharing culinary expertise and a home-style approach to family cooking. His tips and recipes were featured in Parade, Men’s Health and on The Daily Meal.
- Chef Aida Mollenkamp conducted a satellite media tour for NFRA generating 20 broadcast and radio interview segments garnering 10.3 million impressions. She shared campaign and product messages with seasonal tips and time saving shortcuts for holiday meal preparation.
These and many other accomplishments successfully reached consumers, effectively increasing awareness of the diverse and innovative products that can be found in the frozen and dairy food aisles of supermarkets and other retail outlets, and helped to change the conversation about frozen and refrigerated foods.
NFRA aims to build on these efforts in 2015 with new storytellers, increased media exposure and an enhanced social media strategy.
