Can Lego Teach Us Something About Social Media?

Last year Lego released a social media platform for kiddies to share pictures of their Lego creations. A bit of a risky move on behalf of Lego, given that social media can be a place of concern for parents, making sure that their children are safe online. Many parents will ask whether it’s a safe place for their kids and whether they might be open to abuse by other people.

However, Lego has created a platform that responds to these concerns, and I think provides a great example of creating an experience that speaks directly to their target audience.

Let me explain.

The platform targets seven-year-old to share a picture of their Lego creation. But there is a second audience here that needs to be convinced that they want to use the platform as well, and that is the parent of the seven-year-old. The way that Lego has created this platform is that they have incorporated the parents into the process. For example, when you go to the sign-up page, there's a picture of an adult Lego man and a little kid Lego kid and they're holding hands, with the idea that the kid has to get their parents to help them sign up for this. The initial barrier is that the child will need an email to sign up in the first place. Perhaps an older kid in their early teens would be able to circumvent this, but for younger kids they're going to be reliant on their parents to create that account for them. Certainly, the email is sent and they need to confirm it before the account can be opened up. A kid can't just get on and create an account without, in theory, their parents being aware of it.

The other thing is that once they are on board, when the kid loads the pictures of their images they’re actually vetted by real people before the images are released into the platform. This means that there can be no inappropriate material published by people that are perhaps trying to use the platform for purposes other than actually allowing kids to have a bit of fun and to share their Lego creations.

In addition, they also have created a language within the platform which is all emoji-based. There’s no commenting, there's no text, and the whole interaction is that you share the post of your creation and people like it, love it, share emojis on it. There can be no bullying with the way that people interact with your post. It's a very safe environment for kids to be introduced to a social media space. It's kind of really interesting that Lego have been able to be so on-point in terms of their target audience.

How does this translate into learnings we can use in our social media approach?

Lesson 1 – talk to people in their own language

Lego has focused on and used the right language to talk directly to their target audience. In fact, they've created their own language that is easy for kids to use using ‘Lego emoji’s’.

When you are on a social media platform, responding to your audience in the right language and tone is essential. If you happen to be talking to seven-year-olds, the use of emojis and using Lego characters to express key messages makes complete sense. The question for you as a business using social media is what is the right kind of language for you to use?

Lesson 2 – make the action you want people to take super easy and simple

The simplicity of the platform is another key learning. Making sure that when we are putting in call to action or putting forward an offer that we make it simple, clear, and easy for people to understand is essential. After all, you are vying for attention against a million other things that are going on in the social media platform, let alone what else is going on around a person.

Lesson 3 – make sure you answer all the questions

One of the key barriers that Lego needed to overcome with this platform was to address the safety concerns of the parents. While not their target audience, parents were key to getting kids onto the platform to use it. Lego overcame this by being up front and address these concerns head-on by telling kids to get their parents to help them setting themselves up on the app as well as being upfront about the vetting procedure for any content that is to be published.

As a lesson for others, this is a no-brainer. When you're talking to people, and your potential customers online, answer their questions. Lead with value, so that you're answering the questions before they ask them. This means that you're offering a transparent experience and people are not having to think hard about whether they should buy from you.

Lesson 4 – make it easy to share your message

Lego have taken a real life ‘experience’ with their product and they have made it into a shareable digital format that allows people to easily share the word, putting referral and word of mouth marketing onto steroids.

Think about your own product and how people are using it in the real world, and how you might use it to take that into the online world to help people share and talk about your product or service. If there is not an obvious way to do this, is there a way that you can encourage your customers to actively share photos of them using or engaging with your brand in some way? Content that is generated by people – not the brand – are worth their weight in gold. It provides you with tacit recommendations by showing real people using your product or service as independent proof points that other people should also consider using your product.

How might you apply these key lessons to improve your approach to social media for your business?