Audrey Tan Straits Times 7 Feb 18;
SINGAPORE - Another ministry is paying social media micro-influencers to post on Instagram to spread word of an issue.
This time, the Ministry for the Environment and Water Resources (Mewr) has engaged them to raise awareness on climate change and what people can do to help.
This comes after the Finance Ministry was reported to have engaged over 50 of them to do the same for the Budget process.
A Mewr spokesman told The Straits Times that it has paid 28 micro-influencers, with a combined reach of 100,000, for a three-month marketing campaign which started last month.
According to a Forbes article, micro-influencers refer to everyday consumers who have a following of between 1,000 and 100,000 on social media.
The initiative, called the #ClimateActionSG Instagram Photo Contest, involves the micro-influencers posting photographs of themselves practising eco-friendly habits in Singapore, and urging others to do the same.
Some of them have posted photographs of themselves on bicycles, while others pose with air-conditioning remote controls displaying a set temperature of 25 deg C.
One user, @tacomels, has more than 900 followers. She posted a photograph of herself with an aircon remote control and wrote: "Did you know that things we do in our everyday lives actually have a larger impact on the earth and its environment? By not doing our part to conserve energy, we are actually contributing to global warming and this affects the lives of many animals around the world."
Another user, @marcusnai, posed on a bicycle and captioned the photograph: "Global warming is real and we should do our part by reducing carbon footprint. What's more, we can burn some calories while making a difference to fight climate change."
A campaign brief seen by The Straits Times shows that each post costs up to $35. The Mewr spokesman said on Tuesday (Feb 6) that the approximate cost of the campaign is $1,500.
The Finance Ministry had declined to say how much it is spending on its campaign, except that it is in accordance with market rates.
The Mewr spokesman said: "The aim of the contest, which runs from Jan to Mar 2018, is to get online audiences familiarised with the actions behind climate action and to boost awareness and engagement on our social media platforms... The use of micro-influencers helps us to amplify our message beyond the platforms that we own."
This marketing campaign is part of the Government's efforts to get more people talking about climate change this year, which has been designated as the Year of Climate Action.
It is a national initiative comprising a series of outreach efforts to raise awareness that everyone can make a difference to climate change by limiting his or her carbon footprint.
There are more than 400 posts with the #ClimateActionSG hashtag on Instagram, although the paid posts are usually tagged with an additional #sp, which means sponsored post.
Ms Ginny-Ann Oh, director of public relations firm AsiaPRWerkz, said engaging influencers to spread word of an issue could help reach out to the young people of Singapore with varied interests.
"Using different influencers to raise awareness can be useful in achieving exposure for the campaign. After the first outreach, Mewr can study the effectiveness of the posts and explore taking the collaboration with some of them to the next level," she said.
Ms Oh added that in general, campaigns are usually more successful if advertisers are selective and work with influencers whose personal values resonate with the campaign.
Another ministry engages social media influencers in S$1,500 campaign
Nigel Chin Channel NewsAsia 9 Feb 18;
SINGAPORE: The Ministry of Environment and Water Resources (MEWR) has reached out to social media influencers to promote an Instagram photo contest, as part of a digital campaign on climate action.
The estimated cost of the campaign is S$1,500, the ministry said in response to queries from Channel NewsAsia.
MEWR's move comes after the Ministry of Finance last month engaged influencers to promote the upcoming Budget 2018 and related public feedback sessions on Instagram.
Instagram posts by influencers with the hashtags #ClimateActionSG and #SustainableSG have sprung up promoting the contest as early as Jan 18. They include posts on what actions they have taken to fight climate change, and also ask others how they have done their part.
The posts also asks followers to "share your climate action tips and tag @mewrsingapore, hashtag #ClimateActionSG and #SustainableSG to spread the word" for a chance to win an iPhoneX and other attractive prizes. It also includes the hashtag #sp, which stands for sponsored post.
More than 400 posts were tagged to #ClimateActionSG and over 1,000 tagged to #SustainableSG as of Friday (Feb 9) morning.
A check by Channel NewsAsia on Instagram showed that the influencers engaged have between 500 and 16,000 followers each.
A post by Instagram user minicolee, who has 15,700 followers, had 710 likes. She had posted a photo on Jan 29 of her riding a bicycle and said in her caption that "one of the things I believe firmly in is public transport" as Singapore is "too small to justify owning private transportation and being a hazard to our environment".
Another user, tacomels, said in a Jan 30 post that she hopes "everyone can start doing their small part for the environment cause a small change from all of us can really add up to a large change." Her post had 175 likes.
The MEWR said in response to queries from Channel NewsAsia that the "micro-influencers" were engaged through the ministry's social media agency and as part of their digital strategy to promote an Instagram contest.
The contest, which runs from January to March, is aimed at boosting awareness of climate action.
The ministry is also "working closely" with the agency to review the entries submitted by the micro-influencers, it added.
Since the campaign started, they have worked with 28 influencers who have a combined reach of 100,000, MEWR added.
"The aim of the contest is to get online audiences familiarised with the actionables behind climate action and to boost awareness and engagement on our social media platforms," MEWR said.
"We also hope to sustain the use of the #ClimateActionSG hashtag beyond the contest and for netizens to continue using the hashtag whenever they post photos/updates related to climate action in the future.
"The use of micro-influencers helps us to amplify our message beyond the platforms that we own," MEWR added.
Source: CNA/ng
