Chipotle: Facebook Fan Page Launch in Action

Spurred by a delicious burrito lunch the other day, I decided to check out Chipotle’s social media and discovered Chipotle’s Facebook page just a month after its official launch. Chipotle is exactly the kind of brand that can leverage social media, because it generates raving fans.

Chipotle Mexican Grill is a different fast food chain. Chipotle serves “Food With Integrity”, which (according to their website) “includes things like unprocessed, seasonal, family-farmed, sustainable, nutritious, naturally raised, added hormone free, organic, and artisanal.” When possible, they do things like using naturally raised pork instead of pork from CAFOs (Confined Animal Feeding Operations) or locally grown produce, and they build restaurants with a simple yet efficient design that allows customers to create their own burrito and still be served quickly.

Chipotle is definitely dipping its burrito in the social media arena. They have

• A cool, flash-driven website
• A recently released place-your-order iPhone app
• A recent contest for the best image/video about your favorite burrito combo
• A Facebook page just launched on August 31st

Since I can’t possibly review all these things here, I decided to visit the Facebook page and see how it’s doing.

The site was created by combining several unofficial sites, giving Chipotle a jump start to its almost 500,000 fans. Compare this to Taco Bell, perhaps one of the country’s largest fast food brands, which has about 20% more fans than Chipotle despite being far, far larger (did I mention Chipotle is a natural brand for generating fans? Taco Bell is cheaper, but when you eat at Chipotle, you’re saving the planet, dude!)

Starting the fan page this way also creates some challenges. Official fan pages typically have lots of posts by the brand, and hope to get fan responses to those posts. Unofficial pages are usually a lot of fan posts– good, bad, or irrelevant – with no brand response. Chipotle has a TON of fan activity and is doing a truly impressive job in responding to all that fan love.

• A Chipotle representative is answering every single post by the fans, and signing his name (Colin). These aren’t canned answers – he’s got license to be cool and even make a joke here and there. Great job, Colin!
• The fans are talking – and how! There are 10-15 posts from fans each day. Some of them just say how much they love Chipotle, but a large percentage are asking when a Chipotle will open in their city.
• Colin, diligent guy that he is (he was answering on Sunday) “checks his list” and lets people know whether a Chipotle is scheduled for the town they ask about. If it’s not, he lets them know that their vote is counted and not to give up hope, things can always change.

So the page has kind of turned into this “where is Chipotle opening stores” app powered by Colin with his list. A few other topics come up, but it keeps getting back to “when are you opening another store in Smithville, North Carolina”. This is a great resource for fans, who now have a place to ask, and to Chipotle, who can use this input to gauge where there’s a lot of interest in a store.

This is a great start to the transition, and clearly the fans are asking for this information. Here are some more things Chipotle could do to create a stronger brand voice on their fan page and offer more than just answers on future stores. I’d like to see Chipotle posting a bit more often – even a couple times a day is unlikely to annoy fans. Some of the content they might post includes:

• What is Chipotle up to? Sponsored events, store openings, bike races – anything Chipotle is willing to sponsor is likely to interest fans
• What’s CEO Steve Ells doing? Since he is the figurehead of Chipotle, talk about his latest ideas and events
• Feature a supplier of local produce or naturally raised hogs from time to time. Share the challenges and delights of raising food organically. (I could actually see a great blog here– there is a lot to say about the challenges of bringing organic and natural foods to a nationwide chain, and great learning for the future of our planet.)
• What other “green initiatives” are going on? What ideas do fans have for going green? What can fans do at home to follow the same guidelines Chipotle uses in its stores?
• What other suggestions do fans have for the chain? There was an interesting exchange about breakfast burritos, where a fan asked for breakfast burritos, and Colin asked the fan whether he meant breakfast for breakfast, or breakfast food at lunch hours. This could have generated more responses if it had been an original post by Chipotle instead of a response to a fan post.
• Extensions of other marketing activities – it would be great to talk about the iPhone app, and I’d love to see how many more votes that contest would have received if it had been run on Facebook as well as the Chipotle site.
• Finally, while I think the tunein newsletter lists is useful (Colin directs fans to sign up for the newsletter covering their regional area to get updates on local activity) I’d love to see some social media tools to cover this as well – perhaps Twitter accounts – as many of the younger generation are tuning out, not in, from email as a source of information.

Well, that’s enough for now – I’m off to get myself a Chipotle burrito – Sunnyvale location!

Added note: For more information on Chipotle and an interview with Colin, read Rick Liebling’s blog EyeCube. Rick and I were thinking along the same lines!

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