{"id":4116,"date":"2014-02-26T08:51:08","date_gmt":"2014-02-26T08:51:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.printivity.com\/insights\/?p=554"},"modified":"2025-07-30T18:44:22","modified_gmt":"2025-07-30T18:44:22","slug":"case-study-how-lego-uses-content-marketing-to-increase-sales","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/insights.printivity.com\/case-study-how-lego-uses-content-marketing-to-increase-sales","title":{"rendered":"How LEGO Uses Content Marketing to Increase Sales"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

As children, we all knew LEGO as those building block toys that we spent hours playing with. But LEGO has turned into something much larger than those blocks that we would make into castles or planes. What I\u2019m interested in is the empire that LEGO has built with their Content Marketing<\/a>, and that\u2019s what I\u2019m going to write about today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

LEGO creates a wonderful universe with their content marketing to create hook people into their world\u2013kids and adults alike. They\u2019ve spun such an incredible story around these little simple bricks that LEGO\u2019s has almost become a lifestyle of imagination and creativity. These special twists they\u2019ve put on magazines, LEGO sets, and social networks make their audience want to engage in the LEGO world, to follow their news, to share the news, and most importantly, to desire their goods.<\/p>\n\n\n

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\"Get<\/a><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Making a LEGO catalog that kids LOVE to read<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

LEGO does this neat trick with their LEGO Life Magazine. This magazine (which is a very thinly disguised catalog) makes kids \u201creally, really WANT\u201d to read it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Take a look at what is really going on here. If Lego had just created a catalog<\/a>, kids would find it boring and Mom would say \u201cno way! I\u2019m not giving you a catalog will just make you whine for more toys.\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n

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\"a<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

But instead, LEGO creates a magazine which is \u201cfull of comic adventures, games and puzzles, building challenges and Cool Creations\u201d (pulled from their website). Now, this little kid wants this FREE magazine from Mom. Even if Mom doesn\u2019t want to spend money on new LEGO\u2019s, it\u2019s hard for her to tell to say \u201cno\u201d to free entertainment!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This magazine just plants a seed in this little kid’s mind that makes him want LEGO\u2019s even more. When they’re in the toy aisle of the store, guess which toy they’re going to cry over?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How can you use the lesson of the LEGO magazine to grow your business?<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s hard for customers to say no to \u201cfree\u201d, so create content that provides \u201cfree entertainment\u201d, \u201cfree useful news\u201d, or \u201cfree education\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you find something related to your business, and something that appeals to the kinds of customers who buy from you, maybe you can create \u2018free content\u201d to hook your customers! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let\u2019s say you need to sell to adults\u2014what do you do?<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Over at River Pools and Spas, a swimming pool contractor based in Virginia, they created \u201cThe Most Educational Swimming Pool Blog in the Country<\/a>\u201d, full of great pictures of homeowners with lounging around in their awesome pools!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you were a homeowner who wanted a pool, could you see yourself spending a lot of time digging through their information? Wouldn\u2019t you want to share nifty facts with other friends who might be interested in a pool?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

See what happened there?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you can do the same thing with your blog, you can hook in potential customers in the same way!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(By the way, in case you were wondering: they only provide service in VA, MD, DC, and WV. But with a blog so cheap to maintain, they can educate the entire country just to take in sales leads from 4 states.)<\/p>\n\n\n

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\"Cover<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

How LEGO meetups drives desire for LEGO products<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Let\u2019s remember for a minute that LEGO\u2019s original goal is to sell more by publishing free content.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Content Marketing, you sell more with a free content service; each piece of content you create is another opportunity for customers to discover, follow, and share you. At some point, LEGO realized that events could work like content did. That\u2019s their motivation between Lego Club meetings at Lego stores.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Think about it: they\u2019ve already prepped kids to want LEGO\u2019s and to spend a lot of their time playing and thinking about LEGO\u2019s. If create a meetup that parents and children could go to, the parents have an opportunity to take their kids to play (and it\u2019s \u201cfree\u201d). These boys and girls have a great time there. But when they leave the LEGO store, can you guess what happens?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Taking in the lessons from LEGO\u2019s Content Marketing<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

As Joe Pulizzi says in this article, LEGO uses Content Marketing to create more opportunities to sell more. The LEGO Club was created in 1966<\/a> with this very purpose in mind. If you create a magazine that is \u201cfun catalog\u201d, your customers will WANT your catalog.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

LEGO was one of the first companies to take the opportunity to spark their customers imagination by building a bigger world (by producing free content) around their company. These days, they\u2019ve really taken off with this original idea: they have a social network, a theme park, a social platform (for their adult audience), and a couple feature films! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, this is how LEGO takes advantage of Content Marketing. It was important to give you a real world example successful companies using a Content Marketing strategy to show you the ins and outs of a campaign.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before you start on your own Content Marketing campaign, make sure you read our introduction to Content Marketing, and read this excellent book<\/a> written by Joe Pulizzi. His book contains many more examples of how real companies (of all types) use Content Marketing to increase sales.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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As children, we all knew LEGO as those building block toys that we spent hours playing with. But LEGO has […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":4596,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,8,13],"tags":[42,65,134,184,292],"class_list":["post-4116","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-growing_your_business","category-marketing_strategies","category-running_a_small_business","tag-attract-customers","tag-blogs","tag-content-marketing","tag-digital-marketing","tag-marketing-investment"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/insights.printivity.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/LEGO_Cover-1.png?fit=1280%2C720&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pgont1-14o","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/insights.printivity.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4116","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/insights.printivity.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/insights.printivity.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insights.printivity.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insights.printivity.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4116"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/insights.printivity.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4116\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10190,"href":"https:\/\/insights.printivity.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4116\/revisions\/10190"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insights.printivity.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4596"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/insights.printivity.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4116"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insights.printivity.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4116"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insights.printivity.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4116"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}