Social Media Mike

Over 20.4 million people will participate in the Great Shakeout, an annual precautionary opportunity to practice what to do during earthquakes. And for this college demographic, it's a time to check their phones and onto social media to pass the time during the period of waiting.  Perfect.  The Shakeout will begin at approximately 10:16am on October 16, 2014. Knowing the exact time, we can predict that students will be on their phones - so we are getting them when they are on.  For the #IServeLA initiative, our goal is to promote the hashtag and educate readers to what the program is. Participating will be a sense of belonging for a great cause. Here is the copy*:

"Be apart of something bigger as we give back to the community. The #IServeLA initiative transforms the educational experience for Cal State L.A. students, while making a meaningful difference in hundreds of neighborhoods across Los Angeles. Taffany Lim of the Center for Engagement, Service and the Public Good says, “Our students are going to be out there pounding the pavement.” And they sure are!"

We have twice the opportunity because after the drill has ended, students have to walk over to their assigned meeting point, again another opportunity students will be checking social media. A few minutes later, we will push the promotion of our Cal State L.A. mobile app with a very popular Instagram vantage point of view with university color branding. 

Here's the copy*: "See what everyone is saying in the social section. Download the Cal State L.A. mobile app. " Currently at 16,700 downloads (10/16/14) since its release in May 2014.

Here's the story behind October 3rd.

Cady Heron likes Aaron Samuels, but she couldn't talk to him because Regina George and him used to go out. After she survived her first three-way-call, she had Regina's blessing to talk to Aaron more and more. And on October 3rd, he asked her what day it was. She replied, "It's October 3rd."

If you want to get into specifics, Aaron asked Cady what day it was in 12-grade calculus. In the opening of the movie, Cady enters into "real school" and her first class is shown to be math class with Ms. Norbury, who is also the coach for the Mathletes. So that means her calculus class is first period. Oddly enough, Ms. Norbury taught 12-grade calculus in first period where she first meets Cady, but why was Janis and Damian in there, but not Aaron. Long story short, October 3rd is now a reference into pop culture as the day Aaron Samuel asked Cady Heron what day it was.  Goal: Use Pop Culture with Cal State L.A.'s Social Media Strategy: Knowing October 3rd was coming, I created a photo from a screen capture and replaced Aaron Samuels head with our mascot's. You always have to tie in your brand in some way, so I referenced my university's mascot, Eddie the Golden Eagle. The message straight from the script, "And with Regina's blessing, I started talking to Eddie the Eagle more and more. On October 3rd, he asked me what day it was." #parody #meangirls #October3rd

Also tried to mimic a scheduled social media posting with the exact time Aaron asked Cady, which was around 9am after she day dreamed about him, in first period. But it seem as to social currency, users like to see their favorite brand use it first so they could be the first. Brands like American Eagle Instagrammed one at 8:30 AM.

The Results: Effective engagement and interaction with our users. In one hour, interaction increased 6.7% on the photo from our followers base. Users commented showing love for the university for being one with the students. Followers took to twitter with a screen shot to show their friends. On Twitter, our post reached 3,072 impressions and 595 users engaged with it, for an increased engagement rate of 19.4%.

rOn October 3rd, Eddie the Eagle asked what day it was. "It's October 3rd." #CalStateLA pic.twitter.com/Wk2FMeHxG0

— CalStateLA (@CalStateLA)

October 3, 2014

I love my school for this 😂 #csula pic.twitter.com/VdxA8UsV5x

— V ☯ (@BecauseVane)

Integrated Marketing with videos, posters, and social media.

Goal: Encourage students to engage in three specific behaviors to improve student communication: Download mobile app, follow us on social media, forward campus emails to personal email accounts. Strategy: Communicate desire behaviors as tips for students, while informing them of some recent developments on campus that contribute to student success. Created videos, light box posters, and social media campaign.

Videos – 15 second video tips to be posted on social media, once a day for two weeks.

Posters – displayed in light boxes and relevant to student with Text message conversation.

Social media – personalized interaction and engagement.

Email – email direct to students to notify them of recent improvements including campus wifi, the 24-hour Open Access Lab, the Graduate Resource Center, and more.

Results: Monitor increases in social media following and mobile app downloads.

#FirstSteps Social Media Campaign (Emotional appeal)

Stop what you’re doing and look at your feet. You’re here at #CalStateLA. These are your first steps toward an academic journey. Your first steps toward a degree. Your first steps toward engagement, service, and the public good.

So, where will these first steps take you? Use #CalStateLA and #FirstSteps and show us your arrival on campus.

_

Thurs, Sept 25 – soft launch Monday, Sept 29 – Video and reposting other examples. Monday, Oct 6 – Collect examples, create storfiy, and homepage slider.

Cal State L.A. Communications and Public Affairs office was originally on social media for news media outreach. Now, we see that its a massive communication tool used to connect with students. As we are in the stage of rebranding our university, we are also revamping our social media strategy. Here it is:

Strategy First, brand awareness. Targeting mostly current students. Have students be familiarized that we are the official accounts for Cal State L.A. and that we have a presence on major social media platforms so they can communicate with us. Promote more of the (hashtag) #CalStateLA out there in replace of #CSULA. Moving away from the acronym C.S.U.L.A.

Every year FORBES ranks America's Top Colleges based on graduation rate, student satisfaction, post-graduate success and student debt. This year, they tried something new. To engage with the nation to encourage postings onto social media. Who has the most school spirit? The school who has the most post will be displayed on the interactive map online.

We want to get on the map. So we stategized.

Target Audience:

Current students

Incoming students

Alumni

Actions/Rules:

Must use #MyTopCollege hashtag

Must use #CalStateLA hashtag

Only Twitter, Instagram and Facebook messages count

Contest ends July 30

Strategies:

Telling new students at orientation, other events

Can tag old pictures/posts with the hashtags

Our first initial message is to first make us known, to challenge and to encourage. Also an incentive to be spotlighted in the issue.

Messaging: It’s on! Help put Cal State LA on the social media map! Use #MyTopCollege with #CalStateLA and lets show the world who we are. 

What makes our university special to you? Tell using#MyTopCollege with #CalStateLA for a chance to appear in FORBES magazine.  

There's not much recruiting in Marketing into the creative side at Cal State LA and I was so happy I met someone who graduated from Cal State LA who is now working in an advertising agency. We talked about the best and worst part about working for a creative.

Copy Writers are the one who come up with the ideas, post messages onto social media

Art Directors shoot ideas down

Strategy team does the market research (not really the one coming up with ideas)

The Good: the company culture: there is always food and you will always be fed.

The Good: For some, it's dog friendly, walk around with bare feet.

The bad: Late nights; you may leave at 1am because art directors are on your case and always around you wondering if you are finished with your work.

The bad: If you lose a client, your job is up in the air. You may be let go or the agency may keep you for other clients. 

The good: with a smaller agency, you get to know everyone a little bit more. The bad: with a larger agency, you don't know everyone. "Who's that guy? I've never seen him before. - Oh thats the new copy writer."

You may see a picture or an article on your friends Facebook page on a prank, a branded installation, or an interactive activity. This is experiential marketing. 

Shareen Pathak of adage defines experiential marketing as messaging you can touch, feel, or view in a physical space. It is on the rise in recent years as marketers of everything from automotive to entertainment aim to make their brands a tangible presence in consumer's lives either in person or digitally through video, tweets, or instagrams. 

Marketers are spending more on experiential even though return on investment is low. It was reported that experiential is growing faster for companies with more than $1 billion in total revenue with events, attractions, and custom physicality. However not all, experiential marketing has to be that expensive, it just has to make a statement and strategized to make users react in some way either through tangible means or spreading the word digitally. 

From the article, "What Is Experiential Marketing, and How Can It Be Measured?," Jeff Benjamin, chief creative officer at JWT North America, mentions that experiential is what brands do in the world that get people "participating." He called it an evolution of what interactive advertising was a few years ago -- anything that pulls people into the brand, digitally or physically.  At the end of the day, social media isn't "physical," however, experiential can be sharable through video and a custom hashtag. 

To test out experiential marketing at my University (Cal State LA), I set up a social art piece message board that builds conversation, engagement, pride, and excitement leading towards commencement (graduation) ceremonies. It is centered around the focal point of Cal State LA Graduating class as we encourage them to write something, such as: Why I love Cal State LA; what they plan to do after Cal State LA, How are you #IamCalStateLA; favorite memory.  Writing on the message board with the suggested prompts is an emotional connection to our campus, one of which we are lacking. It makes you think back to why you came here, the struggles you faced, and thinking back to the four years of your life as a college student. We like to think Cal State LA propelled them with the tools to make the students successful. 

To increase brand awareness, we set up this message board in the center of our campus in front of the book store were there is a lot of foot traffic. Is it especially viewable to the students entering and leaving the library as it is finals week. It will also be up the during commencement week as events will be taking place near the message board. 

Setting up was easy and was not costly. To set the boards up, the total cost was $88, pens and twine was provided, the yellow super adhesive sticky notes (1,000 count) were $35. And we hope it will be worth it as other students participate and read what other people wrote as the countdown to graduation continues. 

Although this experiential installation is about tangible set ups and an interactive activity, we want to spread the word though social media and encourage students and graduates to share with us what they wrote using the official #CalStateLAGrad. So far on Instagram, there is a reported 116 uses of the hashtag and we hope to see results. Previously, we created another hashtag #IAmCalStateLA for the inauguration of our new University President and it generated solely on Instagram an incredible 1,049 images. 

Customers will always have something to say. They can either complain via telephone customer service or Tweet about it. But when they post it onto social media, it could quickly turn ugly for your brand. So how frequently are you responding to your customers on social media? 

Consumers will punish brands that fail to respond quickly or address any issues. With social media, we see that consumers are interacting more and more frequently with brands via social media, whether it is a mention or a complaint. Customers have high expectation for a quick response. Lithium Technologies reported that 53% of customers who expect a brand to respond to their Tweet demand that response comes in less than an hour. That figure skyrockets to 72% when they have complaints. When companies don't meet those lofty response expectations, 38%feel more negative about the brand and a full 60% will take unpleasant actions to express their dissatisfaction and escalate their negativity. 74% of customers who take to social media to shame brands believe it leads to better service. 

What Brands Could Do: Some brands are not fully involved with social media and don't see the benefits of it. The good brands who are on social media and respond to comments/concerns are ones that are one step closed to providing better customer service. The account managers or social media team should typically have a calendar and timeline of when to respond to comments. (From what time to what time, who will be scheduled to do so at this time)

Sometimes with limited staff, one cannot respond to comments 24/7. Although, social media is a 24/7 thing, however account managers and content creators are not up in the middle of the night. What I propose is to have a monitoring system. With a small social media staff, customers response can be provided throughout the typical workday from at least 8-8pm. Make sure to provide that detail in the bio section to let customers and follows know what timeframe they should expect to receive their responses. 

With larger companies with many fans/customers, they should have a larger social media team. With them, their responses should have more of an expanded timeline. And it should be monitored constantly. The brand responders could address the concerns and mark ^MC (with initials) and favorite the tweet to let others know that the respond has been responded to and by who.

Good Customer service is one that is not copy and pasted. It has to be customized to each individual's response, provide a helpful response, a generosity tweet, or a response that encourages another response.  

If brands recognize and seize the opportunity to meet consumer' rising expectations and respond quickly and effectively, they can achieve serious results. Some results can be seen as that 34% are more likely to buy more from that company; 43% are likely to encourage friends and family to buy their products; 38% are more receptive to their advertisements; and 42% are willing to praise or recommend the brand through social media.

It was reported that $32 billion is spent annually on fast food breakfast and McDonald’s commands one-third of the market.The fast food breakfast industry is competitive and Taco Bell is penetrating into it with its new breakfast items and famously, its Waffle Taco. To stand out, Taco Bell acquired a group of taste testers all coincidentally named Ronald McDonald in its campaign introducing its biggest menu rollout to date. The campaign features them to proclaim their love for the breakfast menu in the ads. 

Taco Bell President, Brian Niccol, said in an interview with adage that the strategy is to turn heads and make the chain stand out in a sea of sameness. He said “This is about getting people to understand that there’s a great alternative to their breakfast routine. There are a lot of competitors (at breakfast). Even the advertising all looks the same, and it’s hard to distinguish one breakfast sandwich from another.” They needed marketing that is not going to be taken as your ordinary breakfast-menu marketing. And Taco Bell certainly chose a good time to rollout its breakfast items. Maureen Morrison of adage reported that in 2013, 12.5 billion breakfast visits (which accounts for about 21%of all restraints visits in the US), are made to US foodservice outlets, up 3% from 2012.  

The TV spot was a blatant poke at McDonalds, the biggest player in breakfast by a wide margin. And McDonalds had a pretty good comeback. McDonalds posted an image on social media showing their mascot, the red and yellow Ronald McDonalds clown, kneeling down to pet the Taco Bell Chihuahua with the words, "Imitation its eh sincerest form of flattery." They also offered free small cups of its McCafe coffee to customers during breakfast hours for two weeks. They also put on a concert in Times Square and a flash Mob in Chicago to sort of get the buzz growing in major cities over their McCafe coffee line. 

Although McDonalds is the "breakfast king," with Taco Bell's introduction to the breakfast fast food industry and its growing social media presence with its engaging customers, McDonald's now has another well rounded competitor in the fast food chain.

Taco Bell had to change their marketing message in response to the consumer. Chris Brandt, CMO of Taco Bell mentions that the consumer still watches TV, but they watch it across through many things like Tablets and Mobile so Taco Bell had to evolve their marketing message to follow where their consumers go. TV is still a great place to get mass awareness, but they know the consumers wants to be engaged and talked to so they have to go to the places they are. 

The drive to getting digital is because the Brand is a powerful connection with 18-34 year olds. The consumers love interaction with this brand through social, mobile and in the digital space, so much so they were asking Taco Bell to be digital.

Taco Bell has dedicated fans. They are posting pictures of how they are making their halloween costume out of sauce packets. They are posting about how they driving around the country to track down Doritos Locos Taco, and pilgrimages to Omaha, Nebraska to get the Waffle Taco First. They currently have 10 million followers on Facebook, 1 Million followers on Twitter, they are the number one food brand on Instagram, and defined how brands used snapchat. 

Taco Bells past history to becoming successful as a brand is taking little bets. This model also follows through in its social media presence. They are always going to be experimenting to see what works. They leaped onto Snapchat before it was huge and used it to creatively broadcast important, shareable news from the brand, such as announcements like their return of the Beefy Crunch Burrito. They used snapchat to deliver novel content through short-form movies, utilizing snapchats features. Taco Bell pioneered the way other brands are using Snapchat and keep their audience, the millennials, wanting more.

Digital has far surpassed print in the way we consume news. In fact, over 50% of people have learned about breaking news via social media rather than official news outlets. 

Some of the most famous news stories were first broken by social media such as the Egyptian uprising via Facebook, the Hudson River plane crash, Whitney Houston and Michael Jackson's death, the Osama bin laden raid, and the announcement of the royal wedding via Twitter. Social media is a strong platform for online new sources, with Facebook being the top news source with 59.5% and Twitter with 19.9%. 

And thanks to social media, we're getting news at it happens (live) -- sometimes even before news organizations have a chance to report it. That is what I love about Twitter and and how it is instant and its live aspect. Facebook is also live, but with Twitter, your message could reach a more broader audience. Currently, there are 255 million active users on Twitter with accounts and followers who have similar interests as you.