While some people have an addiction to coffee, Amazon, food, and shopping online, I personally am a frequent flyer of the popular clothing site Shein. I also may have an addiction to coffee and Dunkin purchases, but today we will focus on Shein’s marketing through social media, and which platforms they use.

While scrolling through my Instagram this weekend, I came across the following ads for Shein. This was on Instagram, which I believe is the platform Shein gets the most traffic on. Given that their target audience for their clothing is the younger audience, they utilize Instagram and Tik Tok the most. I recently made a few purchases at Shein, and the company’s marketing team strategically used my ‘cookies’ to suggest these pieces for my next purchase.

The name of the account was sheincurve, which is something that may turn me away, but looking at the pieces suggested to me, I was interested in them and did scroll to find out more. With spring on the way and the warmer weather coming, these outfits were appealing and I may purchase a few in the future.

As we all universally have cell phones now, the more connected we seem to get when we can’t physically be together, the more distant we fall apart with the ones geographically close to us. Businesses also have the same problem, where small businesses’ marketing department is run only to cater to online or in-person customers, very few organizations excel and deliver to both audiences well.

As a spin-off of my last blog about “The Blend Oneida- Social Media Goals” we are going to travel not far down the street and visit Higgie, the symbolic character and mascot at Hipster’s Cafe, also in Oneida.

About Higgie:

“Higgie’s name is an homage to Oneida’s founder, Sands Higinbotham. He doesn’t play by the rules. He has his own style and panache. Hipster Higgie loves cool tunes and cool vibes and hot delicious coffee. He listens to vinyl on his headphones. He loves flannel. He wears ink but he only shows that to his closest friends.” -hipstercafe.com/hipster-creation/hipster-higgie/

I believe this organization has a good mixture of both an online presence and community engagement because they host a lot of giveaways for their followers on Instagram and Facebook, as well as collaborate with local organizations, charities, and businesses like The Blend, Kym’s Pallet Art, and more.

For charitable community outreach, Hipster’s has sponsored for multiple years Connor’s Clan walk to benefit Connor Bailey, a boy diagnosed with autism.

By supporting this walk, Hipster is able to reach a geographically local community that are ready to donate, and seeing Hipster at the forefront of this campaign sells people on emotion, and the audience falls in love with how personable and local this business is, which is influential in the morning making the decision between Starbucks, Dunkin, or Hipster. Running giveaways on their social media entices the community to share their content, and if just the right cover photo has been selected, people will want to ‘try this place out’ making it their new favorite coffee shop to stop at before work. Including the audience in both the physical atmosphere and having an influential presence online helps get the word out, generating that into direct sales for the company, making them overall successful.

Looking at a social media managers’ day-to-day operation, many may think that its spur of the moment with no plan to what they are responding to. However, as described in the “How to Use Social Media for Crisis Communications and Emergency Management” article, many small communications help build that long-term relationship with customers, making them feel valued, and obligated to support their end of the relationship. If we were to compare this relationship communication to that of a friendship, our society considers two individuals’ friends on the basis of communication and quality time spent together. I know of the President of the United States; he doesn’t know me. If I tweeted him, I’m keeping my end of the communication “deal,” but unless he were to respond, we aren’t considered friends, I’m just a follower. This comes back to the strategy that businesses should be personifying their brand, to connect with their audience better, ultimately turning relationships into sales conversions, or awareness trends, per the case.

                When posting an apology, companies should be conscious of who is getting the credit. I recently was writing thank you cards, and deferred from saying, ”Thank you for your dedication and expertise to the success of our program.” and replaced the program with students. This shows that it is not us benefitting from professionals’ time to make our program look good, but the students, and those who will benefit from the knowledge shared. With the COVID misinformation example, they used the clever verbiage of “We would like to thank our amazing community for letting us know of our mistake right away.” This reflects the negative mistake on the company and the positive impact on the community.

                The key is communication. Make sure all employees are aware of the situation, especially those involved in posting. Group chats and using a messaging app I feel are more effective than email, it encourages employees to send a quick text rather than a formal email. Maybe even creating a Press Release to blast to all employees involved and guidelines of what and what not to say to the public could be helpful ensuring everyone is on the same page, literally. Be sure to include the main point of contact for any questions or gray area clarifications. When the HR department of a company knows they are to fire an individual, they should have a list of people to contact about this change before notifying the individual. One of the essential people should be the Social Media Manager, being proactive to not cause sabotage against the company. When employees put their 2 weeks in to quit, it should be the next day that Managers remove the employee from social media accounts, also preventing potential sabotage and grand scheme demolition, depending on the severity of the case. Not only can employees be your most loyal retweets and engaging audience, but on the reverse side, are the biggest threat to your brand. In addition to the brand tracking extensions Hootsuite mentioned, I have found using Google Alerts at my internship to track the newspaper and third-party mentions we get and then featuring those on our social media is helpful, but at times finding the mention can be confusing. Another helpful tool may be updating or releasing a FAQ sheet if a crisis or confusion among the audience seems to be the same questions. Many corporate companies ignore their bottom-line employees and give them the dirt of benefits when, in reality, these are the individuals making them the most money with their personable attitude and kindness towards customers. The bottom-line can also break the company brand, with an incident and their response to individual customers with a voice in the community. Responding to all haters will not solve the problem, so in the famous words of Taylor Swift, “Haters gonna hate, hate, hate.”

The Scenario:

Canva has started a campaign to help those affected by the war in Ukraine. After all, the I’s are dotted and t’s are crossed, they release a campaign advertising new templates with a theme of yellow and blue, symbolizing the Ukrainian flag. After releasing these templates, the social media team receives comments stating “How dare you take advantage of the war for your personal benefit.” “Do you not understand there are innocent civilians dying from the attacks?”

Marketing calls an immediate meeting to evaluate what to do. Canva removes the posts and releases the above picture to all social media platforms (i.e. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, Pinterest) with the caption “We understand there may have been some confusion with the release of some new templates on our site. Please watch this video for an explanation.” On the video release date, the video is compiled of the staff at Canva saying we’re sorry, including the president. “We realize that we did not take into consideration the misunderstanding that was conveyed to our valued customers. All subscription dues for the month of March and April will be going to XX Foundation to support Ukrainian refugees during these troublesome times. We appreciate your edits and will also be donating XX to XX Foundation. Join us in helping by donating here.” Creating a video may take longer, but I believe with a simple “teaser” letting viewers know that the staff is tirelessly working on the issue is reassuring to know that Canva Cares, which could even be their hashtag #CanvaCares.

One of my favorite places to visit in Oneida when I visit friends and family is a small shop downtown named the Blend. “From cold brew lattes and sparkling water to smoothies, smoothie bowls, sweets, and waffles, there’s something on the menu for everyone because it’s all made-to-order.” (Pritchard, 2020) The Blend was started when four sisters were tired of driving to Syracuse and Utica whenever they had a smoothie craving. So, they decided to add flavor to Oneida. Located at 105 Main St. and with a huge online presence, The Blend serves the greater Oneida community and hosts a welcoming atmosphere for all meetings or office escapes.

After just opening in 2020, right before the global shut down and introduction of COVID, The Blend had a community to feed, and a bowl to get out. Owners had to quickly set up their online presence, as the world quickly transitioned to online. At first glance, their social media is very appealing to the 18-24 year old demographic. In 2 years, they have gained over 2,000 followers, which I consider successful.

Day to day on Blend’s Instagram posts consist of smoothies, bowls and new menu items that drop. Both their store and Instagram are busiest during the summer, when it’s hot out and people are looking for cold juices and snacks to cool down. Before winter 2021-22, The Blend expanded their market to those looking for organic household items, introducing the Blend Market. Although they did advertise, I don’t think they got much foot traffic inn the store, because of space and publicity. The Blend Market didn’t have as many followers on Instagram. Shortly after opening The Market, the facility had a small fire creating a total loss, losing the buzz on the street. With no expected date of reopening, both sites lost followers and sales, but with the relaunch I think with a few boosted posts on Facebook, Instagram, and around the community, the sisters and owners will quickly gain their following back.

With Spring and warmer weather on the way, if the Blend can get in the local parks during festivals or concerts, providing samples and business cards, or unique tchotchkes, the community will remember and visit their new facility and fall in love with the comfortable atmosphere and delicious food, just as I did.

Pritchard, C. (2020, February). New business seeks to add flavor to Oneida. The Daily Sentinel. Retrieved March 9, 2022, from https://romesentinel.com/stories/new-business-seeks-to-add-flavor-to-oneida,92725 

Barnhart, B. (2020, March 31). Social media crisis plan: What to do when things go wrong.sproutsocial. Retrieved March 2, 2022, from here.

As social media is an ever-growing platform that companies can use to market products and track the click-through rate of their customers, it is also a threat to companies because users are encouraged to give their honest and truthful opinion, and it will spread faster. The article written by Brent Barnhart on sproutsocial highlights a few of the many negative comments taking social media by storm, creating communities of common people who have similar issues.

The story that stuck out to me and made me want to do more background research on it was Ayesha with DevaCurl. Knowing it was a sixteen-minute video as well as my attention span, I was not expecting to be entertained or even still paying attention halfway through, but I now want to know more of her story, and her hair journey after DevaCurl. I found it intriguing that she was a devoted, completely free advertiser who, after being so loyal to the brand for 6 years, found the product and company to be a lie. I can’t imagine what position the company is in, Ayesha herself and with her all-inclusive personal branding for free, has turned from an opportunity for the company to embark on new platforms, and is now a threat that the company has to amend her comments, and prove themselves correct that their products are damage free.

Personally starting to grow my hair journey, I have never heard of this brand and their product line. After reading this article and seeing the proof of the damage and the statistical numbers from how many women these products affected, it leads me to some suspicion when purchasing these products.

New visitors who come across devacurl.com/us see the first product as a hairdryer designed for curly hair. While this may be a coincidence, maybe the web design team was not in favor of the scandal, and to deter that from being the face of the company, chose to direct the consumer’s attention towards tools, then products. ‘The initial impression of the unique design of this hair dryer could distract the customer from our harmful products.’ But it could just be a coincidence…

As with many POS websites, there is an email subscription pop-up. The timing of this one seems very sudden, as another distraction. I may be a conspiracy theorist, as Ayesha posted her original video over 2 years ago, and testing trials and compensation have persisted since then. Once the large public is impacted by a traumatic event such as this, it’s hard to forget.

Stories. Everyone loves hearing personal stories. It makes a business more personable, and people love getting to know the community. Utica started to do our stories, placing a spotlight on the students, alumni, and faculty of Utica, but from my browsing on social media, they did not advertise or take advantage of the audience influenced by these platforms.

So, I took the stories and pictures from the Utica.edu website and created an Instagram series that Utica University could potentially use, and obviously get more followers, just from this campaign.

This first post would be a teaser to the series to come and encourage the audience to post their own stories, using the hashtag. I’m surprised that after an Instagram search, Utica University hasn’t used this slogan for the promotion of the stories and any college marketing. They recently started branding the phrase “We want to know you.” on billboards, Facebook ads, as well as print issues.

Sharing these personal stories will make use of the #OurMooseTracks and start building a brand around the first few stories. Maybe the branding of the association will trigger people’s memory with the common ice cream flavor.

That being said, this campaign should be released around college graduation time, where alumni can post their stories, and encourage recent graduates to post their graduation pictures, as well as their future plans, whether it’s into the field, or internships. Using the #OurMooseTracks will allow the university to find these monumental pictures and, with permission, use these for marketing and success stories.

Are you allin4uc? Utica College released a campaign for the month of October encouraging donors to be “All In” for various campaigns, in correlation with the 75th anniversary. Students, parents, teachers, grandparents, siblings, alumni, faculty, and staff all donated for raising a total of $118,200 for different organizations and clubs. Each campaign was categorized into three categories based on what they stand for and their main operating focus. Donors were able to choose UC Pioneer Athletics Challenge, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Initiatives, and ALLIN4UC- Academics. While the two-week push for donors didn’t work well for the general public, Once the campaign got into the hands of big donors, the stretch of funds multiplied. Utica put out different incentives, encouraging donors to give $75, and they would send you a pair of anniversary socks. Anyone willing to donate $50 got a branded face mask for UC.

The campaign was intended to raise more funds for organizations on campus. While the small organizations rolled out with their plan to raise funds, making small videos, introduction posts, promotion pleas, I believe the college as a whole didn’t promote the campaign enough in advance, getting the community excited and interested, saving up for this campaign. When churches run a penny fund, members are aware and are saving for the event year-round. When allin4uc was launched, there was only a three-week prime time, where campaigns had a week to promote, and two weeks to get members to donate. While there may have been a plan in the marketing department, it wasn’t displayed to the people well and seemed very quick.

The metric used to measure how well this campaign performed can easily be identified by the monetary value that was raised at the end of the campaign. Using the SMART goals to evaluate this campaign, it was very specific when laying out the plan, as well as had a measureable goal and with a month’s time of achieving it, was attainable. Being that this campaign launched during the 75th anniversary year gave people a reason to give more than what they may have given, with incentives as well. This campaign was followed with the launch of the five year plan, Thrive On, allowing donors to continue their giving.

This advertisement was placed in distribution during the month of September 2021. The creator had the right idea using vibrant colors that catch the eye, but the colors are not coordinating, and are almost too vibrant. This flyer has a lot of information on it, enough to be split into two placed on a circulating loop in conjunction with one another. Using that strategy, the information would be distributed wider.

When this flyer got distributed, it was mainly a social media campaign, and the audience was family and friends of the team, who were primarily out of state, or were signed up to help set up for the event. This flyer should’ve gotten into the hands of those who were local to Chittenango, and far enough in advance that people would be able to plan lunch to get chicken barbeque.

As you may have been able to derive from the ad, I created this for a small robotics team I was a part of in high school. Although it may not be A+ marketing skills, small ads like these are what got me interested and intrigued in marketing. I’ve also redone these ads below to what I, now with a little bit of marketing experience, and the help of Canva, wanted them to be.

We also may have overwhelmed people trying to host 3 events in one, and while trying to advertise for all, only partially advertised for each.

The revised version of this flyer is only advertising the Chicken lunch. There are only four colors, two of which are a neutral tone, black and white. The team’s colors are mainly a teal, with hints of dark blue. This flyer should have been placed on facebook groups, newspapers, and at a big community event. It needs to get into the hands of the families in the Chittenango, Canastota, and Fayetteville areas. The cans and bottles event should have been advertised separately, revisions below.

The distribution method for this flyer may not be as effective online, but door-to-door in the local community. The timeline for this should be at least a month in advance, so people can start collecting cans and bottles with the robotics team in mind. Door to door means protecting your flyers from weather, so maybe a doorhandle bag with a small fridge magnet, encouraging families to pin it to their fridge as a reminder. I only used black and white colors for text colors, as the background picture is busy, and even though I adjusted the opacity, but not too much that viewers lose what the picture is.

With the introduction of these flyers, I would then revamp the original flyer to only advertise the yard sale, which ended up being our bigest fundraiser of the three. I would probably keep the white background, as we could increase the amount of print flyers, and even make bigger flyers for roadside advertising. Looking into 2022, I will probably plan to use these flyers if we choose to do these events again.

I decided to take PRL 408- Social Media because I really believe this class will be beneficial to all aspects of my life and the future of my career. In addition to wanting to become a Public Relations agent, I would like to specialize in social media advertising and designing. I’m really looking forward to adding a more creative aspect to my personal brand so that I stand out amongst other candidates as well.

My original interest to join the PR field stemmed from a robotics club I started in high school. Now, you may be wondering, “What does robotics have to do with digital advertising and marketing? Most robotics nerds don’t have good graphic design skills.” I am here to defy the odds and tell you that I wasn’t really interested in the mechanical side of robotics. I gravitated and fell in love with creating a brand around our robotics team. From advertising for recruitment events to scheduling where to go during our competitions, I planned it all. Since I first started robotics in 2012, I have managed 2 teams, started and coached my own team of 6-9 year-olds, and participated in a 6-week intensive robotics competition. While the league stops after high school, that didn’t slow me down! Since graduating, I’ve volunteered for events and even hosted my own week-long camps for recruitment to the league.

After graduating college with my BBA, I hope to continue working for a company that works closely with children. As I don’t have a specific agency picked out yet, I believe I still have time to narrow down my options before graduation. It’s also not an immediate need, but I also hope to get my Master’s in Business Administration as well. If this career doesn’t work out, I have developed a strong passion for television news anchoring and reporting, and that is my backup career.

Before entering a career such as Marketing/Advertising, I believe everyone should develop their own brand and content. With the introduction of YouTubers and viral influencers, anyone who wants to create content is now able to easier, and encouraged to. It is soo easy to set up a phone with a camera and microphone, do a few edits with any app, and post a video on youtube or Facebook, even Instagram now has these flexible capabilities. Anyone can create an introduction video and easily post and share it so everyone gets to know you, building your personal brand. From these small steps of learning how to show yourself off, one will appear more professional in front of employers, as well as the general public, by random google searches.

My LinkedIn profile can be found here.