Alex's Class Blog

My Facebook Ad

Recently I started a Facebook Ad campaign to advertise my blog to people interested in advertising.  The image is shown above.  I made the picture in Photoshop and thought it would grab the attention of its viewers because sex sells in advertising and everybody know that whether they like it or not.  Personally, I hate the over usage of sex in advertising which is why I tried to satirize it a bit and I also tried to allude to that in the copy by saying “Well, sometimes.”  As far as the creative goes, I’m pretty happy with it.

Now, for the process of how I made it.  Facebook makes setting up an ad very easy.  The creative is composed of a jpg and 135 characters of body text.  Then, once it has been made, the targeting for your ad is so concise and useful.  Not only can you sort your audience by any demographic, you can also sort it by their interests, likes on facebook, and where they’ve worked.  Because my ad is for a blog about advertising, the likes I sorted by were Ads, Advertising, Blogger, Blogging, Blogs, Blogspot, Branding, and Marketing.

And finally, onto pricing.  Because I don’t plan on seeing an revenue coming in from this blog, I tried to keep my budget low.  First, you can choose to pay per click or pay per impression.  I chose clicks because impressions that aren’t click throughs simply do not matter to me.  I was not sure how much to bid per click, so I clicked “Use Suggested Bid Amount.”  The suggested bid amount was $1.28.  Apparently the more you pay for a click, the more impressions that will be made.  I do not mind bidding this amount because I am not expecting a whole lot of clicks, so when they are, I don’t mind paying a little over a dollar for it.

It’s that easy!

It’s interesting that this is the blog topic for today because I have actually had to quickly explain what I was doing in this class in a job interview for an advertising internship once before.  While I mostly talked about Google Analytics and what we’re doing for a group project, I think if I had another chance I would be more concise with my answer.  Here it is:

Did you know half the world’s Internet users have a Facebook account?  The trends in social media are growing rapidly and it is continuing to become a fantastic new opportunity for business ventures.  In my social media innovation class we not only learned more about the capabilities of various social media platforms, but also the learned about the potential it has have on a business.  In the midst of working on a group project, we learned more about AdWords, AdSense, how to track a campaign using Google Analytics, and how to set up a clean and concise WordPress blog.  Also, through presentations from fellow students throughout the course, I learned about social media sites and that their capabilities that I had previously never heard of.  Overall though, did not learn more about social media, but rather how to use it and use it right.

UgotMunchies Truck @ Norris & Liacouras

One example of viral marketing that I have participated in recently was for my favorite food truck on campus, UgotMunchies.  One day I was walking through campus and saw a truck I’ve never seen or tried before and I was starving so I figured I’d give it a try.  I looked at their menu and say things like “the natural disaster” (a cheesesteak with chicken breast, fried onions, and french fries all on a long roll) and the “big wheezy” (a cheesesteak with chicken breast, marinara sauce, and mozzarella sticks all on a long roll).  Oh yeah, and deep friend girl scout cookies.  Instantly, I knew I would love it.  So, I ordered the natural disaster and after savoring every bite, I knew I had to make sure everyone I knew that goes Temple found out about this.  After telling my roommates through word of mouth, I went on Facebook and posted a link to their menu.  Within the next week, the majority of my close friends tried it and agreed with me that it is the best pig out place on campus.  Looking back on it, UgotMunchies probably should have paid me for it.

In relation to the reading, I definitely don’t think my viral marketing of UgotMunchies would have been successful without positive network effects.  If I had had a terrible experience at you got UgotMunchies, I would not have told anyone and there it would have had no network effect, and I would not have told anyone anything good about it.  Therefore, I kind of think viral marketing can be both helped and hurt by network effects.  For the most part, it depends on the individual’s experience.  However, I do think that positive effect go a longer way than negative effects.  In other words, if I had a bad experience, I probably would have just told a few people.  Though, since I had a great experience, I told as many people as I could.  So, when it comes down to it, I think viral marketing can go either way depending on how the network effects particularly played out amongst consumers.

Gary Stein’s article, “Nobody Gets Social Media… Yet,” offers a dynamic insight regarding the expansion and popularity of social media in business.  He argues that, although very popular among marketers, social media is commonly used incorrectly because it is often not quite fully understood by the marketers who use it.  What these marketers have not yet grasped, according to him, is that social media should not be used to just connect with consumers, but to connect the consumer with your brand on a personal, proactive level.

Doing this is easier said than done, and contributes to the reason why marketers have struggled to do so.  Though, in order to do so, we must first learn and understand the specifics of social media and the topics related to its usage.  First, in what ways is social media something new and different?  Well, in comparison to traditional forms of media such as newspapers, televisions, radio, etc., social media is the first form of media that allows such an instant interaction and feedback from consumers on a personal 1-on-1 kind of level.  Also, social media is more engaging that traditional forms because you are able to interact with a brand rather than sitting and reading or watching their pitch.

Though, in this sense, social media is also something that has always been around.  Outside of traditional forms or media, promotional campaigning such as contests and events sponsorships have been able to accomplish this interaction.  However, the new form of web-based social media can been said to be more effective because it allows interactive participation with the consumer without much encouragement.  In other words, marketers do not have to do as much to get a consumer involved since they’re already using the same platform of social media.

Still, marketers require new skills and capabilities to use social media to its fullest capacity because it is in some way different than every form of media, communication, and marketing.  Of course, there are a ton of similarities, but one thing all marketers need is the ability, as Stein outlines, to have a clear direction and mission for your company in the use of social media, to not rely on statistical results to communicate success, and understand that is it no different than other forms of media in that it is being used to allow consumers to come in contact with your brand.  These are the opinions of Stein that are rather agreeable, but I also think social media marketers have to take full consideration of the target audience before determining how the brand can seem enjoyable to the consumer.  This is not necessarily by doing whatever encourages them to click and engage with the brand’s social media, but rather doing what will encourage them to take the brand experience outside of the realm of social media.  That is always the best kind of marketing.

The two website promotion activities I chose were two of the most basic: search engine optimization and social networking integration.

First, search engine optimization may me the most effective way to go about promotion your blog or webpage.  I say this because search engines are the most used and helpful thing there is to find something you’re looking for on the web.  However, people may not necessarily be specifically looking for your webpage, so it is important to use search optimization to your benefit by adding more popular and trending key words that are relevant to your site, as well as cross linking between different pages of the same site to provide a larger number of links can increase the likelihood of it coming up in a relevant search.  By doing this, you may see your website getting more search results in hopes that it will increase the traffic to your site.  In partnership with Google, you can also choose to purchase AdWords which can increase the relevancy of your site to specific search words or phrases.  Also with Google, you may set up Google Analytics to track this increase in traffic.

Secondly, something that a lot of businesses are doing nowadays is promoting their website and brand through social networks.  The same success they have can also work for blogs or personal webpages.  By setting up and Twitter account and a Facebook page for your site and actively updating it with posts, you can connect with friends and people you may not already know on a more personal level.  Since these sites are personal to a people or a business, it is the best way to interactive with your potential reader-base by introducing yourself to them without having to be face-to-face.  This can be beneficial because some people frequently look through Facebook and Twitter pages almost as much as any other webpage.  Also, through Google Analytics you can track the success of being achieve on these social networks because they provide stats that tell you exactly where the link was posted that brought these people to your site.

So, the first, larger brand I choose was Apple.  On their website, there is no links to Facebook and Twitter to be found.  Even under the contact section, there is only contact information provided with their phone numbers, street address, and email address. On Facebook, I searched for Apple under the Pages section and came across a few unofficial promotional pages, but no official pages.  However, on Twitter, it’s a bit of a different story.  Although I didn’t find a official Twitter for Apple as a brand, I found about 6 Apple affiliated Twitter accounts, such as The App Store, iTunes Music, iTunes Podcasts, etc.

The second brand I researched was one of my favorite places to eat around Philadelphia, Tony Luke’s.  When you go to their website, there are immediately links to Twitter and Facebook pages for Tony Luke’s Pronto (the sandwich they’re famous for) and Tony Luke Jr. (the owner and face of Tony Luke’s).  The Pronto’s Twitter has not been updated since last August, which is not a very good thing for their promotions, and most of their promotional updates were provided through their Facebook.  Tony Luke Jr., on the other hand, was as highly active on Twitter as he was on Facebook, which was a very times per day.

After comparing the social media presence of the two of them, I think that, although they don’t show their presence on their website, Apple does a better job of using Twitter.  Personally, I think I would be more likely to follow Apple’s App Store on Twitter than I would follow either of the two separate accounts of Tony Luke’s.  However, as far as Facebook goes, I think Tony Luke’s is more effective.  I feel this way because it is smaller brand that is like to have more promotions that cannot be publicized in as widespread and expensive of a way that Apple would be capable of publicizing.  This is essentially what I think Tony Luke’s is trying to achieve through their use of social media, cheap advertising and marketing.  If I were in charge of a small business like this, I would do the same.  However, I think I would post more about promotions than general updates like “good morning!”  Also, if I were in charge, I think it would be easy to measure the success by tracking how many fans or followers you’ve attained, posting promotional events on Facebook and Twitter and then measuring how they turned out, and creating ads on Facebook in which you can track how much clicks and impressions they receive from viewers.  Opportunities like these to track ROI for a business on social media networks have made it just a pivotal part of business today.

Prof. Johnson taking his lunch break

I can’t wait to become a Social Media teacher.

The discussion of the book “The Starfish and the Spider,” is mostly based around the comparison of centralized organizations versus decentralized organizations.  A centralized organization is one whose business decisions come from higher management, while a decentralized organization is one that uses multiple levels and divisions of labor to share in the decision-making process.  Both styles have their many advantages and disadvantages.

To apply these differences, I will describe how the student organization I am currently a part of, Temple Ad Club, operates in their decision making.  At the Temple Ad Club, there is a executive board composed of a President, Vice President, Secretary, Treasurer, Public Relations Coordinator, Agency Director, Director of Communication, Director of Promotions, and a Director of Fundraising.  Outside of the executive board, everyone else is simply team members.  While everyone has their own responsibilities, people also have shared responsibilities as well as shared decision making.  Whether it is doing work for clients or organizing events, everyone does their part to accomplish things for the organization.  In a lot of ways this makes it a decentralized organization because an action that the organization takes is almost always based on the general consensus of the organization as a whole.  However, before anything is final and ready to commence or be send out to the clients, everything most be approved by the President and Vice President.  In this way, the organization can be seen as a centralized one.  Therefore, I think I would definite it as a bit of a hybrid organization.  Although final decisions are to be approved by the President and Vice President, all internal operation decisions are decided on by everyone else, including the team members.

The reading of “How to build a community online,” by Christine Cavalier, was very interesting to me because I feel like I have already applied a lot of this theory in the past.  In my quest to find a writing job in the advertising industry, I started a blog to display my skills as a writer.  In doing this, I found that in order for it to be effective, I would have to build a community around me of people who are interested in the same topic I am writing about.  These people that I have targeted to be part of this community are mostly potential employers in the industry, however, when I told them to check out my blog I did not mention anything about a potential job.  Although it is my attention to gain exposure in my quest for a job, I do not tell anyone this because, like the reading suggests, “When you find them, don’t sell, sell, sell. Don’t pitch. You don’t need to sell to them, and doing so will just make you seem disingenuous.”  Also, when I spread the word of my blog I don’t just flat out say, “hey check out my blog.”  Usually, I will attach a link to the end of my email signature or I will post it to my Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn profiles.

If exposing my blog to other people does not land me a job, I still appreciate the support of others in my community.  This is my opinion is the most important part of the 3S approach to build a community.  Supporting others work and ambitions will naturally encourage them to do the same with you.  Also, if you send your support via Facebook, Twitter, etc., that person will most likely look at your profile and possibly click your links to send support right back.

Overall, I found the guide to building a community online to be very useful and effective.  It is a strong belief of mine that if you support someone who is, as the author describes it, a “fellow believer,” they might support you back.  And even if they don’t, what’s wrong with being nice?  It is my hope though that what goes around, comes around.