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I created an Instagram campaign for YETI Coolers with five days of daily post content and two individual story concepts.

YETI was founded in Texas in 2006, as a high-end cooler company – primary audience being middle-aged men with disposable income for their expensive coolers. In February 2014, the brand introduced the Rambler series of drinkware with 20 and 30 oz. Tumblers. Much more modestly priced than YETI’s premium coolers, the Rambler line served as introduction to the brand for a wider audience. Since then, YETI has expanded its range of Rambler offerings to great success. The brand has seen popularity explode in the 15-25-year-old demographic, with an especially large increase in female consumers.

My Instagram campaign was aimed at that 15-25-year-old audience, with a particular focus on its female consumers.

One of the main taglines used by YETI is “Built for The Wild,” but most members of the target audience are not primarily using their YETI products “out in the wild.” In particular, YETI’s Rambler mugs and bottles can be found in the hands of college students across the country. The drinkware line is well-made and high quality, perfect for carrying water on a long hike, but also for using as your everyday bottle.

Because of this, the main messaging I used for this campaign is focusing on how real YETI fans are using their products. I had initially planned to use the tagline “Built for Everyone,” trying to highlight the different demographics of YETI consumers, but instead went with “Built for The World,” a better play on words with “Built for The Wild” that focuses on the different settings in which people use their YETI products.

DAILY POST CONTENT

YETI fans post on Instagram (and other social media) with their products and allow the company to use their content and highlight them – as outlined here (https://www.yeti.com/en_US/ugc-terms-of-use.html). Daily post content features photos submitted by everyday users of YETI products, each of which has been approved for YETI’s use by the original poster.

Some of the photos feature outdoor settings, a hallmark of the brand’s advertising and social media presence, but without a focus on the traditional activities YETI is associated with, such as fishing and hunting. Instead, the photos feature real users showing how they really use their products. YETI Ramblers are affordable, well-made, and can be used anywhere, relaxing at home or on the go. The brand’s pet products are also reasonably priced and stylish ways for younger users to show off their love for YETI.

By using and promoting photos that feature lower-priced YETI products, Ramblers especially, being used in everyday life, YETI can appeal to a younger audience with less disposable income, but an affinity for stylish, quality merchandise. Each post would link to YETI’s website, where users can shop for the pictured items.

INSTAGRAM STORIES

YETI often features brand ambassadors on its Instagram stories – mostly through the Lunch & Learn series, videos with the ambassador teaching about an aspect of the activity they are known for. All but one of the brand’s current story highlights feature men, mostly performing activities like catching / cleaning deep-sea fish. Promoting more women ambassadors, especially women known for things other than fishing / hunting, will help the brand to reach a younger female audience.

Brooke Orrison-Lewis is a YETI ambassador and co-owner of The Shed Barbeque & Blues Joint in Ocean Springs, Mississippi. Her team at The Shed has won multiple high-profile barbeque competitions, including Memphis in May, the World Food Championship and the Kingsford Tour of Champions.

YETI’s Lunch & Learn stories have been popular but are lacking in female representation and content variety. A Lunch & Learn story featuring Brooke teaching viewers about barbeque cooking would be a good change of pace for the series. The story would focus on her cooking and experiences as a restaurant owner, drawing excerpts from her existing Q&A on the company website. With much of the world (including her restaurant) closed right now, many people have taken on learning to cook as a hobby. This story would be timely and highlight one of YETI’s female ambassadors in a unique setting.

Not all of YETI’s stories are Lunch & Learns. The brand has previously featured stories interviewing their brand ambassadors. Robin Van Gyn is a YETI ambassador, a world-class backcountry snowboarder and “a leader in navigating the high and steep, the wide open and the densely treed.”

YETI should continue to highlight their female ambassadors, who do not have anywhere near the same level of representation on social media as the brand’s male ambassadors. The second piece of story content links to Robin’s ambassador page with her Q&A, followed by a link post for viewers to purchase the Rambler-series bottle she is pictured with.

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We’ve been stuck inside for a while now. I’ve spent plenty of time binging Netflix and playing Animal Crossing, but for my video project, I decided to cover an outdoor activity that we’re still able to do while social distancing. Fishing can be fun and relaxing, while not involving any sort of exposure to others.

For the introduction, I recorded my TV in a dark room, wanting to imply being shut inside. I shot the rest of the video in well lit areas hoping to emphasize the warmth and positivity that getting outside can bring.

I specifically recorded the fishing sections by the water shortly before sunset. I wanted the warm, evening colors and reflection of the sun on the water, as well as to highlight that I was heading home at the end of the day.

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Name and Genre: The Revue - Informational / Entertainment

Short Form Description: The Revue is a weekly podcast focused on covering the biggest new releases in pop and hip-hop music. All the latest songs you need to hear, every Friday afternoon. Hosted by Kevin Daniels

Extra Comments: The title, "The Revue," came from a play on words with reviewing and musical revue in theatre. The main theme / backing track is copyright free, but I did use short excerpts from three new popular songs. Each clip is between five and ten seconds and used for informational purposes, which fall under YouTube's fair use guidelines for copyrighted music (https://www.newsweek.com/youtube-change-music-copyright-claim-rules-favor-creators-1454780). As this is non-commercial use, I felt that including clips from the discussed songs would be beneficial for the purpose of educating the audience on this topic, so I decided to include them while following common guidelines on fair use.

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Workshop 2: iPhone Photography Fundamentals

For workshop 2, I aimed to capture the emotion of sadness in my photo series. The images were desaturated, in order to show only a black and white image. 

The first three photos are intended to represent human sadness and a create a narrative of ways in which people cope with and numb themselves to it. The young man in the first photo suffers from depression. His face is covered by a hood and he is seated on the floor, leaning up against a door. His lazy, almost weak, pose suggests that he is feeling defeated, that he has given up on life. 

The next two photos show his downward spiral, resorting to vices in order to numb the emotions haunting him. His expression solemn, the man lights a cigarette in the second image. A nicotine rush distracts him from his sadness for a moment, but only a moment. Soon it comes creeping back in. 

By the time we reach the third photo, the young man’s mental health has deteriorated further, as he turns to drugs. Pills are dumped out and scattered across the table, as the man desperately seeks something to take away the pain he feels inside. 

The remaining two images are intended to depict sadness in the world around us. 

In the fourth photo, a wilting rose, dropping its petals and leaves, sits alone in a vase. Unwatered and uncared for, the flower will soon wither away unless someone works to preserve it. Cut roses are beautiful, but fragile and fleeting. The vase was framed to be left of center, drawing focus to the bent and broken stem and the rose’s fading bloom.

The fifth, and final, image shows a lonely dock, stretching out over the water. This photo was actually taken at Lake Herrick, on a gloomy, rainy day. The trails and land around the lake were empty, devoid of both people and animals on that day. I framed this photo in order to display the dock’s symmetry and took it at a lower angle to highlight the reflection formed in the water on the boards.

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