saraannaross

[saraannaross]

Week 8!

After reading chapter 6 and watching the Implementation video there are a few challenging areas my client my face. The first would be being unprepared. A lot goes into creating a social platform, and to implement all my suggestions would take a lot of work. Another area I think they might struggle with is having too many staff members with access to the social accounts. Too many staff having access could cause confusion about who is posting what, who is checking the social on which days and which times, and which customers have been replied to or not. Cutting down on staff who has access would be beneficial in this scenario. Another challenge may be not having the confidence to post and engage with their customers. To create a meaningful and purposeful social platform they have to be willing to put themselves out there. Since my client is a yoga studio, they are not only a yoga studio but also have a retail section which sells branded clothing and yoga props. Another challenge may be incorporating posts about the studio and yoga, alongside posts about the retail section. It is important to stick to the yoga roots and not become a fashion brand for yoga.

[saraannaross]

Creative Content

There are many ways to create and share effective content. You can create posts through Snapchat, Instagram Stories, Instagram feed posts, and even go live on Facebook. There are many editing features one can use to make content more creative and appealing. Such as adding geofilters, tagging location, and adding captivating captions with the use of emojis. One very interesting fact I learned after completing Hootsuite chapter 5 is that increasing rate at which people are viewing silent videos. I often find myself either turning the volume very low or watching videos in silence, especially if I am in the same room as others. Going live on either Facebook or Instagram is always a great way to engage with your online community and present effective content. Going live gives you the opportunity to present demonstrations and even have Q’s and A’s sessions. To make this run smoothly its important to have dedicated staff to help with lighting, sound, and even have someone feeding you the questions from the audience. Another important key aspect is to pay attention when you have the most engagement on your platforms and schedule your posts around the time they will have the highest chance of being viewed.

A social organization is crucial to the development of effective content because it falls on those responsible of creating content and running social platforms. It operates as a system of evaluating, planning, and creating. Without a social organization a social platform might be chaotic, unprofessional, and ineffective. A social organization is responsible for creating relevant and creative content to market to consumers in a professional and timely manner.

[saraannaross]

week 6

To build an effective online community, it requires at least two things. 1. A purpose and 2. Community collaboration. Without a purpose there is no reason for an online community to exist in the first place. A community is a group of individuals who come together because they have similar ideas, interests, and values. Without a vision there is not a reason for these people to gather. When this group of individuals do come together, it is often times because they are collaborating ideas over a shared vision. A great example of a brand that uses community collaboration and states its vision very clearly is www.sandcloud.com 1) Their vision is to clean up the oceans. 2) Their purpose is to save the fish. 3) They collaborate with the community be offering collaborations with other brands, promote through influencers, and have a brand ambassador program. A brand ambassador gets to purchase products at a discounted rate as long as they post and promote the product to their personal social pages. Ambassadors are given a discount code to promote and share with the community so others can purchase at a discount. This drives traffic to the company’s website and increases sales.

After working through chapter 4 of Hootsuite, one thing that I was interested in was companies use of influencers. In my experience I’ve only seen influences on fitness pages, they usually consist of individuals who are already naturally tall, skinny, and already have a background in fitness. Alo Yoga caught some heat recently for not being an inclusive brand of all body types and skin tones. Something that peaked my interest was hiring an influencer that is already within your community,. I am working with a yoga studio for my small business client project, and I love the idea of hiring someone who has been a long time student to promote our events, work-shops, and studios.

[saraannaross]

Big Data

Businesses need to be aware that their networks may not be as secure as they think they are. Though it may not be easy to do, they are hacked all the time which puts their consumers at risk. Consumers need to be aware that breaches happen all the time and even if they are giving their info to a trusted business, it may not be just them who eventually has access to it. The video we watched proved that it’s not just online business from overseas that may not be safe. Big companies such as Home Depot, Target, and even banks have experienced data breaches. To balance the threat business could be more diligent about erasing consumers info when they no longer benefit from it. Maybe they could reconsider exactly how much info about a consumer they really need, and exactly how long they store it for. Consumers should be more careful about who they give their info to, and always double check that websites and emails are secure and correspond to the company they say they’re for. I had an experience receiving a fake email from PayPal saying my account has been suspended, and I almost gave into it before realizing that the email I received was one letter off from PayPal’s actual customer service email. Always double checking and doing extra research before giving your info away is always the smart move.

After reading the article and watching the video it is evident that our info is being stored to benefit big business. They try to target us and advertise what they think we want, need, or a product to improve our lives. Take Facebook for instance, at one point it was every five posts was an Ad and now my feed shows an ad every 3-4 posts. We are are constantly being sold an idea or a product. Is it any coincidence that many of these ads are intriguing to me? Not at all, because almost all of them are related to something I’ve searched, somewhere I’ve shopped, or some similar event to something I’ve already participated in. This is because my data is being stored and businesses are trying to benefit from that.

[saraannaross]

Algorithms, Advertising, Exposure

1. Algorithms: For a long-time I wondered why I would only see certain posts of similar information or posts from certain people and none from others. I finally started to understand what algorithms are. A personal experience I have related to this pertains to my own small business. I make chocolates and holiday treats that I was selling via Facebook and Instagram that I was advertising and posting about heavily. When I was at order capacity a friend texted me to see what I had been up to and how life was going. I told him I started my own business and he started asking me questions. I see him actively on FB and IG all the time, so I asked, “haven’t you seen any of my posts?” he replied “no, not a single one.” This was right around the time the election was confirmed and he reported only seeing political posts and nothing else from friends about literally anything else. I should have been more aware that my posts were not reaching everyone that I wanted to see them. One thing I could implement is posting at different times throughout the day and using hashtags more frequently.

2. Advertising: I often find myself falling victim to click-bait articles. The two places I see them most often are on www.yahoo.com and within Snapchats “news” feed. They are always intriguing headlines that want you to click and go to their website. I usually find these articles very underwhelming, exaggerated, and often times I have to click “next page” many times to get through the entire article. This becomes very annoying to consumers and many will skip right over them. However, for the ones who do utilize click-bait articles Click-bait articles are an effective way to drive traffic to your website and get your click count out, but it may also deter others from clicking. 

An example of click-bait articles:

3. Exposure: When we limit our exposure to only our beliefs or one certain thing, we gain a very biased view of the world because we are never getting both sides of the story. It is also intriguing that with a click of “unfriend” or “unfollow” we never have to subject ourselves to others thoughts or viewpoints that we may not agree with. This can be dangerous because we never dig deeper into research and it’s easy to share or repost false information. This is very common with political posts. If we are only seeing posts that support our favored party it is easy for us to post something promoting that individual even if all the facts within the post may not be true.

[saraannaross]

Consultant Expectations

A social media consultant should be both mature and informed. They should know how to research and only post about real and true facts. A social media consultant should be empathetic, understanding, flexible, and willing to teach and be teachable.

If I were my own social media consultant, I would do research before posting. I would make sure my posts had no grammatical errors. I would make sure my posts are worth reading, worth engaging with, and that they look professional. I would want to give my consumers something worth coming back for.  One thing I have done for my own business on Instagram is to keep my business page public and always tag my posts with relatable hashtags. I believe this has brought me more followers who are searching for similar products and may just interest them in mine!

[saraannaross]

Algorithms & Addiction

Whenever I open up my laptop or turn on my device, I constantly feel like I am being listened to and watched. Why does something I google show up on my Facebook ads or in my email for the next three days after searching it? I feel like I have no privacy on the internet. Due to big data keeping track of every single key swipe and search and the related algorithms constantly showing me what they think I want to see. It is alarming to me something I search on my phone will be the first ad I see when I open up a browser on my computer. Although these devices try to make our lives easier out of convenience, our privacy is truly at stake. People are no longer living in the moment and we are constantly staring into our phones waiting for the next hit of dopamine.

It is alarming to me that in the documentary when asked what the issue with social media is, every single participant in the documentary had to pause and form their thoughts because there are so many issues. They were the ones helping to form these addictions, and there is truly no form of recovery except to stop cold turkey. They do not even allow their children to use the platform they helped develop. In my opinion though, that is a good thing. The documentary talks about the childhood rate of suicide sky rocketing because of social media. 

Things we can do on an individual level to alleviate some of these issues is to limit our use. Setting timers has really helped me and not sleeping with my phone next to my pillow. I think something everyone could work on more is to only consciously post. Ask 1) Is this information true? 2)Does this add value to my life or to anyone else’s? 3) Could this post hurt anyone? 4) Could this post potentially hurt me or someone else in the future? Things that could be done on a business level is to focus more on our customers privacy. Maybe not force ads and sales down the throats of those trying to support our business. Engage with them, make them laugh, make them feel good about themselves and about supporting our business. On a societal level we need to stop posting about our “best lives” and live in the moment. Take a look around and keep it as a memory instead of constantly viewing our world through the lens of our cameras attached to the tiny computer in our hands. We are too addicted to trying to impress strangers on the internet and life is passing us by.  

[saraannaross]

Mornings & Night Social Media free

Once I realized how much time I was spending on my phone I tried to stay off my phone first thing in the morning and three hours before I went to bed for two days. When I went on a yoga retreat last year one of the thing’s we did was something called silent mornings. No talking, phone, writing, or making yourself available to other things other than yourself for at least three hours. I try not to subject myself to news of the world or what is going on first thing in the morning. Sometimes I purposely stay off my phone until my first work call or email that has to go out, but it doesn’t always happen. So, for two days I purposely didn’t check my phone until three hours after I woke up (unless work related) and put it on do not disturb for three hours before bed.

During these times I often found myself bored and disconnected. I wondered what my friends were up and often wondered if anyone was trying to get in touch with me. It made me question why I make myself so openly available to others. Especially because social media often gives me anxiety about what I am doing in life compared to what others are doing. I often have to remind myself that social media is not real life. People don’t always post about their low points, or depressive episodes, or when they are hurt and sad. We mostly see pictures of “happy” relationships, children, and of others travels. I always need to take a deep breath and not compare myself to what others are doing or why I am not further along in life than I am. Life isn’t a race. So, although by 30 I am not married, don’t have my own family, and haven’t finished a degree yet.. I have done so many things that bring me happiness. I found myself sleeping better throughout the night and feeling more energized in the morning without staring into a screen all night. 

I always say there is never enough time in a day, but there really is, you just as long as you prioritize your time. I realized I spend an average of eight to nine hours a day on my phone or devices, there is so much more I could be doing with my time. Such as getting ahead on homework, cleaning more often, folding the laundry as soon as it’s done, and getting some exercise in every day. Using my phone less, or at least more consciously is definitely a goal of mine that I will continue to work on.

[saraannaross]

Life On Social Media

There is a documentary on Netflix I watched recently called The Social Dilemma. It talks a lot of the same things that Max Stossel talks about in his talk. Many of the speakers in the Netflix documentary had a similar job to Max’s some type of app/web developing/ engineering job. Their job was to get you hooked on apps, grab your attention, and keep you coming back for more. The biggest take away for me in the documentary was to turn off all unnecessary notifications. A lot of the tech experts in this documentary do not let their children use the apps they helped develop. That alone shows how scary social media and our addiction can be. All of my unnecessary notifications such as Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat are all silenced. I have to go into every app and check for notifications instead of being alerted. At first it was pretty hard for me, I was checking apps constantly wondering what my friends were up to and whether or not anyone was trying to get in contact with me. I always find myself closing one app and immediately opening up another one. It’s a vicious cycle until I finally tell myself to put my phone down for a little. Something I found very interesting is that although my social media notifications were off, my text and call alerts were still on. Eventually friends were wondering why I wasn’t opening and responding immediately. They would ask if I was ok, if I was mad at them, and what was going on. But not one tried to text me or call me. 

I find it interesting how at one point in time we only communicated through talking on the phone. Then came texting and people slowly stopped liking to talk on the phone. Texting became a way of life. I remember getting my first phone when I was in 9th grade and was always getting yelled at for texting and getting my phone taken away from me during class. I never talked to people on the phone, I texted friends and crushes all day and all night. When social media developed messaging features I no longer wanted to text. Especially with Snapchat, you can reply immediately with either pictures or direct messages. It was a lot more convenient than opening up the messages on the phone. So even though my friends noticed something was off, they continued to only contact me through social media instead of calling or texting me directly. I think that says a lot how we have become to addicted to an immediate response and instant gratification that we have lost touch with real communication. Although there are some positives, in my experience it has only had negative consequences on friendships and relationships. 

Last year I went on a wellness yoga retreat in Puerto Rico, and one of the things we had to do every day was something called silent mornings. We were instructed to not check our phones, not write, and not even talk to the others we were sharing the house with until we meditated for one hour, practiced yoga for one hour, and ate breakfast in the quiet. After these three things we were given free time to journal about what feelings arose and how we felt. It got easier with time. It was nice to not be bombarded with notifications, alerts, emails, and news of the world first thing in the morning. How you start your day really sets up the tone for the rest of your day. This is something I have kept up for over a year. Sometimes it’s only a quiet 30 minutes and sometimes its two full hours of not worrying about anything else. My only exception is early morning work calls or meetings. 

Some of the times I have no access to the internet is while I am in Northern Michigan camping, or at music festivals. It’s some of the more peaceful times in my life, though annoying when I want to post something and can’t. It is really important for me to disconnect once in a while and connect to nature and my surroundings. It is really important for me to disconnect from devices and enjoy the moment of whatever I may be doing and enjoy the people I am with, whether it is at a concert or out to eat with friends. Something I always think about are the more simple times in life just going outside and playing with friends, and once we went home not being able to see or talk to them until the next day at school. This is what Emma’s article reminded me of. The simpler times. There’s a quote I always think of “One day you went outside and played with your friends for the last time and none of you knew it.” It reminds me to live in the moment and enjoy what is in front of you.

[saraannaross]

Hello!

Hi, my name is Sara Rossi and I am a transfer student at CMU. I am part of the global campus program and this is my second semester. I decided to return to school after six years away. I graduated in 2014 with a degree in Mental Health/ Social Work from Oakland Community College in Auburn Hills, MI. I’ve worked in various roles as a substance abuse counselor, family therapy, group therapy, and held a management role within Salvation Army, USA. I left that role to focus on school full time. One of my goals this year is to be accepted into the accelerated masters program for Business Administration. A few things I enjoy is live music, festivals, traveling, and staying active (physically and mentally). I currently help run a yoga studio in Metro-Detroit part time. I’ve been practicing yoga for five+ years and highly recommend it to everyone. One of my long-term goals is to own my yoga studio with a focus on trauma for victims of abuse, suicide survivors, and those suffering addictions and in recovery.

One of the brands I love following is  www.sandcloud.com. This business sells beach towels, home accessories, clothing, and jewelry. 10% of all proceeds go to marine conservation and cleaning up the oceans. Their motto is #savethefishies. I enjoy following this brand because their posts are always professional, colorful, and easy to follow and engage with. Their team is very responsive and they are always coming up with new products, and promoting sales. Sand cloud works with many non-profits such as the Surf-rider Foundation, Marine Conservation Institute, Pacific Marine Mammal Center, The Hawaii Wildlife Fund, and many more. They work with these non-profits as a way to give back to the community and come up with sustainable materials and packaging. Working with all these foundations is a good representation of mass collaboration.

I am looking forward to learning the ins and outs, and the do’s and don’ts of social media during these next eight weeks!