Facebook Analysis

At the beginning of the semester I wanted to do something worth while. I wanted it to be fun, and that I would really enjoy just helping out. I knew that if it was something that was my hobby I would have been a huge slacker, but I'm glad that I chose something that allowed me the freedom to experiment and to try new things. The Children of Hope Academy was just the place for me. I was extremely excited when the owners allowed me the privilege of helping them out with their school. I really enjoyed getting to know them, and all of the students and volunteers who go there everyday.

The audience I had chosen for this were mainly college students who lived near by that could donate some spare time to help out at the academy and people who were in the early to mid 30's range. I was glad to see the most of my audience ranged from ages 18-34.


 I did notice that with my posts the most popular posts were those that had pictures. It seemed like more people are drawn to seeing a photo than reading a long status update or even reading an article. One of my goals was to post different articles; however, the first article I posted only got 49 views with 1 like. I thought it would have gotten more, but I did notice the jump of likes and views when I posted pictures and tagged people them. I realized, as with myself, that it is easier to like a photo than to actually read. It's been a lot easier to gain peoples interest when it deals with people that they know. I also noticed that more people viewed a post on the page if it had to do with raising funds for the school. One of the posts I had received 803 views because it focused on selling Dixie Direct books and how half the funds made went to the academy.

I had hoped to gain more likes, shares, and comments with this Facebook page, but I realized that if you want more of those likes, shares, and comments it is best to be consistent. I tried to post once a day or every other day, but it turned out more to be once a week at best. I did notice within the last week with my posting of the 10 commandments to communicating with people with disabilities that a lot of people were interested to know and they did get a few shares, likes, and comments.

Overall, I really enjoyed learning more about working with social media and what it takes to get people involved in your page. If I could change or do anything differently I would be consistent posting at least once a day and tagging more people in photos. I would also try to stay on focus with my goals. I don't think that I really stayed on task like I wanted, but I still think that the whole page turned out great and hope to keep going with it. I would love to get The Children of Hope Academy more likes and get the word out about the wonderful things they are doing there.

Sustainability: St. George, Utah

Reduced or Eliminate Carbon-Based Fuel Consumption

"Fire made us human, fossil fuels made us modern, but now we need a new fire that makes us safe, secure, healthy, and durable." -Amory Lovins

Ray Anderson said, " I remain troubled by the revised Ehrlich equation, I equals P times A divided by T2. That A is a capital A, suggesting that affluence is an end in itself. But what if we reframed Ehrlich further? And what if we made A a lowercase 'a', suggesting that is a means to an end, and that end is happiness -- more happiness with less stuff.

Fun Theory
How can we improve?
 -my score

There are so many things that we could be doing currently in our cities, but one of the most important aspects is getting people involved. The fun theory suggests just that. Our society is one that is networked. It is a society that revolves around technology. What if we used that technology, and our connectedness to make a a difference. St. George tried to reduce the use of carbon-based fuel consumption. In 2010, Mayor Dan McArthur and the city of St. George decided to build a photovoltaic power station. The plan for the solar farm was to start powering a few hundred homes, and as the farm increased the residents could start owning a part of it and receive energy credit based on how much they owned. The idea is to increase the amount of renewable energy while cutting down on CO2 emissions. The idea is long since abandoned; however, we still have the means to do it. The idea of the fun theory allows us to give people incentives to try something new. To have fun with the idea of doing good. 

In reality, the only thing that we could do with St. George is to help this community to have fun. Help them with understanding that doing good is part of humanity. That they shouldn't be afraid of being part of something bigger.

As for using technology and social networking it would be really amazing if there could be an app that helped you find ways during the day to reduce your carbon consumption and help us to calculate what we use everyday or month and how to cut that usage down just like how BP has the website dedicated to calculate carbon consumption within the home. I know that I would use that kind of app everyday especially concerning what I can do to reduce my carbon footprint.

Contextual Analysis

2011 by Ad Age

The Walking Dead has been one of the most viewed dramas in basic cable history. The television series has been the top trend since October 14th (4th season premiere). The television show is about zombies. More importantly the show is about the post-apocalyptic world and how the lives of the survivors. "Walkers, as the cast of the show calls zombies, are everywhere and the show centers around a group of people who have managed to survive this walker apocalypse.


AMC's The Walking Dead acquired 16.1 million viewers (The Wall Street Journal, para. 1) for the season premiere, but not just that AMC has done a huge push to involve their mass amount of fans through social media. They use Facebook, Twitter, Story sync, and a few other sites. AMC engages their fans, uses creative hashtags, re-purposes old content, and has made The Talking Dead to follow up on new episodes. They have used social media to incorporate fan interaction. With these different methods it allows fans to engage during the episodes and have a continuous social conversation through out the week until the next episode (Social Media Today).

The Walking Dead has become one of the most iconic roles in our society. It is completely entertainment based, but many people have become so enthralled with The Walking Dead. It has come to the point where people have become emotionally involved with the characters of the T.V. series. People would like to think what would they do in this post-apocalyptic world. How would their views, hierarchy, or life change because of this new world. How would they scavenge, take care of their family, or react/relate with other people. Certainly the situations presented in The Walking Dead are situations that people could imagine themselves in. The could determine the best course of action to take, or determine if the characters decisions are the same decisions they would make. Many tweets on Sunday consisted of "why would Rick make such a decision?" "Would I make that same decision? Why would I do that?" They involve themselves. The show has become a setting where people involve themselves. It has come to a point where it is the topic of conversation and a person is considered weird for not watching the show. It has become a bond of sorts between people and their friends, and even "friends" on the internet.

AMC has done an extremely good job at keeping fans engaged not just with an emotional tie, but also involving people through a temporal context. Each week when a new episode airs many fans get on the AMC website for The Walking Dead story sync. This allows for real time interaction with fans, interactive games and changeling others, and constant updates about the episode including pictures, polls, and interesting facts about the series. This keeps fans involved and engaged throughout the whole show. Another aspect of the temporal context is how through twitter or Facebook there are consistent updates as to what is happening on the show. Many fans who are following are also commenting about a certain scene or decision made.

I think that it is amazing that networks can involve so many people at once to enjoy a television series. I think it's amazing all the effort and work put into making hashtags and involving fans with polls, games, chat, and apps to fully engage each individual. I believe with this, since the main demographic is 18-49 year olds, AMC really hit the mark on including this specific demographic because they use social media almost everyday of their lives. I think it is a pretty smart marketing technique to make fans keep wondering and engaged through conversations all week so that they and maybe more people will be tuned in for the next episode that following Sunday.

Audience Stuffs

Here is my Facebook Audience stuffs

A lot of my facebook targeted audience is those who have time to give to help out, and to support this wonderful school. I first started out with just philanthropy, but it was too specific and wouldn't reach a wide enough audience. I had to expand my search to schooling, volunteering, and non-profit organization to gain a greater reach and to expand my audience.

Social Media Divide: Privacy Position

I find the idea of the social network divide very interesting. I love what Bob Sullivan said about avid Facebook users putting themselves into the category of "I have nothing to hide, so why worry" (New Concern: Social Media Divide, para. 7). I see that very thing often among my friends and especially family members who have Facebook accounts. I see posts that even I would think shouldn't be made public. Relationships, vacation areas, or even the littlest information to allow other people to know what they are doing or what is exactly happening in their life. For me, I would prefer not to know that information.

With concern to this privacy position, I would most likely be in the middle of the road/privacy elite. I don't mind sharing certain information, but it must be to people whom I know personally. I'm not necessarily at a point where I don't care at all about my privacy, I just don't mind sharing certain things. I am; however, huge on keeping certain aspects of my life to a complete minimum or even non-existent from an Internet/Social Media stand point. Currently I post on Facebook occasionally, and most of the time it is usually once a month or less. I always make sure my account settings on any social media site that I am apart of are set to private, or at least set to a certain level of privacy. I also like the fact that I have a brother who is technologically savvy because I am not in the slightest savvy with technology. My brother, when things go wrong especially with privacy, helps me to be safer through my social media encounters, and other things I do on the internet.

Children Of Hope Ad Copy

COHA
Help your loved ones reach their full potential. Visit the Children of Hope Academy.

COHA
Looking to do service? We have the place for you! Contact us today to see how you can help.

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Facebook Page Plan

My Facebook page is about The Children of Hope Academy. I had previously written my mission statement, but here it is again. " The purpose of the academy is to help challenged individuals achieve their full potential."

I want my page to be about the Academy and the benefits for having it. Also I wanted to let everyone know that this amazing Academy needs help as well. They need volunteers, and support from the local community.
Something I think that will really help to improve overall readership is definitely consistency. To continually keep posting on the following things:

1. Pictures of those that attend the Academy (of course getting permission from the parents of younger children)
2. Share blog posts from those that may have children/adults with special needs
3. Testimonials from those attending the academy and their family
4. Testimonials from the volunteers
5. Articles that could help, benefit, or give ideas to families
6. Stories on how the Academy came to be

Stake Holder Questions

• What does the stakeholder think of social media? They believe that social media is a way to access everyone. It is a good way to get the word out about their organization and are open to trying anything out that will allow them to receive more volunteers.
• Is the stakeholder using Facebook and/or Twitter? They have Facebook accounts, but are not many social media sites. 
• What are your organization's best campaigns for dealing directly with customers? They use a lot of fliers and rely heavily on word of mouth. However, they know that isn't the best way to get people's attention. They need easier ways to keep their customers engaged in the activities that they have every week.
• How can your organization improve customer engagement? I think that since a lot of their volunteers, and even students that attend the academy use Facebook that by going to social media they would be able to increase the engagement. It's a simple answer, but I think for right now that is what they need the most.
• What does social media success mean? I think every organization needs exposure. Social media is the best way to expose that organization. Success in social media is allowing the word to get out, but receiving benefit from the word getting out. Most companies would probably receive higher revenue as they increase their social presence on the internet, and the same will happen for other organizations even non-profit. For the Children of Hope Academy, I think if they increase their exposure through social media then they will receive the help they need if that is raising funds or having an increase in volunteers. It will happen.
• How does social media marketing increase workload? I think it increases workload because there is a lot of time and energy that goes in social media marketing. Its not something you do once a day. It is constant, or continuous. It increases not just your time on every social media site, but it could possibly increase workload by bringing in more customers which are probably desperately needed.

Syria, Obama's Address

 I understand what is currently happening in Syria and has happened over there, but I have no opinion. Unfortunately I didn't get the chance to watch the address until a few hours after it was given, so I have no idea how the social media exploded from the words of the President. 

I did get the chance to hear Obama's address on YouTube, and I noticed that the way he uses his words. He relates to the hearts of the people, and tries to even persuade them to come to his side and accept his point of view. To accept why our country is going to do a military strike.

However, even after getting on a few hours later there were still people tweeting about President Obama's address. The comments revolved around mainly negative aspects of Obama's speech. There were plenty of criticisms, and many people saying that it is the worst idea for the United States to go to war. On Facebook, I had one friend that said, "No matter how little or big of an intervention it is it will still be bad for us." He continued to say if we did go to Syria with this military tactic who would we be benefiting? The rebels, or the Syrian Army.
There were also a instances in which people did agree with what he said. They think it is perfectly fine to take this opportunity to get rid of the chemical bombs that have done harm to those in Syria.
Anyway, even after Obama's address there were still thousands of tweets popping up on twitter with vast criticisms and support for his position on Syria. I can understand that there is no easy way to look at this kind of situation. After reading and talking with a few of my friends about it, my opinion still hasn't changed, but I also find that I can agree with the fact that it may not be the best idea with the military strike in Syria.

Mission Statement

The purpose of the academy is to help challeged individuals achieve their full potential and to provide their families with programs and other helps to make that happen.

The Children of Hope Academy

https://www.facebook.com/thechildrenofhopeacademy

Persona's

Karen, 18, is a first year human development major at Dixie State University. She has always wanted to be a teacher and enjoys learning and helping others. She is very family oriented and loves to serve them however she can. Karen usually uses Facebook to connect with friends, family, and finding ways to serve in her community.

Matthew, 24, just moved from California. He decided that it would be good to finish his degree in business at DSU. Since he is new to the city he wants to get involved with DSU and the community. He loves to learn, and help others when he can. He also enjoys being active and having fun with his friends. He has a little brother who has down syndrome and, he gets the chance, loves to hang out with him and play.

Emily, 32, stays at home while her husband goes to work. She does love helping out the people in her ward that need help. She loves to cook and make different kinds of recipes when she can. She also sings and dances. She was a dancer before she got married. She likes to go out and stays active. Since Emily stays at home she tries to find things to do, but ends up on Facebook looking for local community events and activities her husband and she can go to.