Out of the Box: VR/AR

Have you ever experienced virtual reality or augmented reality? Did you walk across a piece of wood so high up in the air that you were scared of falling even though you were never going to fall? Or did you use augmented reality to try on new glasses from the comfort of your own home?

I never would have expected us to use VR/AR (virtual reality/augmented reality) for online marketing but at the same time, I think it is such a great idea so you can virtually try on products. AR allows us to turn shopping into virtual shopping, you can shop eyewear on websites such as Eyebuydirect or clothing on websites such as TryNDBuy and try them on using your phone camera. This gives consumers the option to shop at home but still be able to try things on to see how they look as if they were in an actual store. I often have influencers pop up on TikTok who share how easy it is to use Eyebuydirect, the deals they offer and how they found their perfect frames.

VR can produce brand experiences, it can create an immersive experience that helps engage and captivate its users by using interactive storytelling, and virtual events, and can also be used for virtual tours that would be great for travel or real estate. Using VR they can market their services and properties, destinations etc., online and give their users a virtual yet realistic idea of what they are selling.

This technology allows businesses to stand out and attract consumers looking for new and unique ways to test products or go on tours. This opens up so many new opportunities that could help businesses increase customers and engagement, and bring more awareness to the business and their social media.

What is the Real ROI of Social media?

Today I attended an online event hosted by Hootsuite with two speakers, Laura Rychlik and Tabeer Ali, who spoke about ROI, value and the analytics of social media, the webinar was called “The Real ROI of Social Media“. They took the time to showcase Hootsuite’s add-on features for advanced analytics, which is going live the first week of July. Tabeer Ali went into depth about how to use the features on Hootsuite and what they can do, she also demonstrated and explained what each percentage and number represented.

If you are looking for webinars to attend yourself, you may be asking why I chose this one? Here were my top reasons:

• Most were not free
• ROI is very important when working with social media
• To see what else I could learn about ROI of social media
• To see what others have experienced working in this field
• To see what other attendees had questions about

I am more interested now to try Hootsuite and see all the beneficial ways it can monitor and measure your platforms, especially with the new add-ons that are launching. I asked if they had any advice for someone just starting out but unfortunately, our time ran out and there were so many other attendees that had questions as well so we did not get them all answered.

I walked away feeling like I have a better understanding of ROI and value. While giving an example she ended with saying that customer experience even as communication online does not tie directly to revenue but still has a large impact on whether the customer decides to stay based on the experience and how the business responded or if they responded at all. She went into depth and defined ROI and value, how they are different and and providing an example of both helped me walk away with a better understanding to help me remember. Something Laura Rychlik said that I wanted to remember was “Don’t be afraid to try new strategies, even if you think it may not totally fit with your organization because you never know, it could just work”.

I think I would attend an event similar to this again but I think I would personally like to try an in-person event. Although I gained new ideas and knowledge from this webinar I found it difficult to concentrate on what they were saying as well as the comments and I believe in person would help separate that so I could fully take in what they are saying and what others want to ask when it is their time to.

Do you enjoy online or in person events?

COM0014 – Blog #7: Personal Reflection

What kind of ad grabs your attention, the one with a puppy and a boy and their story together? Or one where someone is talking on a tv or radio promoting their business with a deal and their number? I think we can all agree that ads with a story are more compelling and gain your attention, having that emotional connection with the ad makes you curious about the product and draws you in. That is why telling a story is so important, you make a connection with your audience and gain their trust and loyalty.

Photo by Mohamed_hassan on Pixabay

Storytelling is important to digital content because it helps show the story visually and is able to make a better connection with the audience. As an audience you are more inclined to buy a product you felt a connection to and it will stick in your head and you will remember the brand. Digital communication also allows companies to:

• Tell a story and simplify complex ideas
• Use visuals to capture the audiences attention faster
• Create content with visuals and a story because it is easier to remember

Because storytelling is so important you need to know your message and what content helps bring your story to life. When creating content you want to see what your audience is more drawn to and what kind of story you can tell to promote your products that will draw them in. Knowing your audience and what emotional connection they relate to will help with content and how it is guided by the story.

Creating a story that makes a connection with my audience is important, I want to talk about my products and be honest with my audience to create trust and bond. Showing visuals to represent the message I am sharing through my content is important so they can make that connection and understand the story better. I have learnt how important storytelling is and that you can use it in everything you do, it helps you grab their attention and stay as a memory. Digital storytelling allows you to do so much more with your story and expand your creativity in how you tell your story.

Do you use storytelling?

COM0014-Blog #6: Do People Know Your Story?

Do you ever think about all the challenges you had to overcome to get to where you are now? What was it that you overcome to get to this point? For me, I had a lot of challenges, from not knowing what I wanted to do in life, to taking a program I thought I had an interest in but had none, taking time off to figure it out AGAIN! To this moment, two weeks away from my next challenge, what do I do after I am done school?

Photo by silviarita on Pixabay

Back in Highschool, I struggled to pick electives, it is supposed to be this fun decision you get to make where for the first time in school you get to pick what you want to do and every year you get more and more options. Well, I had no idea what to pick, not once through Highschool did I know what I wanted to go to school for. I was always interested in working with kids, but after doing my co-op in Grade 12 I did not like how repetitive my days were, and I knew what to expect every single day.

After that, I graduated and did not pursue the original program I had picked, Child and Youth Worker. I would go through the entire list of programs at multiple colleges and nothing would stick out to me, I ended up taking two gap years and just worked. In that second year, I was living with my boyfriend at the time and his family, I was pushed towards school and that led me to Interior Decorating, before I even started the semester we broke up and not one part of me wanted to do that program anymore. I did it anyways and knew only a couple weeks in that this was not the right path for me but proceeded to finish the semester with great marks but it didn’t matter, I was not doing a second semester.

Flash forward and once again I took a semester off and tried to figure out who I was and what I wanted, and that led me here. I have always known I was creative and loved designing things (now you can see why I thought Interior Decorating was the way to go), I started watching GirlBossTown on TikTok where she makes videos on how she would produce or creative direct commercials for different businesses. I was so intrigued by all her ideas that It made me want to look more into marketing, more specifically social media marketing. Having platforms, content, and consumers and building a community to make connections, have engagement and gain an audience just sounded like everything I was looking for. I get to be creative, organized, and loyal and have so many accomplishments I can be proud of.

@girlbosstown

Reply to @neelycampanyy #greenscreen @Converse

♬ Stand By Me – Ben E. King

She uses storytelling in all of her ideas because she knows the emotional connection she can make with consumers. Suddenly I didn’t have the challenge anymore of trying to figure out what I wanted to do, I knew what I wanted and now I am almost done. The problem is, there are always going to be challenges to overcome, the good news is that you still accomplish so many things while fighting those challenges and that’s why you keep going.

Professional Networking Now and in the Future

How are you representing yourself online and in person? Are you the same person during both? Below I will tell you how I represent myself and what I am doing now compared to my strategy in the future.

Present Strategy

My present strategy for developing my professional networks online and in person is being myself and showing off my best qualities to both. It is crucial to make social connections on and offline, you want people to know, trust, and respect you and I try to do this every day.

My current online strategies are:

• Updating my platforms to the most relevant information.
• Keeping up with content and comments and tracking what gets the most likes.
• Looking for new accounts to follow.
• Interact with followers.
• Be myself and promote my personal brand.

Photo by WebTechExperts on Pixabay

My current in-person strategies are:

• Be myself and promote my personal brand.
• Take the time to communicate with people face to face.
• Use my best qualities so I can listen and understand whom I am talking to, and make them feel understood and heard.
• Find new ways to connect with people face to face.
• Share my knowledge.

Photo by Geralt on Pixabay

Future Strategy

My activities and commitments in the next 6-12 months are very important when developing my network strategy for the future.

I plan to:

• Set clear goals and objectives for myself throughout the year and have patience.
• Find new ways to interact with people with the same likes and interests, by finding common ground I can make great connections and learn even more about the individuals I meet.
• Collaborate with the people mentioned above to share our knowledge with each other.
• Volunteer with people or communities within social media marketing to make connections and gain experience in person.
• Join an organization to use all of the new knowledge I have gained in the past two years so I can see what I am capable of.
• Create a LinkedIn so I can put myself out there with an updated resume and information about myself.
• Look for events based on social media so I can meet like-minded people and create valuable connections with them.
• Use all knowledge based on courses and connections to promote and create content that best represents me and how I want to be seen.

Making social connections on and offline is essential when developing a professional networking strategy, the connections you make can last forever and can offer you so much knowledge and value in the present and future. Although my present strategy is not the best it can be, I know what I would like my strategy to look like, and I can create a plan to reach my goals in the next 6-12 months.

COM0014 – Blog #5: Personal Brand

A personal brand defines what you stand for as an individual, what makes you stand out, and the experiences and skills that make you who you are. My personal brand could be described as someone who is compassionate, determined and personable.

Photo by Geralt on Pixabay

The big question is what sets me apart from others? Many people are compassionate, determined and personable but I like to think that I am reliable and show understanding and compassion towards people I interact with daily. Making social connections allows me to see more than just the outer layer of a person, I get to see who they really are and what makes them unique, and understanding life and problems is what allows me to make those connections.

A personal brand is shown a lot through social media, just like most of you, I have many platforms I express myself on. Taking these courses has helped me stand out because I have gained the knowledge to know how to tell my story and show off my best qualities. Some say I am very approachable and have great communication skills. I do my best at work to make sure everyone is in the loop and have received many positive comments on it from co-workers. It is such a great feeling when people pull you aside and say how your simple smile or small talk with them makes their day better and it is something they look forward to. I am proud to be that person, because of those characteristics I had the most votes to be on the health and safety committee, me showing my co-workers who I was and what I can offer came back in a way that showed me they trust and respect me and that is such a great feeling.

What personal qualities set you apart from others?

COM0014 – Blog #4: B2C Case Study

Does Dove Have a Good Approach to Social Media?

When you think about a brand that has been with you through it all, did you ever think about Dove? From deodorants to every shower product you could need including baby Dove, but Dove is so much more than their products, they are the message they send to women worldwide about self-love and confidence. Dove tells moving stories and shares campaigns to engage with its audience to help change beauty standards and create only positive social media feeds. They spread only kindness and positivity through their platforms and are very inclusive and globally relevant with their content.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Dove Global Channel 🌎 (@dove)

Dove uses platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube to educate through the platform and promote effective and powerful content that includes its products. Dove uses hashtags in all of their posts, this not only spreads more awareness and gives its audience something to use when they post their own content, but it helps them reach a larger audience. Dove responds to multiple people on all of their posts on Instagram and had a very interactive post on their Facebook page back in 2022, where they had many women share their stories in the comments.

Dove receives a lot of interaction, whether it is about its products or the stories and awareness they are spreading. Most of their interactions on their platforms are positive and if they receive a negative comment, they reply to direct message their account and they would try their best to solve the problem. They are good at responding to multiple people because they monitor their accounts so they can stay active and reply quickly. I think their approach is working because they post about self-esteem and connect with many women of all ages, Dove is taking a stand so the next generation can have a positive relationship with how they look. They have reached a large audience and have created a safe space full of positivity and inclusiveness that appeals to so many women. What they portray on their platforms is honest and that’s why they have the loyalty of their audience and consumers. They are creative with their ideas on how to use their product in such a way that tells a story to their viewers, while still receiving the appeal of the product.

Looking at all of Dove’s platforms, I was instantly drawn to them; they share such important messages and use their platform to have a voice. They did such a great job at showcasing their products that I went out last night looking for two of them I wanted to buy. Dove is a very inspiring organization and does a great job at interacting with users, using social media as their voice, and is very creative and globally relevant.

Do you think Dove has a good approach to social media?

Strong and Weak Organizations – Airbnb vs Dollarama

What are you more drawn to, an organization with a strong social media presence and has goals or an organization with no presence, so we are unsure of their goals?

Strong Social Media Strategy

Although I have never stayed in one, I would be lying if I did not say I have not looked at many Airbnbs throughout the years and have been so tempted, but the timing never worked. I was impressed by their social media pages because they:

@airbnb

i was taken by the view like we were in… 🗼🥐🇫🇷🥖 #airbnbpartner #paris

♬ original sound – airbnb

• Post often on multiple platforms
• Gain attraction by posting photos and videos of different Airbnb locations
• Cater to different audiences through content
• Monitor comments and posts from hosts of Airbnbs
• Responds to questions and concerns on platforms
• Has the goal of creating a world everyone can belong

To elaborate on the points I made above, Airbnb does a great job of showcasing many different locations on their Instagram and reposting photos and videos the hosts of those Airbnb have shared on their own social media. They make sure to share many different locations as well as different styles depending on the audience, some examples are cabins, places with animals, at the lake etc. They use their TikTok to cater more to specific target audiences looking to rent an Airbnb by showing them ones available if they like trains, water or even ones that have views of well-known landmarks.

Weak Social Media Strategy

Everybody loves Dollarama, so many great things for around the house at an affordable price, but they have no social media presence because they probably do not believe they need one. I think they could benefit greatly by creating a social media strategy.

First few steps:

• Start with TikTok, hop on trends and reach out to influencers sharing similar content
• Analyze the growth of the following to see how often it increases or if it increases at all
• Create a schedule of when to post and how often based off of information found from monitoring the audience
• Expand to other platforms and link them all on the website and platform bios

Once their platform is created they can use it for:

• Showcasing Dollarama must-haves
• New products and brand-name items that come in
• Using influencers to try their different items to prove just because they are cheaper does not mean they are not good
• Post updates when the seasonal product arrives
• Posting dupes and brand-name products for a reasonable price so they can compete with other organizations and give consumers the best deal

@saishoppe_ss

Shocking items at Dollarama 🇨🇦 only for $4.75 🤩, grab it now guys!!🔥🔥 And don’t forget to follow me for more updates 🫶🏻❤️ #homefinds2023 #hotdallaramafinds #dollarstorefinds #dollaramafindcanada

♬ original sound – Bhavjot_0

With these strategies, Dollarama can set goals for themselves and by monitoring their platforms with the tool Brand24 to see what is being said about them, communicate with their audience and connect with influencers who post videos about their own Dollarama finds. Creating these relationships will help them build a solid following and use platforms like Instagram, TikTok and Facebook to create content that will help them reach their large audience that is already out there. Making sure to post often and across all platforms will help them keep the loyalty of their audience. They can also gain feedback on what kind of content their audience wants to see, such as DIY, testing out their kitchen or beauty supplies, meals you can make from just Dollarama etc.

Due to inflation, this is an excellent time for Dollarama to showcase what it can offer anyone wanting to save a little money. I think some people forget everything you can buy from Dollarama. Creating a presence on social media will help expand who views videos of trending items and bring in customers looking for what they see online.

While some organizations have a stronger social media strategy, that is not to say ones who are weak will always be weak. Implementing the proper strategy can help you gradually reach your goals; it takes patience and dedication, but the outcome is worth it.

COM0014 – Blog #3: Target Audiences

Who Wants Coffee?

For every wakeup, meetup, interview or meeting, coffee is there. To energize you, wake you up, a late-night pick-me-up or a hot drink, but who exactly drinks it? Personally, I started drinking coffee when I was about 17-18 years old and have never been addicted to it, but I did, however, develop a problem where drinking caffeine made me nauseous. It would last for the remainder of the day and sometimes still cause me to wake up dizzy. I switched to decaf and became part of the slim percent of people who drink it, which is a possible target audience. Tim Hortons and Mcdonald’s only sell decaf hot drinks, not cold, and in stores, you cannot buy decaf coffee in the refrigerated section. A campaign geared toward this target audience could effectively communicate with them using the tools below whether they cannot drink caffeine, do not want to or are moms-to-be.

Photo by Lina Kivaka on Pexels

From a business-to-consumer standpoint, the target audience is adults ranging from the ages of about 18-80, leaving there to be quite a large audience. This can be broken down into different target audiences, such as:

• Students: Using coffee to stay awake to write a paper.
• Working Professionals: Drinking coffee in the morning to get them through tough long days.
• Seniors: Going out to get coffee with old friends.
• Moms: Needing a little pick me up because they did not get their total 8 hours.

You can cater to any of these target audiences by researching more about each specific group and determining ways to turn them into buyers. This could be picking a social media platform that the audience uses the most to promote and can use influencers to promote and offer discounts. Being active on that platform is just as important because you create loyalty and trust with consumers, creating the cycle of being a regular customer. Twitter is an excellent tool for engaging with consumers and can help get feedback and monitor conversations about your products. Advertising based on current trends to your target audience will gain their attention, and tools like Twitter and Facebook being used to promote and communicate will help achieve more consumers.

Using the proper tools and strategies to reach your target audience will help effectively communicate with them, turning them into buyers who continue to return.

COM0014- Blog #2: Storytelling and Communication Styles

How to Tell a Good Story

When telling a story, you want to collect all the details you intend to include before writing it. Nothing is worse than telling a story or hearing a story where you constantly have to backtrack because you forgot a part and now everyone is confused about what is happening. When telling a story, you must immediately grab the reader’s attention. If you were to click on a blog and it is long and wordy, the interest of the viewer could be gone, by adding headings, bullet points and leading with the most critical information, the reader is able to skim the text and get a quick idea on what the main subject matter of the blog is.

To create a beginning, middle, and end for a blog, I like to use the information we were taught as a kid when creating speeches. In your opening statement, you need to hook your audience while also talking about all the points you are going to touch on.

1. Tell them what you are going to tell them.
2. Tell them.
3. Tell them what you told them.

Photo by cottonbro studio on Pexels

Important Communication Styles to Use

Storytelling is an excellent way to approach any content you are creating, you want to grab the reader’s attention whether it is a blog or trying to market a product, because you want to engage with the reader. Viewers are more likely to continue reading if the storytelling and communication styles are done properly and they can fully visualize what they are reading and feel connected to what they are reading. While most people automatically use a passive voice when writing a blog or making a post but it is equally essential to use an active voice to be more clear, understanding, and interesting to your audience.

Do you find it difficult to switch from using a passive to an active voice when writing?