Joseph Pass CSIT-155 Class blog

Man, what a semester it has been. It seems like it was last week that I was sitting down at my computer trying to understand exactly what this course would be like. It was my first time ever doing online courses like this and was something I really had to get used to. I was excited though, to be learning about social media for business since I had just started my own business several months prior. I definitely knew that I needed some help navigating through it to understand the real importance and how to implement it within my own work. Since beginning the course, my use of social media has definitely changed and I'm finding better ways to engage my audience. I have really seen Facebook to be much more successful in generating revenue compared to Instagram which has been better for interaction and brand recognition. Knowing this has helped me to prioritize the type of content I'm using on each platform. My target audience also differs from each platform and each demands differe...

It's great to find these sources for managing my social media platforms and there are many different tasks they can help with. The first one that intrigued me was a site called MeetEdgar which is best for automation. There are two paid options within the site and they both offer great services. They allow me to make unlimited scheduled posts, it organizes my posts into a searchable library so I can reuse them when I want and I can schedule specific posts for the right times.  Another source that is best for all around use is Zoho. This allows businesses to schedule posts, collaborate with their team, and check analytics. There are 3 paid options within the site and they all provide great features depending on the size of your company and your needs.  Buffer is another site that helps with scheduled posts and creating content that works for your brand, it allows you to team up with coworkers to draft up posts together, and lets you get analytics. For the publishing feature of t...

For the next few months I plan to utilize several avenues of marketing. These avenues include Instagram, Facebook and e-newsletters. I also plan to use LinkedIn, but this is more just for my own personal use of finding information, not for marketing. Facebook/Instagram Every Thursday + Sunday: setup scheduled daily posts to occur each morning around 10am and then around 6pm on Wednesdays to remind people to come to the Farmers Market on Thursday morning.  Post on stories daily with tagged posts from customers. Check engagement every 3 days. Adjust accordingly  Paid ads will be used in future months to come E-newsletters Create a bi-weekly newsletter on Tuesdays to keep customers up to date with what's happening at my company. Increase to weekly once website is established.

Throughout this semester's course on Social Media, I have really been able to get a taste of how to better use and understand the specific platforms in regards to my small business. As a millennial, I of course already had a fairly good understanding of how to use social media and knew that it is a vital part of running a successful business. Clearly, it's impossible to scroll through Instagram or Facebook without seeing ads for businesses with clickable links that direct you to their profile or website, so when I began my business I absolutely knew I had to have some sort of presence on those two platforms at least. What I didn't know, and what I've began to learn are the details and knowledge that go in to creating a business profile that is actually successful and efficient.  What this course has done is force me to look more in depth at what goes into a social media presence and how to operate it with more ease. What once seemed daunting has now become exciting and ...

As I'm browsing through my Facebook analytics page for ultimately the first time, I am amazed at all the information there is to be found. How did I not know this information existed? I blindly started my Facebook business page last year with absolutely no idea what I was doing other than the basic knowledge I had from using my personal Facebook for the last decade or so. Now that I know I can track all of this information I am eager to build my page and grow my customer base through quality and timely content. To begin, I'm able to get a quick overview of the information with the most recent weeks numbers. I can quickly see page views, likes, reach, and actions. Clearly I have been neglecting my Facebook page which is why my numbers are so poor. However, this is a huge eye opener and really encourages me to post more. As I dive in a bit deeper, I can click on any of those boxes for more information. For example, when I click "Actions on Page" it opens up to all the i...

Google Analytics is an incredibly useful program that can be used to grow your business. There are so many features within that allow you to track important data in regards to your website and social media profiles. Personally, I would use the analytics to track the specific engagement from my audience to determine which types of posts they react to best and and how often they are sharing my posts. That is incredibly important to me so that I can continue to deliver content that they find good enough to share with their friends and family.  I am also able to track how many new users I am getting and how many I am retaining or losing. I would also like to know when and through which methods they are finding me and subscribing to my page. This is important to know so that I can schedule my posts for specific times and where I need to direct my marketing. Of course we want to target our audience when they are awake and online so knowing those times is crucial to my business developmen...

These were three different ads that I paid to have run on Facebook. I actually have never looked at the analytics for these ads until now and I find it super interesting. There is so much useful information to be found and now that I know I can use this for future ads. Now that I'm starting to get a better handle on the labor side of my business, I have a lot more time to dedicate to social media and advertising.  These ads that I made before I really didn't put too much thought into so they may not have been the most effective. However, the first ad did reach quite a lot of people and that is ultimately what got me started with my business. Because of the Facebook ad running all the time, I ended up getting too many orders that I couldn't keep up on my own and had to move my business out of my home and into a commercial kitchen.  The ads are simple; "Fresh baked cookies made to order and delivered. Order now." A very simple call-to-action that works. My main cust...

I scrolled through my newsfeed on my personal Facebook account and got several sponsored posts and ads which are mostly relevant to my current interests. First there was a sponsored post for maternity shoots-my wife is pregnant and she's used my Facebook to search for things related to that. The post used photos done by a photographer of a family and the mother is pregnant. They use a call to action "Book Now" by advertising a discount and when you click it brings you to a website where you can choose a photo package. I get sponsored posts for Vistaprint and ZipRecruiter because they are clearly targeting me for my business side. I use hiring websites in order to find employees and I use a lot of printing services for packaging and labels. These aren't that annoying because they can be useful to me when I'm needing to complete a task or looking for better pricing. Another sponsored post was for Veteran's Loans using a call to action to refinance a home mortgag...

I created a free account with LinkedIn so I could explore what the site has to offer. There are so many inspiring people to follow and learn from along with many different brands that I can follow to gain more insight into the industry. I researched the groups section and found many groups that would be extremely useful to me and my business.  Some of my biggest hurdles in my business are my lack of social media presence, marketing, and packaging. With just a basic search in the groups section I found many groups tailored to these exact subjects. For example, I found a group called "Food Packaging Professionals" this would be an excellent group for me to join to get insight on the best type of packaging for my product and how to enhance my production. Not only that, I am able to find people for hire for areas that I am weak in or cannot execute myself.  Yelp is another outlet that my business does not currently utilize but will in the future. Yelp is great for promoting your ...

In today's world it seems that everything is moving to the online world. We use it for literally everything, we are glued to our phones for hours on end and have to rely on it navigating through the world. It makes sense that as a business owner, I would need to get on bored with the growing trend to make the most of what the internet has to offer in terms of helping my business grow.  We are all very familiar with Facebook and Instagram, but there are many other social networks that provide useful tools to broaden our business whether it be by actually gaining customers, or by networking with other business owners or people who we could use on our team, or just to gain information related to our industry.  I have been all too hesitant to join LinkedIn, not because I don't want to, but because it is just another daunting task that I must add to my To Do list for my still very new business. I am fully aware of all the benefits I could reap by joining and creating my profile and...

I began my research with Twitter to further my knowledge from the little bit I knew already. I have never really used Twitter besides here and there over the years. I don't have any followers on my personal account and I used it only to follow celebrities and other influencers I liked. So I've never made any posts or used it in any productive way. Personally, I didn't like that the posts were mainly just short word posts. I found that Instagram and Facebook were more useful to me and more enjoyable to use. After reading the articles, I learned a bit about how to use Twitter for business purposes. Like any social media platform there is a good deal of effort that goes into making it a successful platform for your business. It's important to come up with a good Twitter handle, creating a clear and concise bio, creating solid imagery and media to attract viewers etc. But even after all of this, Twitter isn't a very useful platform to generate revenue. It has mainly bec...

For my cookie company I would send newsletters weekly to keep my subscribers informed about the specific locations we will be selling. I currently do not have a typical "brick and mortar" location so I sell in different locations, such as at Farmer's Markets, on the military base, and at the Fashion Valley Mall. Providing a weekly newsletter with that information along with any other relevant information would be my ideal frequency.  Of course, upon subscribing I would send out a Welcome newsletter to thank them for subscribing and offer them a special deal as a thank you. I also like the idea of sending out birthday newsletters yearly to give out a free bag of cookies. I think it's incredibly important to build a relationship with each subscriber so that they trust me and my company and continue to come back. Showing appreciation to each customer and keeping them informed is a great way to do this.  It seems like I am signed up for thousands of newsletters, they pile...

Categories on a blog are a great way to group together different posts in order for readers to more easily find what they are looking for. They help to organize your blog site into broad groups which can then be broken down further into sub categories. I think this is a great idea to keep the page looking clean and easily navigable. Having these categories also helps to make sure your posts are staying relevant to your industry. Since my business is cookies I would have a category for Flavors. Perhaps I would use this category to discuss new recipes, customer favorites, holiday and seasonal flavors etc. Another category could be Local Events where I would discuss the events our company would be attending or which farmers markets we would be selling. I could also use this category for posts to talk about other businesses in the area.  Because my business was started with a family recipe, I like to keep my business with a "close to home" feel. For this reason I could have a thi...

Depending on the type of business you have, your blog, social media, website, etc. will be specific to such, making it different from another type of business' blog.  However, regardless of what type of business you have, adding elements of personal touch in your blog can really work well to capture your audience. The goal of advertising and blogging is to connect with your audience. And how do you make connection? You use emotion, humor, relatable content, this all helps to get the person to remember you and hopefully become a customer. No matter your business, you can always find a way to add a personal touch. It may not connect with everyone, but you'll gain a few new followers or customers with the extra effort. I really believe there is always room to add a personal touch in a post no matter the topic or the business. Of course you want to get to the underlying point, which is "Buy my product or service." which I really don't think you can be successful at wi...

Visual media is definitely useful in my type of business. Customers really want to see images and videos to create an experience for them. In turn, this will more likely persuade them to buy my product. To get a better idea of how other companies in my industry are using visual media it's a good idea to look at their Instagram pages. By checking their number of followers, use of hashtags, types of posts and engagement received on those posts, this may help me to better understand how I can utilize similar techniques to grow my following. One local cookie company is called The Cravory. They have 31.8k followers and they post just about everyday. Their latest post was 11 hours ago (March 19). I would think Instagram is effective for them at least somewhat. They really are only using photo posts. There are not any video posts and the engagement is pretty minimal compared to the number of followers they have. Most posts are getting less than 50 likes and zero comments. They use about 4...

I viewed many of the Instagram accounts in our class and I love that everyone is getting their business pages started. Whether they had them since before the class or are just starting out now, I'm very impressed with everyone's work. The three accounts from my group that I commented on were Jan Walker, Morgan McCray, and Sue Godwin. These three have entirely different businesses but all great concepts.  Jan Walker's Instagram is to promote a consulting business, Morgan McCray has a business where people can create their own Kpop outfits, and Sue Godwin has a no-kill animal shelter. Because of the different nature of each of these businesses, they would require each different types of posts in order to capture their target audience. Morgan McCray can have a more colorful and fun type of theme, where as Jan Walker would want something more serious, maybe more neutral colors, with a lot of business inspiration. Sue Godwin would want something with lots of cute photos, but als...

I currently already have an Instagram account for my cookie business. I tend to use the story feature to post updates of where I will be that week, such as when I'm at the Farmers Market. I will also use story posts when a customer tags me in their own story after they've made a purchase. I use normal posts to share photos and updates with the company. I post both videos and photos to keep it interesting. I find that posting solely photos can get a bit boring and my audience tends to enjoy seeing me in the videos. I find them both to be very useful. I tend to get a lot of engagement on my posts and I feel if I had some training I would be able to make even better use of this platform. Currently I have 2,689 followers and I can't wait to get more.  I have never really used hashtags, I suppose that's because I didn't know how to use them efficiently. I don't know what would be useful. I follow many other business profiles and personal accounts. Although, I need to...

So a while back, maybe in October or November I met with a guy who owns a co-packing business in South San Diego. I was interested in working with him to have his bakers do all my baking and packaging for my cookies. I had heard really great things from a number of people who work in the same commercial kitchen with me. Having the convenience of professional bakers who all the necessary equipment and accurate weight measurements to provide me with a consistent, packaged and sealed product every time was very enticing.  So I went and met him at his facility where all the magic happens and I was blown away by the amount of cookies they would be able to produce for me each month. I sat along side his bakers for 8 hours that day, watching them measure and mix and scoop and bake and then package and seal each cookie individually. It was an incredible experience and I learned a lot. Not just about how to better bake the cookies myself, but it opened my eyes to the world of food distribut...

So since I began my Facebook page last April I have barely used it. I found Instagram to be more of my "thing." So I guess I never really learned the ins and outs of Facebook. Until now, I never even looked at my post reach and engagement. From the research I've done thus far, post reach and engagement are very important to know in order to market your business. The reach is literally just the number of people who have seen your post. This is measured by how many screens your post is displayed on. This does not take into account any interaction with the post. The engagement then, means who is actually connecting with your post with likes, sharing, and commenting. The larger your reach, there is potential for more engagement. And vice versa, the more engagement your post receives, the more people you may reach. These are both important to know because it can tell you what kind of posts you want to use more often. The more engagement you get then you know people are paying ...

     When I first started my business back in April 2020 I also started my social media pages; Instagram and Facebook. At that time I was very active on Facebook because I was using the marketplace to post ads for my cookies. I was doing deliveries all over San Diego solely from orders I was getting on Facebook. So at that time my page was incredibly helpful.       Since then I have slowly gotten away from Facebook and aimed my focus more so on my Instagram page, however, they both still lack the quality I want them to have. I have said it before and I'll say it again, I am very unaware of how to effectively use social media for my business. I want to learn how to attract more followers and maintain a solid and consistent presence on both pages.       Besides the fact that I am not the best at managing my social media, another reason I am currently inactive on Facebook is because I am sort of at a stand still in my business. I am wo...