FINAL BLOG

Over the course of the semester my viewpoint on social media has changed.  When I first started the class, the only experience I had with social media was posting on Facebook with my friends.  I now have a better understanding of the enormity of social media and how businesses are using it.

Before taking this class I had never visited a business Facebook page.  If I wanted information about a business, I only went to their website.  Now I understand that, while the website is a "home base", social media is where to go if I want to find up-to-date information.  For example, a month ago I built a chicken coop with my son.  We wanted to find a feed store that sold chickens to populate our coop.  I found several websites of feed stores that claimed that they sold chickens, but it wasn't until I visited the stores' Facebook pages that I found out what breeds of chickens the stores carried, and whether the chickens were in stock.

I now take Twitter more seriously.  I now know that you can search Twitter to find out what people want.  A few months ago, I searched Twitter in order to find horse riders who were looking for a certain kind of boots that I had for sale.  I found that several people had posted that they were looking for boots.  The ability to immediately find people who were looking for something so specific as a certain type of riding boot was pretty amazing!

After taking this class, I have a much better idea of how to use social media to develop a business.  First, the business should identify their target market.  After the target market is identified, the business should find out how their target market uses social media.  A good clue to knowing how the target market uses social media is to find out how your competitors are using social media.  Identifying how competitors successfully use, and more importantly finding where your competitors are NOT successfully using social media will guide your business strategy.  I found that my target market uses Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Youtube.  A business strategy could be to connect with the target market on these sites in order to establish communication.  Finding some way to add value such as offering information or "how to" can be a way to establish your business as an informed source.  A business blog is a great forum to provide this information.  A business can also add comments on others' blogs to establish their credibility.  If it makes sense for the business, pictures and video can be added to the blog.  At this point, the business is trying to build "likes" and "followers".

After the business has engaged the target market, the business can initiate promotion and advertising.  Facebook/Instagram or Twitter ads are a great way to reach your target market.  These platforms gather a great deal of information from users!  When I made a few ads on Facebook, I was able to target females age 16-45 who are interested in horses and, more specifically, who are interested in dressage, showjumping and eventing.  I was pretty amazed that Facebook could target so specifically. Although, over the course of the semester, I began noticing how specifically Facebook has been targeting me!  The great thing about running the ads is that you obtain analytics that can tell you how many people saw your ad, how many people clicked through to a website, how many people shared/liked etc. the post.  Another method is choosing to "Boost" a post.  This will get your post to your followers and their friends.  The Facebook business page also runs analytics, so the business can see how their followers are interacting with their posts.  This information will allow the business to better use social media to engage their customers.

Taking this class has changed the way that I interact with businesses on-line.  Now when I google a business, I will often go to their Facebook page or Instagram page after I have viewed their website if I am looking for more information.  I found the material in the class very worth while and its given me a better understanding and appreciation for social media.

WeeK 16: Post 2 Future Plans

I sell used horse tack on Ebay for myself and for friends.  I chose to market my Ebay tack sales under a business that I decided to call "The Tack Shed".  The Tack Shed promotes the tack for sale and attempts to drive buyers to my Ebay listings.  The tack I am selling already gets plenty of exposure from being listed on Ebay, which justifies paying Ebay approximately 10% commission on each item that I sell.  Any sales that are generated from social media marketing are just "icing on the cake".  In this case, the time I would spend on social media marketing would probably be minimal.

At some date in the future, I might decide to create my own on-line tack store to carry new and/or used tack.  At that point, marketing would be critical.  If I wasn't counting on Ebay to create traffic to my listings, I would probably be spending at least 75% of my time on social media marketing.  Without a physical location to draw buyers, my only sales would be those that I could generate on-line.

At the moment, I have about 20 items for sale on Ebay.  This items are individual items, I only have one of each item listed.  If I ever decided to create a true on-line tack store, I think I would need to increase my inventory and have multiple sizes/colors of the items I carry.  In the meanwhile, it would be a good idea to "start the conversation" on social media.  While I am still selling on Ebay, I can continue to create a presence on social media.  At this time, I think I should concentrate on creating some interesting and educational content in blog postings to initiate some discussion.  I could continue to post on my Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram business pages.  I have access to my Ebay buyers' email addresses at the time of sale, but I think it is frowned upon to use those for marketing outside of Ebay.  I should collect any email addresses outside of Ebay for a future newsletter, but I don't plan on starting a newsletter right away.

Over the next six months I think my plan should be to write at least one blog post per week.  I plan on posting on Instagram 3 times a week.  The Instagram posts will be more casual, mostly pictures around my horses.  I will attempt to get likes and comments from my followers.  I will post on Facebook twice a week, also attempting to get likes and comments.  I think I can manage this much is about 2-3 hours a week.

Week 16: Blogs I Commented On

I commented on strategies by Ashley Enders, Gina Schwendel and Hernan Hernandez.

Week 16: Planning Future Strategy

This semester has gone by so quickly!  We started by learning to create blogs.  The blogs are like a conversation that we are having with our readers.  They respond to the blog, and we respond back.  It is a way to have a dialog on-line.  After blogs, we learned how to set up a business Facebook page and Twitter account.  We researched the best social media platforms for our businesses.  We also covered newsletters.

For my business (selling used horse equipment on Ebay), I found that FB, Twitter, Instagram and Youtube would be the best platforms.  I enjoy FB and Instagram the most, so those would probably be the most effective for me.  I am not counting out eventually using Youtube.  I know I would enjoy making short videos.  A blog is another tool that would be very effective, and also a way to establish myself as a source for horse equipment and training information.  The blog entries should probably be made weekly.  The FB and Instagram accounts would probably be best if they were used every day, or at least more frequently.  A newsletter would be used (at the most) on a monthly basis.

Week 15 Facebook Analytics

Yea! The Tack Shed has more than 30 likes now on Facebook.  I was able to access the Facebook analytics in the Insights tab.  This tab allows the user to see the likes obtained, post engagement, reach and page views.  It also gives reach and engagement for each specific post.  Organic posts are compared to Paid advertising posts.  These analytics would give the user a great deal of information about how people are interacting with their posts and also which type of posts do better than others.  That way, the user could tailor future posts.  The user is also able to "Boost" posts that might create a lot of engagement.

Week 15: Tack Shed Analytics

I only have 20 likes.  I have been trying to get friends/family to like me too, but I'm stuck at 20!

Week 15: Google Analytics

In order to better understand Google Analytics, I watched some of the videos at the "Analytics Academy".  I started with the Beginner videos.  From the videos, I learned that Google Analytics would allow a business to monitor how their customers used their website.  As of right now, my business does not have its own website.  I am selling my inventory on Ebay.  However, in the future, if I had my own website, Google analytics could be used to track how users progressed through a purchase.  It would tell me which pages of my site a user browsed.  It would tell me what kind of device the user was using (i.e. desktop, phone), which language their browser was set to, and how they got to my site (google search, ad click, email marketing campaign).  It will also track where the user is located geographically.

All of this information would be important to my business.  If I found that users were getting stuck at a certain place on my website, I could improve the site to create better flow through a transaction.  If I found that users only arrived at my site from email marketing campaigns, I could try to improve the other avenues of arrival, including using better key words.  The results from the Google Analytics would allow me to improve my online interactions with customers.

Week 14: Creating Ads on Social Media

I was surprised how easy it was to create ads on Facebook/Instagram.  I also was surprised at how specialized the demographics could become.  I was able to choose my exact target market: females age 16-45 who are interested in horses, and specifically the equestrian sports of dressage, eventing and showjumping.  I created several ads in FB, all with different objectives.

The objectives of the three ads above are to encourage people to visit my Ebay listings website.  The first ad consists of multiple images that would interest my demographic.  By saying "Check with Us before you buy new", I am informing the viewer that I am selling used tack at prices that are more reasonable than new tack.  At the bottom of the images I claim "reasonable prices" and "fast shipping".  The aim of this ad is just to inform.  The second ad shows a single image that might interest my demographic.  The third ad uses a play on words to inform the viewer that I am selling expensive items at lower prices.

Another objective for ads is to draw my demographic to a blog.  If I can establish my blog as a place to get great training information, a later call to "buy" could be more effective.

A third objective for ads would be to sell.  The following ad uses an image and tells the viewer to "buy now".

Another objective of ads is to generate "likes".  I am offering a discount for "liking" my page.

Week 13 Post 2

The business I chose for the purposes of this class is a business that promotes my horse equipment sales on Ebay.  The inventory I have consists of the items that I am currently helping a friend of mine sell.  Using social media to promote this type of inventory has its challenges.  The major challenge is that I only have "one" of everything.  For example, I am selling three of my friend's saddles.  For each saddle, I only have one model, one color and one size.  So if I was able to reach someone who happened to want that model of saddle, I do not have a selection of colors and sizes.  I only have one.  I also may or may not have the accessories that a saddle buyer would want to go with their saddle.  I guess what I am trying to say is that my inventory is basically like a garage sale (which is why it is perfect for Ebay).  So, I have the choice of advertising each listing separately for the specific item that I have or trying to drive potential buyers to browse my "garage sale" of items.

I would rather use advertisements that are seen in the news feed rather than on the right hand side.  If I chose to advertise each of my listings I would certainly use a photo ad.  I also have the option of including more than one item in the photo.  If I took an attractive photo of a group of items, I might be able to advertise more than one EBay listing per ad.  I could also try the multi-product ad, where I could include several pictures of listings in one ad.

I might be able to use a video ad if I could think of a clever or funny way to showcase my items.  Using local ads would not help me because I am selling on-line.  Event ads are not applicable to my business.

Using the "Boost Sales" option should work for me.  I know that my target market is female between the ages of 17-45.  My target market would also list horses as an explicit interest.  Also, from my target market's interests and behaviors on Facebook, I should be able to choose horses as an intrinsic interest.

I would want to post ads when I have new listings on Ebay.  I would like to keep my budget as low as possible.

Week 13 Post 1

This week I researched social advertising by companies similar to my business.  All of the advertising used visuals to draw my attention.  The use of visuals is very effective to get my interest.  Also, the continued barrage of visuals from a company eventually makes me more likely to buy something from them because they are at the front of my mind.

One company posts ads on Instagram that ask a question about a picture and promise a $10 gift certificate as a reward for being the first to answer the question correctly.  I found this type of advertising very effective because it appeals both to people that like to get a discount and to people who are very competitive.  The thought of "winning" something is very appealing.  I find myself scrolling through the feed to find this promotion.  I also pay more attention to ads coming from this company because I am anticipating the chance to win something.

I believe that social media advertising is very effective because it feels very personal.  The advertising is arriving on your computer, in your news feed.  It is found among posts from friends, so often I see ads just after I have seen pictures of my friends doing something funny.  I am feeling happy and connected to my friends and it carries over to how I feel about the advertisement in the next post.  In that way, I think that social media advertising is more effective than traditional advertising because of the personal nature of the news feed.  In contrast, I ignore ads on the right hand side of my screen!  I feel like those ads are intrusive.

Week 12 Post 2 Other Social Media Tools

I investigated Google+ in a little more depth.  I could not find any of the groups that I follow on FaceBook or Instagram, so perhaps using this platform could get me in contact with a different group of horse owners.  I found two communities that are active.  The most active is "Horses" with 44,286 followers.  This community had recent posts and each post had 30-50 comments.  This is the type of community that would probably be worth joining and becoming active.  It is not a community with a great deal of advertisements, so I would have to become involved in the discussion before I mentioned my Ebay sales.  Another community I found is "Horse and Rider" with 10,879 followers. It is a community moderated by a popular horse magazine and seems to have a fairly active discussion with recent posts.  The Equestrian Blogger's Network (1080 followers) looked interesting, but I noticed that none of the posts had more than 3 comments.  It seemed like blogging into a vacuum.  Many of the communities and people that I found in my search don't have many followers.  There was one ghost-town community I found (Horse and Hound) with 21,833 followers, but no new posts since Sept. 2015.  I'm thinking that if I become active in one or two of the communities, that might also lead me to other discussion groups.

I looked into the Groupon website because I have not used them before.  In the horse-industry, I found Groupons for riding lessons, reduced price tickets to the Del Mar National Horseshow and horse riding/wine tours.  I do not think this would be an effective place to advertise coupons for my Ebay sales.  The items that I am selling are too specialized for this kind of promotion.  I also went to the Living Social website and I do not think it would work for my business.

I also looked on Yelp under horses.  I found reviews for riding instructors and horse boarding facilities.  I do not think it is applicable to my business.

Week 12: Other Social Media Tools

For the purposes of this class, I am marketing my horse equipment (tack) listings on Ebay.  From my research into marketing in the horse industry in general, it appears that the major social media that others are using are blogs, newsletters (including newsletters sent through Ebay), Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest (rarely) and Youtube.  I have researched tack sellers that sell in a physical store, online through their websites and those that sell on Ebay.  I have also researched related industries such as national horse show organizations, magazines, horse trainers and horse sellers.  Google+ and LinkedIn do not seem to be used much by this group.  I will be doing further research on these for the Monday assignment.

So far, my social media strategy for the class has included Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and a newsletter.  To expand my business, I could use add Youtube and Pinterest to my social media strategy.  Youtube specifically is used frequently by my target market.  My target market uses Youtube to view horses for sale and to share competition and training videos.  Several other tack sellers (mostly those with physical stores) have used Youtube to explain the features of products or to promote events occurring in their stores.

Monitoring changes in social media use by my target market will be an important factor in connecting with them.  Following my competitors and associated businesses and organizations will alert me to changes in social media use.

Screen Shot of Newsletter

Week 11 Comments

I commented on the following blogs: Ashley Enders, Hernan Hernandez, Laura McIntire

Week 11 Email Newsletters

Email newsletters are another method to connect with the customer on-line.  For my business of selling horse equipment on Ebay, a newsletter would be a great way to alert my customers that I have new equipment listings on Ebay.  In fact, Ebay already has this functionality.  

When a user sets up a "store" on Ebay, that user gets a button that allows the "visitors" to the store to subscribe to a newsletter.  I don't know whether the user gets to see their followers' email addresses, I'm guessing Ebay keeps control of those, but it allows the user to send newsletters.  I visited a tack store on Ebay and subscribed to her newsletter.  She sends out her letter about once a month and describes any new listings she has, or any price reductions.  I like her emails.  They are short and easy to glance through.  I think keepings emails short and to the point is best because people receive many emails throughout the day, its not like social media where the user is there to "hang out".  For example, when I am going through my emails, I make a very quick decision whether to delete or read it.  A message has to be pretty short and quick for me to spend the time reading it.

Week 10, Post 2: Categories in a Business Blog

Creating categories for a business blog will help to keep it organized.  The categories would also help direct the user to the blog topic that they are interested in.  In my horse equipment sales, I could have a "help" category that explains how the equipment I'm selling could be used.  I could have guest blogs from local horse trainers.  I could also pose a rhetorical training question, and try to stimulate discussion on the topic.  Another category could be topics related to horse health and horse care.  This topic is always of concern to horse owners.  If the content was interesting enough, I could get a discussion going amongst the users.  One thing is for sure, horse owners do like to give their opinions!  Starting a conversation, or becoming a place for discussion would help to establish my brand as trustworthy, which would be a great way to help a business to grow.

Blogs I commented on: Gina Schwendel, Davina Croft, and Brent Reyes.

Blogging for Business: Week 10 Post 1

Adding human interest to a business blog can be a great idea depending on the type of business involved and the type of personal touch the business uses.  A great example of this that I recently found was from one of the horseback riders that I am following on social media, who of course is also a potential customer of my horse equipment Ebay sales business (the business that I am promoting for this class).  This woman runs a horse training business (she trains both horses and riders) and is also an active horse show competitor.  In her blog, she gives the details of her competition campaign.  She describes the ups/downs/blood/sweat/tears of traveling with horses, caring for horses and competing at competitions all over the U.S. and also in Europe.  She injects quite a bit of humor into her posts as well.  She also briefly touches on the emotions involved and challenges she faces of maintaining her family life with her husband and teenage son in the midst of work and travel.  The blogs are very "real", uplifting and enjoyable to read, and give potential customers a great feel for the amazing person that she is.  This blog was the perfect case in point for adding a personal touch to blogs.

I think personal touches in blogs are appropriate as long as the amount of personal information does not become un-professional, excessive or negative.  The type of business that is being promoted and the image of the business also makes a difference.  

Week 9 Post: Twitter

I finally am getting caught up.  I set up my Twitter account for The Tack Shed, my handle is: @The_TackShed.  I added the same photos as on my FB page to keep the look consistent.

To find people to follow, I started by entering in "Galway Downs" which is a horse show venue in Temecula.  I chose to "follow" Galway.  From there, I found many competitors who had tagged Galway, and I chose to follow some of them.  There were also national organizations mentioned on the Galway feed, and I chose to follow those.  I did not end up trying to search blindly for people to follow.  I just went to the Galway website, and that "introduced" me to many people to follow.  All the competitors are my potential customers because they all need equipment.

I created two lists on my account.  The first list is for horse show competitors that I am following.  The second list is for horse show venues and national showing organization.

I think I could send out tweets at pretty much any time.  It seems as if the horse world never sleeps.

Week 8, Post 2 Visual Social Media

The business that I am promoting for the purposes of this class is an on-line horse equipment ("tack") sales business (its actually a link to my Ebay sales listings) called "The Tack Shed".  I have decided to see how my competitors are participating on other social media sites besides Facebook.  I searched for websites that just sell used tack, but I couldn't find any.  Any website that did sell used was a listing service like Ebay, but smaller.  I decided to research tack stores that sell new.

The first competitor I chose to follow is a local tack store, Mary's Tack and Feed, that has several physical locations.  They also sell tack on-line on their own website AND they sell tack on Ebay.
On Facebook they have 12,906 followers. They post several times a day.  Each post gets between 0-100 likes, and comments are in the single digits.  On Instagram they have 2,375 followers    They post nearly every day, getting almost 100 likes per post.  Very rarely do they get comments
On Youtube they have 68 subscribers. They post every few weeks.

The second competitor I'm following is Dressage Extensions.  They have a physical store in Moorpark, CA, but have been more of a catalog (and now on-line) sales outfit.  I haven't noticed them selling on Ebay, but they do sell from their website.  Their Facebook page has 12,081 followers. They post every few day and each post gets between 0-30 likes and between 1-4 comments.  On Instagram they have 395 Followers and 66 posts.  They get likes in the low 30's per post.  On Pinterest they have 895 Followers. They have 10 boards and 68 pins

The third competitor is Bit of Britain.  They have traditionally been a catalog sales (now on-line) outfit, although I see they have a physical store now in Pennsylvania.  Their Facebook page has 9,800 followers. They post nearly every day.  Each post gets between 0-20 likes.  Not many posts get comments.  On Instagram they have 1113 followers, 131 posts and each gets up to 100 likes.

The fourth competitor is Dover Saddlery.  They have physical stores, but for years they were very strong in catalog sales.  Now, of course, they are on-line.  On Facebook they have 146,400 followers.  They post nearly every day.  Some posts get up to 500 likes, but only a handful of comments on any one post.  On Instagram they have 18,000 followers and 211 posts.  They get between 1000-3000 likes per post.  Each post gets 1-5 comments.

Each of these stores have a decent number of followers, proportional to the size of their business.  Not surprisingly, Dover has the largest number because they are the oldest and most well-known store in the industry.  There is not as much interaction on the posts as I expected.

Week 8, Post 1: Visual Media

The business that I am promoting for purposes of this class is called "The Tack Shed".  I am helping a friend sell her used horse training equipment (also called "tack") on Ebay, so I decided that my FB business page would promote my Ebay listings.  My FB page links to my Ebay item list.  Selling on Ebay is a very visual.  All items are listed for sale with multiple photos, and buyers examine the photos to compare products.  Therefore, social media platforms that allow me to include visuals will be great for promoting my business.

The next question is, which sites appeal to my target market?  My target market is women age 15-45 who ride horses in the sports of eventing, dressage or jumpers.  From what I have observed through my personal FB friends who fall into my target market, Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram are the best social media sites.  On Youtube, my target market shares competition and training videos.  It would be possible to make videos of the tack that I am selling and also discuss how it can be used.  The YouTube videos could then be shared on my business page as well.

Instagram would be a great site to share pictures of new tack listings on Ebay.  I plan to start a business Instagram account for this assignment.