Month: August 2014
IMC Plan: UF’s Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation
The University of Florida’s Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation, part of the Warrington College of Business Administration, is designed to help students at both the undergrad and graduate levels study and develop aspects of entrepreneurship. Even for students who are not seeking a degree, there are various opportunities offered by the center to help develop entrepreneurial skills such as workshops, forums, competitions, clinics, and mentorships. Some program offerings from the college include:
- Veterans Entrepreneurship Program (VEP): Program for disabled veterans who are seeking entrepreneurial opportunities; three stage program designed to expose students to all facets of entrepreneurship; free of cost to disabled veterans
- The Thomas S. Johnson Master of Science in Entrepreneurship Program: One-year Masters degree program where students gain the knowledge needed in order to launch their own businesses; ranked as the #1 Graduate Entrepreneurship Program by United States Association for Small Business and Entrepreneurship
- CEI Ambassadors: University of Florida community involvement program that promotes entrepreneurship and aims to bring students with similar entrepreneurial mindsets together through campus activities; also acts as a campus outreach group to promote CEI and related programs within the university
This Integrated Marketing Plan will be focusing specifically on the Veterans Entrepreneurship Program. Using a variety of marketing communications mediums, the plan is to increase program awareness and increase the number of applicants for the program by 10% over the next 6 months.
Target Audience Characteristics and Demographics:
- Service disabled veterans
- Veterans who are seeking to grow their business
- Veterans who are looking to start new ventures
- Veterans interested in entrepreneurship
- Veterans seeking financial independence
Strenghts of the Veterans Entrepreneurship Program:
- Offers free tuition for disabled veterans
- Part of a nationally recognized, award-winning program
- Ability to complete the program in one year
Opportunities for the Veterans Entrepreneurship Program:
- Large potential target audience, estimated at over 2.9 million in the United States (Associated Press)
- Ability to leverage social media (low-cost and far-reaching)
- Utilize digital marketing mediums, such as QR codes, blogs, and YouTube to connect with audience
The University of Florida’s Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation should take an integrated marketing approach to promoting the Veteran Entrepreneurship Program. Doing so will provide a more holistic approach and allow the target audience to feel more engaged with the program when seeing messaging from various marketing communication methods. According to the Small Business Chronicle, you are able to save money and have a larger impact on your audience when you use an integrated marketing strategy as opposed to using more traditional methods separately; “Integrated campaigns use the same communication tools to reinforce each other and improve marketing effectiveness” (Linton, 2014).
In order to analyze how well each portion of the integrated marketing strategy is performing, the VEP will need to invest in analytics software. Google Analytics is free to use and can give insightful information into how well the VEP webpages are performing. Through Google Analytics, you will also be able to track entry and exit pages (how people got to the website and where they went after the left the website) in order to determine if the users are interacting with other VEP sites or marketing mediums, such as QR codes, blogs, or social media. Facebook, YouTube, and QR Code software provides built-in analytics that help track the activity and engagement of that specific channel. Because the social media manager will only be monitoring one Twitter page and one Facebook account, I wouldn’t recommend spending the extra money to invest in a social media management tool such as Hootsuite at this time. Although it is a fantastic program, the VEP program will be paying more for the product then it could expect to receive in return.
In order for the VEP to get the most marketing exposure, several marketing communications mediums need to be utilized together to create the optimal integrated marketing strategy. With the editions of the VEP blog, YouTube playlist, Facebook, and Twitter pages, VEP’s marketing communications mix will be more effective at communicating and interacting with the target audience. By utilizing these marketing mediums in conjunction with the VEP website, QR codes, print collateral, and tradeshow marketing, potential students will be able to gain a more holistic view of the program and better understand how VEP is connected with the University of Florida’s Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation.
Sources:
Associated Press- Washington. (2008, 11 May). VA: Number of Disabled Veterans Rising. Retrieved from Fox News: http://www.foxnews.com/story/2008/05/11/va-number-disabled-veterans-rising/
Linton, I. (2014, August 01). The Importance of Integrated Marketing Communications. Retrieved from Small Business Chronicle: http://smallbusiness.chron.com/importance-integrated-marketing-communications-73248.html
Health Company Analytics: A Case of the Mondays?
One of the biggest challenges that faces marketers today is how to justify marketing expenditures and calculate ROI. Although there is no tried and true solution to determine ROI, especially for digital marketing efforts, software exists to help you track an analyze how your audience is engaging with your brand. In this week’s post, I will be analyzing Facebook Insights and Bronto e-mail campaign data for ABC Company, a health-oriented business located in Central Florida. I aim to provide analytics and insight into how the audience is interacting with the brand and how other segments of the company’s integrated marketing communications strategy plays a part in these results.
Insights, Key Findings and Reccomendations:
According to the analytics provided, the target demographic is defined as females, ages 25-44, living in Central Florida. Based on the fact that ABC Company is health-oriented and located in Central Florida, the Facebook posts seem to be reaching the correct audience for this type of business. Based on the organic and paid reach numbers, it appears that post boosts were not used during the duration of which analytics were provided. There also appears to be a correlation between the number of postings and the overall page reach. For example, on May 21st, three posts were created and then on May 22nd, four posts were created. After this series of posts, you see a sustained higher than average reach for the page. This could have been a contest for ABC Company or they could have been running a special promotion. The page reach also increased by 39% in the specified time period; much of the increased reach can be dedicated to the occurrences that began on May 21st.
I also found it interesting and important to note that every Monday, the page traffic is at it’s lowest point. Perhaps the business is closed on Mondays? People may be so busy on Mondays that they don’t have as much time to spend on Facebook? In order to determine the causation for the phenomenon, I would need to look at ABC Company’s promotions and marketing schedule and the hours of operation. Through a little investigating, we would be able to determine the cause for such low traffic on Mondays. It’s not necessarily a bad thing, especially seeing as how traffic steadily picks up for the remainder of the week.
There is also a bi-weekly e-blast that gets sent out to the company’s distribution list. Assuming that the Facebook link is in the e-blast and the content is interesting enough to prompt the audience to learn more, these e-blasts are being used to drive traffic to the business’ Facebook page. However, based on the limited amount of analytics that I have access to for this project, I am unable to determine exactly which days the e-blasts are being sent out on. Based on my experience with e-mail marketing campaigns, it is beneficial to send the e-blasts out consistently and regularly, such as every Tuesday and Friday.
Several key findings can be interpreted based on the e-blast analytics provided by Bronto. Although I am not as familiar with Bronto as I am with Mail Chimp, the analytics are still easy to understand. In order to more holistically interpret the data, however, I would need more company information such as the content of the e-blasts and the marketing and promotions schedule. I would also need to hear feedback from the receptionists that may take calls from customers who are responding to the e-blasts.
One key finding was that 25% of the sent e-blasts were actually opened, with the click-through rate being 10.9%. According to Mail Chimp, a leading email campaign platform, the average open rate for the health industry is 24.27% and the average click-through rate is 3.64%. Based on these benchmarks, while the e-blasts are getting opened at an average rate for the industry, the click-through rate is way above average. This suggests that the content embedded in the e-blast is compelling and causes the viewer to want to learn more. This is an example of an engaging e-blast that provides information that the target market wants to see.
One way that I believe ABC Company can increase both their social media engagement and their e-blast open rates is through a photo promotion, like the example posted above. The promotion, centered around all things health and wellness can be housed on their Facebook page using a third party platform, Woobox. Users will be encouraged to show how they are living well and participating with ABC Company’s health products. Users can use #ABCLivingWell on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram in order to enter the contest. Photos will then be voted on by other Facebook users. The person who submitted the photo that gained the most votes will receive a store gift card. This campaign can be advertised through social media, the e-blasts, and within the business. Photo content would be generated for ABC Company to use for future advertising material. And while we’re talking about analytics, did I mention that Woobox has a great analytics platform built right in? You can track your campaign through Facebook Insights, Bronto, and Woobox in order to gain a more holistic perspective on how well you are engaging with your target audience.
The Social Potter 