Critique: 3 NH-based Facebook Pages for Businesses, Organizations, Clubs, Causes, etc.

1. ) Rocco's Pizza Bar and Grill

This restaurant was originally named "The Pizza Man" and is located just outside my hometown in Hudson, New Hampshire. Within the past two years, the restaurant has undergone some serious re-branding, which includes building renovations as well as renaming the company as Rocco's Pizza Bar and Grill. The restaurant added new items to the menu and designed a bar lounge seating area, which is separate from the main dining room, to accommodate a variety of guests.

Most relatively, Rocco’s created a Facebook Business Page to generate an online presence for networking through social media. This online tool is an excellent communication strategy used to inform guests about current specials and possibly attract prospective customers.

Since its initial opening, the pizza place has easily maintained a strong reputation for providing great food. One may ask, "If the restaurant is doing well, then why change it? The answer to that question is simple- the Rocco’s team felt they could provide the same quality food and service to a larger audience and wanted to make more people happy; therefore they made the necessary modifications to attract a mass clientele.

Keeping this company background in mind, Rocco's also excels in its use of social media to promote their business. Multiple times a week, I come across posts from their company on my news feed. The content of these posts include:

    * Information on lunch or dinner specials

    * Photos of their featured food items

    * Photos of their seasonal/holiday cocktails

    * Special offers or discounts

I believe Rocco's is successful with their efforts of using Social Media because they stay on top of their Facebook Business Page! Their up-to-date and active presence on Facebook portrays the restaurant’s image for being highly organized, consistent, and shows they care about their customers (This is a crucial message to relay to both current and prospective guests!)

2.) NeighborFavor

NeighborFavor is a startup company that created and designed an app for the iPhone. The founders of this company are actually two childhood friends of mine, Ben Doherty and Zac Maurais. They demonstrate their effective use of Social Media through both their app and their Facebook Business Page- again their constant activity, engagement with audience and clientel, as well as revealing their vibrant personalities through postings has made them successful for building and maintaining an audience!

3.) New Hampshire High Technology Council

This non-profit organization has an awesome crew working behind them- supporting  innovation, entrepreneurship, and higher education in the state of New Hampshire. Their membership contains over 200 member companies and is a part of a large network of tech-industry experts, university and government officials, venture capitalists, communication professionals, and much more. However, only 83 people like their Facebook Business Page. I feel a company that has a good reputation, such as NHHTC, then it would be effortless to have the same reputation through an online presence, but for some reason this is not the case. I plan to bring what I learn through our classroom discussion into the social media practices of the High Tech Council to help them reach their goal of attracting more people to their page. 

My Personal Photo: Ben and I at our Senior Prom

My Personal Photo: Zac and I were Prom Dates =)

Video Commercial

Chris,

I recorded a video commercial of myself on my iPhone thinking I could send the file from my phone to the computer. However, when I try to upload the video clip I run into issues with the video and audio files not syncing together.

I apologize for not realizing this sooner and I plan to resolve the issue before class tomorrow.

Best,

Sarah Britton

Social Media Marketing Campaign: Mission Statement

I chose the New Hampshire High Technology Council (NHHTC) as the organization for my social media marketing campaign. Nicknamed as "the Council", this organization is an essential client of Cookson Stephens Corporation- which is a strategic communication firm.

I earned my position as Communication Coordinator for NHHTC through an internship during the Spring 2012 semester. This learning experience enlightened my understanding of the technology industry in the state of New Hampshire, as well as the institutions of entrepreneurship and higher education.

The New Hampshire High Technology Council- Mission and Purpose:
"Founded in 1983, and originally known as the New Hampshire High Technology Council, the NH High Tech Council has been the voice of technology and innovation in the State of New Hampshire for well over 25 years. As a member-driven organization focusing on advancing innovation throughout New Hampshire, we help drive NH’s economy by encouraging research and technology-based industrial development."

"The Council brings together representatives from the private and public sectors to establish and maintain financial, technical, legislative, and educational programs that support research and economic development efforts that help New Hampshire lead in entrepreneurship and business on a national level."

Cited from the organization's  website at NHHTC.org

The social media campaign that I plan, design, launch, and maintain for the Council will strive to relay current and accurate messages about financing, technology, legislature, and education. Additionally, the mission is to increase the number of online users who are engaged with the Council's social networking sites. This will inevitably increase membership enrollments and build a large network of business professionals that work for and support the advancement of technology.



Personal Photo: Sponsorship poster from a past event
I "tweeted" this image  from the NHHTC twitter account



Getting More People to Your Facebook Business Page

Social media usage for businesses is an aspect of SNS that was introduced to me during my internship with the strategic communication firm, Cookson Stephens Corporation (CSC). The firm aims to meet the communication goals for their clients' companies.

While interning, I was assigned the task of researching ways to increase "traffic" to the New Hampshire High Technology Council (NHHTC) Facebook page- by traffic my mentor meant activity; such as: number of likes, posts, shares, etc. I was just beginning to learn about PR and social media at the time I was asked to do this, therefore I implemented my own strategy. For my lack of knowledge on the subject and minimal practice, I decided to review the Facebook pages of High Tech Councils from other states. I figured this would allow me to observe the various methods used to increase the number of people visiting the NHHTC business page. Researching SNS techniques through other business pages was in some ways helpful, but for the most part tedious- which is why I'm glad you included a link to the Facebook Help Center (which I didn't know existed!). I personally believe this is an excellent resource that every business should utilize.

The guide to "Growing Your Audience" provides video tutorials that explain certatin functionalities of Facebook- some of which I hadn't known before.

1. Invite friends: Users are able to send mass invites to their friends asking to "like" a business page.
   - I think this is a great feature because people are recieving the invite from someone they know, which gives them reason to view/like the page.
2. E-mail customers: Send a personal email to inform them know about your page.
   - According to the SNS stats that we explored last week, people are engaging in social media more than ever before. From a business standpoint this is crucial because in order to gain the attention of your audience, you need to be where they are. Sending an email with a direct link to your business page makes it easier and faster for them to visit the page. Plus if you encourage them to like the page, they will receive updates about your business in their news feeds- which keeps the process of communication open for the future.
3. Customize your page address: Very helpful- people don't have to log into Facebook to view your page. The address can be added on business cards, reciepts, ads and promos making it easy for people to connect to your business.
4. Use Facebook ads: This feature essentially gives your business a "face" to other people that don't already know your company. Facebook allows you to create an advertisement driectly on the site and is presented to people that may have an interest in your business.

The instructions that are provided with each step of building-up Facebook Business Pages are very helpful because they provide visual demonstrations of where to find these certain Facebook features.

This is a personal photo I took at a recent NHHTC event and shared on their Social Networking Sites.

Pew Reports

In general, the statistics presented in the Pew Reports remain consistent with my previous understanding of social networking usage. As a 23 year-old female I agree with the statement, “Social networking site usage is most popular with those ages 18-49,”-between personal and professional uses of SNS, it’s apparent to see how and why we dominate this type of internet usage. Adults in this age range engage in social media frequently and rapidly. In my personal opinion, this age group can produce the most efficient outcomes for business, promotion, and networking because they practice constantly and have essentially woven it into their daily lives.

The SNS statistics pertaining to geographic location disagree with my predisposed knowledge of internet access. I always assumed that people living in urban and suburban areas engaged in SNS usage much more than people living in rural areas. However, SNS usage according to the report says, “69% Urban, 65% Suburban, and 64%  Rural”- since these statistical figures are very close to one another I can conclude that SNS usage has less to do with where it’s happening and more to do with who is using it.

The elderly is now required to partake in SNS and wireless telephone services in order to stay in contact with loved ones. According to the Pew Reports, “Even among those currently ages 76 and older, 56% report owning a cell phone of some kind, up from 47% of this generation in 2010.” This statistic leads me to believe that the hype over social networking sites, along with the acceleration of other technologies, leaves elderly people obliged to adjust to modern modes of communication. This is largely due to the fact that their children, grandchildren, friends, etc. are a part of this “technology generation”.

I did a double take when I received a friend request from my mother. Although my mother is relatively young (48), I can recall how strange I thought it was when she first started using Facebook. My mother is not the best with computers, but I was shocked to see her pick up SNS as quickly as she did- especially when it took her years to learn how to send a simple text message.

I was surprised when I read that 95% of teens are online and 80% of that use SNS. The statistic suggests that almost every teenager is online and the majority of them using SNS. With data like this, I will not be surprised to see when toddlers and young children become accessible to the Internet.  

Evidence of SNS usage- my Facebook profile