[Hannah Tubbs]
STEAM Village Social Media Strategy
Table of Contents
Situation Analysis................................................................................................................................. 3Company Overview......................................................................................................................................... 3Marketing Objectives..................................................................................................................................... 3SWOT Analysis.................................................................................................................................................. 4Branding Guidelines....................................................................................................................................... 4Budget.................................................................................................................................................................. 5Social Media Analysis..................................................................................................................................... 5
Audience Identification...................................................................................................................... 5STEAM Participants and Awareness......................................................................................................... 5
Awareness...........................................................................................................................................................................6Participants.........................................................................................................................................................................6
Contributions and Fundraising...................................................................................................................7
Competitor Analysis............................................................................................................................ 8Salt Lake Community College...................................................................................................................... 9Game Stop........................................................................................................................................................ 10Salt Lake Comic Con...................................................................................................................................... 11
Goals and Objectives......................................................................................................................... 12
Strategy and Tactics.......................................................................................................................... 13Themes and Voice......................................................................................................................................... 13Implementation............................................................................................................................................. 15Timeline........................................................................................................................................................... 16
1 Month..............................................................................................................................................................................173-6 Months....................................................................................................................................................................... 18
Reporting and Analytics.................................................................................................................. 19
E-Commerce elements..................................................................................................................... 19
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Situation Analysis
Company Overview
STEAM Village is a non-profit organization that provides assistance for five groups of
people to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering, arts, and math. The five
groups STEAM Village caters to are: youth aging out of foster care, veterans, youth at risk,
high functioning disabled adults, and graduates of the Utah Scholars program. By the year
2018 Utah will have 101,000 STEAM related jobs that need to be filled. STEAM Village’s
goal is to help prepare the next generation for these jobs.
Marketing Objectives
Although STEAM Village does not have a current strategy for marketing, it does have four
overall objectives to help them accomplish the task of preparing Utah’s youth for STEAM
related careers:
1. Increase the number of qualified students who are pursuing careers in science,
technology, engineering, arts, and math.
2. Increase the access to such careers for those with disabilities, “aging out” of foster
care, Utah Scholars program, “youth at risk” and training for returning veterans.
3. Position Utah and Sugarhouse in Salt Lake City as a top ten leader in the sharing of
best practices for education and STEAM careers. Coordinate and collaborate more
effectively within public education and higher education to share learning best
practices with each other.
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4. Utilize Social media and other marketing to create a peer group model of STEAM
students perceived as role models for STEAM Careers
SWOT Analysis
Strengths
Concept
Description
Purpose
Objectives
Weaknesses
Strategy
Accessibility
Awareness
Opportunities
Social Media
Community
involvement
Threats
Funding
Participants
Sustainability
Branding Guidelines
STEAM Village currently has no specific branding guidelines. However, they do have a logo,
which includes the name in front of a gear with five colored spokes (purple, blue, green,
yellow and red) to represent the five STEAM areas. The background of the logo is dark gray
with black accents.
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Budget
STEAM Village is currently raising funds to implement the program. There is currently no
budget for marketing or social media, unless results prove valuable. For the purposes of
this strategy we will assume there will be no budget for social media purposes.
Social Media Analysis
STEAM Village currently has 8 ‘Likes’ on Facebook. It does not have a presence on Twitter,
Instagram, or YouTube. The button links at the bottom of STEAM Village’s website for
social media only link to the main page of each social media channel, some of them re-route
to the STEAM Village website itself.
Audience Identification
STEAM Village has different objectives, which causes there to be at least two different
audiences. One audience is focused on participants in the program and encouraging STEAM
careers, while another is geared toward contributions and fundraising. Even within these
two different focuses, there are different audiences that STEAM Village needs to reach. The
distinctions within these areas will be discussed below.
STEAM Participants and Awareness
Although STEAM Village’s purpose is to provide resources and help to individuals in order
to pursue STEAM careers, it also wants to promote STEAM careers on a wider level. These
two groups will be categorized as ‘Participants’ and ‘Awareness’. The ‘Participants’ group is
a narrow sub-set of the ‘Awareness’ group.
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Awareness
Demographics
Youth ages 14-20 years old
Live in Utah, primarily Salt Lake County
Male or Female
Attends High School or has recently graduated
Taste, Preferences, and Lifestyle
Enjoys creating things
Enjoys working with their hands
No chosen life-path
Wants a higher education
Uses social media
Likes technology
‘hands-on’ learner
Participants
The individuals that STEAM Village wants to participate in the program fall under the same
basic demographics as those in the ‘Awareness’ category, however, their tastes,
preferences, and lifestyles are more precise.
Taste, Preferences, and Lifestyle
Falls under one of the following five categories:
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o “Youth at risk”
o Veteran
o Youth “aging out” of foster care
o Adult with mild disabilities
o Graduate of the Utah Scholars Program
Needs encouragement to pursue higher education
Does not have a support system
Contributions and Fundraising
STEAM Village is non-profit organization, which means that it needs to acquire funds to run
the program from outside sources. $200,000 is the estimated cost per year to keep the
program running. A majority of the funds will come from grants, which for now, will not be
affected by the social media strategy. However, a portion will come from the community
through fundraising events. A significant event STEAM Village has the opportunity to
participate in twice a year is the Salt Lake Comic Convention (Comic Con). In April they set
up a 72 hour Game-A-Thon where people could pay $10 to play video games for one hour.
Individuals can also sign up to host a video game party with proceeds that go to STEAM
Village throughout the year. The target audience for this type of fundraising is as follows:
Demographics
Young adults ages 18-30
Lives in Utah, primarily in Salt Lake County
Male or Female
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Taste, Preferences, and Lifestyle
Plays video games on a regular basis
Wants to contribute to a good cause
Has a little extra spending money each month
Loves comics, and super hero movies
Pursues higher education
Fits the ‘Gamer’ stereotype
Buys video games at GameStop
Plays video games with friends
Likes ‘old-school’ video games and pop culture
Likes technology
Uses social media
Night-owl
Competitor Analysis
STEAM Village is a unique organization within the Salt Lake Valley. The organization’s
objectives are focused on a very specific purpose that is not found in any other place. This
means that there are no direct competitors for STEAM Village. However, there are
organizations that influence STEAM Village and its target audience. A few of these
influencers include Salt Lake Community College, GameStop, and Salt Lake Comic Con.
Understanding how these influencers interact with their audiences on social media will
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help STEAM Village to know what works and what does not work. It can also help STEAM
Village to better understand their target audience.
Salt Lake Community College
Although Salt Lake Community College is not a competitor, it does promote higher
education. Also, STEAM Village will encourage its participants to attend community or
technical schools in order to obtain specialized certificates and degrees in STEAM related
fields. Salt Lake Community College maintains profiles on all of the major social media
sites; Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram. Salt Lake Community College use social
media to interact and engage with former, current, and prospective students. Posts include
photos or information about events and campus life, and deadlines or other school news.
Salt Lake Community College also maintains a blog for more in depth information and
engagement. The following data shows basic reach and engagement for Salt Lake
Community College on the various social networks.
Salt Lake Community College has 8,676 ‘Likes’ for their Facebook page as a whole. 341
People are talking about Salt Lake Community College. And 30,312 people have ‘checked-
in’ or said they were at SLCC. Multiple posts every week, with no more than one per day.
Photos: 4-380 ‘Likes’ per photo, 1-12 ‘Shares’, 1-10 Comments
Links: 1-18 ‘Likes’, 1-2 ‘Shares’, 1-3 Comments
Videos: 1-28 ‘Likes’, 1-2 ‘Shares’, 1 Comment
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Salt Lake Community College has 1,313 ‘Followers’ and is ‘Following’ 325 people. SLCC has
a total of 1,171 tweets. Tweets include pictures, links, and campus news. On average,
tweets receive 1-5 re-tweets. Multiple posts every week, sometimes 2-3 tweets in one day.
YouTube
Salt Lake Community College joined YouTube in 2009 and has 55 subscribers. The channel
has received 56,424 views on its various videos that range from 30 seconds to 10 minutes
in length. Videos include promotional and artistic views of campus life, as well as tutorials
and faculty spotlights. 2-5 videos uploaded per week.
Salt Lake Community College has 292 ‘Followers’ and is ‘Following’ 107 people on
Instagram. It has posted 94 pictures or videos. Each post averages 15-30 ‘Likes’. Salt Lake
Community College typically posts one photo or video each week.
Game Stop
‘Buck the Bunny’ is the voice and face behind all of Game Stop’s social media. Having a
character as the communicator makes it easier for individuals to connect with the brand. It
is easier to connect with another human being (or bunny, in this case) than asking
questions or interacting with a corporation. ‘Buck’ uses social media to share gaming news
and discussions in a community of ‘gamers’. Game Stop uses Facebook, Twitter, and
YouTube as its primary means of interaction with this community.
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GameStop has 5,977,971 ‘Likes’ on Facebook. There are 45,950 people talking about
GameStop on Facebook, and 561,305 people ‘were here’. GameStop uses social media
primarily to start conversations with ‘followers’ about games, gaming systems, and other
game related topics. Mixed in with these conversations are a few promotional or
advertising posts. GameStop posts on average 3-5 questions, photos, and promos per day.
Questions: 600-12,000 ‘Likes’, 5-850 ‘Shares’, 200-6,000 Comments
Photos: 1,000-5,000 ‘Likes’, 50-400 ‘Shares’, 25-2,000 Comments
Promos: 100-1,500 ‘Likes’, 1-86 ‘Shares’, 5-115 Comments
GameStop has 477,000 ‘Followers’ and is ‘Following’ 95 people. It has a total of 15,000
tweets. Tweets include pictures, links, and product information. An average of 2-9 tweets
per day. ‘ReTweets’ range from 6-636 per tweet, with 5-570 ‘Favorites’ per tweet.
YouTube
GameStop has 34,407 ‘Subscribers’ on YouTube and over 4.5 million total views. Videos are
mostly excerpts from games which range from 30 seconds – 10 minutes. 5-10 video
uploads per month on average.
Salt Lake Comic Con
Since one of STEAM Village’s largest marketing events is held at the Salt Lake Comic Con,
the attendance at Comic Con is important to understand. Awareness for the event is
primarily gained on social media channels such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Salt
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Lake Comic Con uses these social media sites to announce VIP guests at the events, share
photos, and to build an event loyalty.
Salt Lake Comic Con primarily uses Facebook to share pictures and offer giveaways for
passes to upcoming Comic Con events. There are 92,223 people who ‘Like’ the Salt Lake
Comic Con Facebook page, with over 43,000 people talking about it, and 16,308 saying they
‘were here’.
Photos/Contests: 1,000-4,000 ‘Likes’, 3-577 ‘Shares’, 82-2,000 Comments
Salt Lake Comic Con has 6,826 ‘Followers’ on Twitter and is following 751. There are a total
of 4,218 Tweets made by Salt Lake Comic Con. Tweets include pictures, announcements for
future events, and re-tweets from people who attended the previous events. 4-25 tweets
per day. Each post gets 2-25 ‘ReTweets’ and 1-45 ‘Favorites’.
Salt Lake Comic Con has 882 ‘Followers’ on Instagram and ‘Follows’ 809 people. Posts
include a few behind the scenes photos but mostly ‘reposts’ from people who attended the
event. Their photos receive 28-130 ‘Likes’ per post and 1-5 comments on average.
Goals and Objectives
The objectives of STEAM Village should always influence the objectives of its social media
strategy. Increasing the awareness for STEAM related careers and more specifically
creating awareness for STEAM Village is the primary objective for the time being.
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Fundraising is a strategy that will help create awareness while also getting the money to
implement the program. Specific goals for how to best accomplish these objectives are
outlined below.
1. Increase total number of Facebook ‘Likes’ from 7 to 150
2. Create a Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube accounts and have 100 unique and
engaged ‘Followers’ or ‘Subscribers
3. Raise $35,000 at Comic Con and through virtual gaming fundraisers
Strategy and Tactics
Themes and Voice
The purpose of this social media campaign is primarily to gain awareness. There are two
different reasons why gaining awareness is so important to STEAM Village; fundraising and
participants. Everything that STEAM Village posts, whether on Facebook, Twitter,
Instagram, or YouTube, needs to be appealing and have the objectives of the campaign in
mind. People who ‘Follow’ STEAM Village on social media will be more interested in what
we have to say if the posts relate to current events and the interests of the viewers. The
voice of STEAM Village on social media should be casual, friendly, and encouraging.
One topic that would apply to both segments of the audience is superheroes. This topic can
be applied to fundraising and participating in the ‘Game-A-Thon’ during Comic Con. It can
also relate to everyday heroes that work in STEAM related jobs. Some of these professions
could include doctors, astronauts, aerospace engineers, and architects. How this message is
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conveyed will differ depending on the social media site. Following are some ideas and
examples of what will work best for Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram:
Pictures of STEAM professionals
Questions to start conversations
o What STEAM career are you most interested in pursuing?
o Who is your STEAM Hero?
Videos from the YouTube Channel
Photos of STEAM Village events, especially Comic Con
The same strategies used for Facebook will work for twitter; however how the content is
published will make all the difference:
Here is a picture of an everyday #SteamHero.
Who is your #SteamHero?
Pictures from #STEAM events
Picture of a #SteamHero
Pictures of STEAM Village participants
Partial videos from YouTube Channel
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YouTube
Video of people dressed up like superheroes playing video games
Video of everyday STEAM heroes playing video games
Video from Comic Con
Interviews of everyday STEAM heroes
Implementation
The first thing that needs to be done for this strategy to work is to create accounts on all of
the social media networks. STEAM Village already has a profile on Facebook, but Twitter,
Instagram, and YouTube all need to be created. Along with creating the social media pages
for STEAM Village, the links to these pages need to be updated on the STEAM Village
website. Robert Cox along with STEAM Village participants will be implementing all of the
elements of this strategy. This campaign will begin the first of May and run through the end
of October. Salt Lake Comic Con will happen again on September 4-6, which means a large
portion of the campaign will be directed towards that event.
The success of the campaign will primarily rest on its visibility. It is important to have
followers, otherwise it doesn’t matter how many times a day STEAM Village posts or how
creative their posts are if they have no followers or people to see it. However, the more
creative and interesting the posts are, the more likely the current followers are to share it
with their friends, who in turn will hopefully ‘Like’ or follow the STEAM Village pages.
Another important way to gain followers is through an existing email list for prospective
STEAM Village participants. The primary source for the list is from the Utah Youth Mentor
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Project. The list will continue to grow, so as it does, new candidates and potential
‘Followers’ can be found. The emails to the individuals on this list should briefly describe
STEAM Village and its purpose then encourage recipients to ‘Like’ or ‘Follow’ social media
pages for more information and interaction. Each post will be an experiment to see what
works and what does not, especially for the first few months. However, we can see from the
competitor analysis that videos, pictures, and conversational questions have the highest
rates of engagement.
Facebook and Twitter will be the priority because they have the most users. As STEAM
Village gains more awareness and also knowledge of social media Instagram and especially
YouTube will become more important to the strategy.
Timeline
The target age and lifestyle for STEAM Village is primarily online in the evening and night
hours. This is when all of the social media posts should appear so they will be most visible
to the target audience. The following schedule is not concrete and can be changed
depending on current events and other time-sensitive matters.
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1 Month
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The strategy behind this schedule is to post almost daily on Facebook and Twitter with
weekly or bi-weekly posts on Instagram and YouTube. The first month or so will be
extremely experimental especially in seeing what type of content does better at what time
and day of the week.
3-6 Months
After a few months it will be easier to see whether it is better to post in the morning,
afternoon, or evening. We will also be able to see whether STEAM Village receives more
engagement and interaction on specific content on different days of the week, for example;
individuals may be more receptive to photos or videos over the weekend and
conversational posts on weekdays. These are ways the strategy can improve after
implementing this plan for a couple of months.
Also, during this time period STEAM Village should work on building an email or
newsletter list. An email marketing service such as MailChimp would be appropriate in
housing the database of contacts and sending monthly newsletters and other marketing
emails. A link (shortened URL) to sign up for the newsletter will be shared via the different
social media channels. STEAM Village should also create a blog either on blogger or tumblr.
The monthly newsletter will simply be a condensed version of the blog. Once the blog is
created, STEAM Village should plan to have post at least one meaningful and well-thought-
out blog post each week. These could include more in-depth interviews with STEAM
professionals, personal organization bios, or advice for success in STEAM careers.
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Reporting and Analytics
For the first six months on social media STEAM Village will manually track its success. Each
social media platform has an analytics or insights section for measuring reach and overall
success. Some social media sites require the organization to have a certain number of
‘Likes’ or ‘Followers’ in order to be able to access the analytics. Specifically, the Facebook
page for STEAM Village has to have 30 ‘Likes’ before we can access the insights for the
page. However, we can still see how many people have seen each post and how many
‘Likes’ we have received. This is why it is so important to increase the number of ‘Likes’ and
‘Followers’ on these social media sites.
Reports will be created at the end of each month to document and prove success. Reports
will include overall ‘Likes’ or ‘Followers’ for each of the following four social media
platforms: Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram. Each one will then be broken down
into type of post that was most popular and how many ‘Likes’, ‘Shares’, and comments it
received.
All links used in posts on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube will be shortened
URLs. STEAM Village will use the Google URL shortening tool. This tool allows easy tracking
to see where traffic to the link is coming from.
E-Commerce elements
STEAM Village is using an online fundraising service called Blackbaud for its virtual gaming
events. The Blackbaud online software program is where individuals and teams can
register for the live Game-A-Thon at Comic Con as well as register to host a virtual gaming
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party. This service also provides access to analytics and tracking. This is where STEAM
Village can really see the effectiveness of each post and its conversion rate. STEAM Village
can also see exactly how much each person contributed or raised through their own
personal efforts.
Links to this online interface for registration will be crucial within the next six months.
Anytime fundraising or the Game-A-Thon is mentioned on social media, STEAM Village
should post a shortened URL link to the Blackbaud registration page.
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