Social Media Marketing Plan for Ho Toy Restaurant

Social Media Marketing Plan for Ho Toy Luau Restaurant 2012
Using Hootsuite to manage multiple social media tools

Video Project

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hyks2-hqFpw&list=HL1350411076&feature=mh_lolz

Chevy Monitor 2

From this week’s brand monitor, I got a better look of Chevrolet’s social media marketing. There are things we can learn from them and there are things they need to improve.

    First of all, Chevrolet did a very successful job investing in the movie “Transformers”. The movie “Transformers” was on July 2007.  

The searching point had been up to 92 and lasting for a whole month. You can really tell the difference the movie made, and the same thing happened in 2009. I remembered the first time I knew about Chevrolet was I watched the movie. For people already knew Chevrolet, they would take a different look at it. Every time the new “Transformers” came out, it always caused a buzz for Chevrolet. 

    Chevrolet has their Facebook page, twitter, YouTube channel, Flickr, and something else. Chevy has some major social media platforms for its customers. Chevrolet has already tapped its groundswell. In my opinion, Chevrolet is not using them well.

    First, there are not enough efforts that they should put into these social media metrics. The statistics from Samepoint.com says that the total social mentions are 4890.

  They did build a twitter page. But they only posted three tweets within one week. Obviously for a big company like Chevrolet, that was not enough.

  On their Facebook page, you can barely here a voice from Chevrolet. The executive from Chevrolet didn’t give too much attention to its groundswell. However the customers are quite passionate about Chevrolet. They are using Chevrolet Facebook page as a platform to share their stories with other people. People inside Chevrolet gave some respond once a while but not that often. There are negative responds on the page, but nobody took care of it. The customers’ voices have to be heard. That is one of reasons to have social media platforms. Chevrolet needs to have someone particular to be there and listen to the groundswell. If they have any complains and problems, make sure they are taken care of instead of being ignored. It is a large amount work taking care of the groundswell’s complain. But they should do it step by step and solve problems one by one. One happy customer will go out tell his/her friends about the happy experience he/she had at Chevrolet.

Good Example

Good Example

Bad Example

    Chevy should rely to negative comments as soon as possible in order to make the customers feel they will be heard. 

   Second, comparing Chevrolet with Ford, another famous American auto brand, Chevrolet is appealing less attention than Ford. On the search list, Ford has 100 points attention and Chevy only has 50. 

From the map we can see, Chevy only has a large market in North and South America. Basically, they gave up a larger market in Asian area. 

The groundswell can help them get into the Asian market if they use it well. There are a group of international students studying here in America. When they go back there country, they will recommend their friends to buy Chevrolet if Chevrolet pays more attention to them in U.S. From the book, the author told the reader to let go of groundswell, and let it do its work. If Chevrolet can catch those groups of people and make the best of it, they can expand the market in other countries too.

    Third, Chevrolet has to maintain its social media network. From the statistics on socialmention.com, we can see the numbers of last month and now. 

now

last month

Comparing all these numbers, Chevrolet did better last month. It is hard to enhance all the numbers, but at least Chevy should maintain it. Customers won't stick around and wait for you. If you don't draw much attention, they will lose interests of your brand. Just like it in the book, after you did all the tapping, energizing, and embracing your groundswell, you have to attain social maturity. 

 

Chevrolet brand monitor #1

    The brand I picked is Chevrolet. The reasons I chose Chevrolet is that it is an American brand, so that I can learn the American advertisement strategies from that. It has a long history and still is a very popular brand in America and other countries. 

    Chevy caught my eyes for the first time is the Bumblebee in the movie Transformers. I had a great first impression about Bumblebee because it has a cool looking and amazing characteristics. Everyone wants a car like that.

     I found at Addictomatic.com that Chevrolet Camaro 2012 new model was exhibited on the 2011 Chicago Auto Show. Now the information and photos about ZL1 are on their official website.

    Someone mentioned on Twitter that "Who doesn't want to get their hands on one of these #Camaros!?!!" 

         Isn't it amazing?! However some people like it, some don't. 

Look some people's comments:

     Chevrolet has its own Facebook page and twitter. One of the Chevy fan said on twitter: 

    Not only Camaro, other models are catching people's eyes too. At the Super Bowl, one of the best commercials are Chevy Sonic. 

video: http://www.chevrolet.com/culture/article/superbowl-2012-sonic/

    I am going to focus on the news about Chevrolet gas saving. One of the shortage of American cars is that they don't save on gas. But American cars are safer than Japanese cars. If Chevrolet can combine the safety and saving gas together, they will expand the market easily. 

42 MPG HWY

Global Marketing & Advertising Final Presentation

Global Marketing&Advertising Final Presentation

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Final Presentation

Final Presentation

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Brand Monitor: Goals and Recommendations

   From this month’s brand monitor, I got a better look of Chevrolet’s social media marketing. There are things we can learn from them and there are things they need to improve. For a company has been in the market for a century, Chevrolet has done a wonderful job on social media marketing. It abandoned the traditional methods and adopted new methods and technology. There is still space for improvement.

    There are three goals for Chevrolet in order to improve itself. First, Chevrolet should maintain the American market by energizing and embracing the groundswell. Even though the book “Groundswell” mentioned that companies should let go of groundswell, Chevrolet should not completely let go. Letting go does not mean no any care or responds. Chevrolet did a great job on tapping into customers’ enthusiasm with ratings and reviews and creating a community to energize its customers. However, it does not participate in and energize online communities of its brand. Chevy should get more involved with its groundswell, and make the groundswell feel that they are not alone and their voice could be heard. Chevrolet should check the social technographics profile of its customers and find out what its customers’ problems are. Free information is provided online, and Chevrolet can make the best of it. After finding out what the problems are, they should do some adjustments on their products or services.

    Second, Chevrolet should be more competitive and enthusiastic. No matter for its customers or its competitors, Chevy did not show its enthusiasm enough. Like it is said in the book “Groundswell”: “A community is like a marriage; it requires constant adjustment to grow and become more rewarding.” If Chevrolet does not show its support and care to its customers, the customers will complain about that Chevy ignores them. Sooner or later, they will leave Chevy. Chevrolet has to be more competitive than before. Being better than other competitors is another way to gain customers. Chevy has to be more active on the Internet activities than other companies in order to appeal public’s attention. People can only see the best, so Chevy should do the best to be seen.

    Chevy should connect the groundswell with the company itself and make the groundswell spread to other countries. It would have strong impact if Chevrolet involves their executives in their social media marketing plan. Having executives involved in the marketing plan is more persuasive and it can drive innovative marketing to another level. It would be better to take small steps that have big impact at first in case the big projects cost more money and have risks that it might not work.  It will be necessary to build websites and Facebook pages in other target countries in their languages. It has to tap, energize and embrace the groundswell all over again to gain customers in other countries. Then the expanded groundswell will bring benefit back to the company. They will raise the sales and make Chevrolet well known.

Reading#3: Believe in Groundswell

   For the people who did not get the chance to get to know social media marketing and how well the groundswell can work, they do not know how important to have social media marketing strategy. The groundswell impact is hard to build and takes a long time. Most companies and individuals aren't willing to invest that much money and time to gain the results they don't even know if they will get. Therefore, we have to be patient to the groundswell, and believe in it. 

    In the book Groundswell, the author used two successful cases to tell the audience how to connect with the groundswell transforms your company. Groundswell needs to spread with a customer-centric organization. The author suggested you want to create your own mini-groundswell within the company to embrace the groundswell of customers outside it. There are tree essential elements to this transformation. First, it is important to take step by step. Unilever did this. They chose small customer groups and succeeded. The key was they all had measurable success metrics that were tied to key marketing goals. Unilever lets us know you will gain more support for groundswell thinking if you can show a series of successes that have impact. It is necessary to have a plan and a vision. Each little plan supports to build a natural program. Organizations have to look far ahead in order to make the goals clear. It is better to have executive support. You need to have someone has a voice, and bring more attention. The groundswell feels themselves heard, when they know they get more attention.

    Dell’s story tells us that even though it has a lot of difficulties when it starts, don’t give up. Dell used step-by-step strategy. They transformed their customers one by one by listening first and acting later. This needs energy and patient, of course the belief in groundswell. Executive has to realize the impact of groundswell and push it. Dell couldn’t get anywhere in the groundswell until it honestly admitted its flaws. There is an old Chinese saying “People have bright eyes”. They see your flaws, and you need to admitted and improve yourself. This is how groundswell works. If people talk about your brand, you don’t do anything to respond the audience, you will lose them all someday.    

Dell

    Organizations usually forget they have a small groundswell inside their companies. These employees are just like a group of customers, and how to energize them to go out and talk to other people about your brand. The groundswell inside your company will do the mouth-to-mouth advertisement for you for free. Why don’t we make the best of it? Groundswell is just like everything else. It needs follow-up maintain. It needs someone to be there to take care of all the customers, and make sure the groundswell to be heard.

    Even though building groundswell takes more time and effort than we expected, it would come back to us eventually. So have belief in Groundswell. 

O#3: New Generation of Technology: APPs

    25 billion apps have been downloaded from Apple app store. That's a lot of apps. The winner is a Chinese and won 10,000 dollars app store credit. Since Apple app store's creation, 14 billion apps had been downloaded by March/April 2011. Less than a year later, app store had its 25 billion downloads. The speed of its development is incredible fast. 

    
It is amazing how fast the apps has been developed. It started for iPhones and iPods and later on there are more apps available for iPads. With the development of iPads, the speed of increasing apps has been faster than ever. 

History of Mobile Apps

   
    I have tons of apps on my phone and some of them are incredibly useful. I use online banking app to check my account balance at anytime and anywhere. One of the benefits of apps is that they can provide the functions you need without the limits of time and places.   Plus, the network can not be more convenient nowadays. You can get internet access easily through your 3G phone network and wifi. 


    The easy access of internet has provided a platform for the apps' development. Everything you can imagine can be provided in applications. People don't have to rely on computers, and phones and tablets devices are lighter than computers and laptops. We should take advantage of apps, and make the best use of them. 

How Amazing it is to have Communities and Twitter?

    I have been using Microsoft Windows System since I had a computer. I'm already used to it. I just started to use Mac System a couple days ago. I never imagined I could have so much trouble using my computer. I asked one of my friends who has been using Mac System for a long time for help. It turned out all the major software for Microsoft System have Mac System versions. I cannot stop thinking about how Dell saved 1 million dollars on its customer phone service by answering questions on the Internet. What I did is going online and look for answers. It was amazing that I found a big website for all Mac users. It is soft.macx.cn. You can just input keywords of your questions and search within the website. You can find an answer. I used online chatting service on Lexmark's official website to help me find a printer driver for my Mac. 

    That is what we called “Community”. I cannot stop think how rich the sources are, and how the community was built. In the Groundswell, the author mentioned several tips for create a community. “Start small, but plan for a larger presence. Reach out to your most active customers. Plan to drive traffic to your community. Build in a reputation system.” Once the community got started, we need participators to contribute information. “Supporting communities need activities.” People are playing an important role in groundswell because they are the host of Internet. Some people take information and some give. “Activity creates content, which creates traffic and links, which boosts search engine placement, which drives more traffic, and so on.” Some of the creators can be really popular in communities, and they feel good about helping people even though they don’t make money from that. 

    

    When I read about tapping the groundswell with twitter, I got so excited about it. One good thing about twitter is you can. I started to check out twitter everyday when I followed DulceCandy1987. She is a fashion blogger. I check twitter everyday to see if she uploaded any interesting things. Then I found out you can put links of pictures from Instagram, videos from Youtube and other websites. Just because it is so easy to link to anywhere you like, and the sources are so rich, twitter has been a push for the Groundswell. After I followed DulceCandy1987, I found and followed a lot of brands’ twitter, such as H&M and Forever 21. These twitter sites communicate with customers and post new-arrival products. Twitter has been a good tool to bring customers and merchants closer.

Did you shop Valentine's Day gift online?Original #2

    Did everyone have a lovely Valentine's Day? I wonder how many people actually shopped gifts for him or her online just because they didn't have time to go to the mall. I sure didn't have time to go to the malls. Plus it takes a long time to drive to different malls and you don't even know if you are gonna find the things he or she likes. So finally I went to Amazon.com and pick a home gym equipment for my boyfriend. How easy was that? I just sat at home, clicked several times, and it's all set. The gift came a day before Valentine's Day, so I made it right on time.

    Amazon.com was advertising Kindle Fire for Valentine's Day.

Amazon.com

     I love shopping personally, but there is no malls in Worcester. So I turned my interests to online shopping. Because online shipping is becoming more and more popular, online shopping websites give as many sales as possible for every holidays as well.

                                                                              Macy's

                                                                             Target

                                                                          T-mobile


    We don't realize how much our lives have changed because the Internet. We shop for groceries and food online just because it is convenient  and time-saving. We shop for clothes because we don't have time to go to the mall and walk from store to store. We shop everything online, and even more when the sales come up.

    I checked out the Ebags.com when I read about it in Groundswell. Their website is simple and well devided into catalogs. Customers can easily find the bags they want.

Plus, online shopping is easier for customers to compare prices from one website to another. We don't have to spend more time and money unnecessarily. Thanks for new technology and online shopping.

How to Use the Groundswell Better? Reading#1

Let me ask you a question first. Are you a creator or a visitor on the internet? According to the statistics of Chapter3 in Groundswell, only 20%-30% of internet users are creators. In that case, we can say more than 60% of users are visitors. They check and share information, videos and blogs every day. That is not enough. The more active creators are, the more audiences they can get. The more you involve with Groundswell, the better you can use it.

    Why do we need to participate in the groundswell? In the book the author mentioned people join the groundswell because “they can keep up friendships, make new friends, succumb to social pressure from existing friends and pay it forward.” Some people also have “altruistic impulse, prurient impulse, creative impulse, validation impulse and affinity impulse” which encourage them to create.

    It is not enough if you only have the enthusiasm about creating on the internet. You have to know your customers, make friends with your customers. Customers will open their hearts to you, and tell you what they really want. What you have to do first is to listen. Listening is a two-way strategy. Customers can monitor the brands they are interested in, and organizations can know their customers by checking their social technographics profile. One of the benefits that internet give us is openness. Absorbing information is the first step of listening. You can only win customers’ trust when you know them well. “In the groundswell, relationships are everything. The way people connect with each other—the community that is created—determines how the power shifts. (Groundswell, p18)” People become to the host instead of creators in the groundswell. It is all about satisfy the audience.

    What should we do after we know our customers and audiences? Let’s talk to them. There are so many ways that can make you heard. You can post a viral video. You can engage in social networks and user-generated content sites. And you may join the blogosphere and create a community. The author of the book “Groundswell” gave ten tips for successful blogging. They suggest you “start by listening, determine a goal for the blog, estimate the ROI, develop a plan, rehearse, develop an editorial process, design the blog and its connection to your site, develop a marketing plan so people can find the blog, remember blogging is more than writing, and be honest.”(p.117) I believe that the more you give to the groundswell, the more you can get from it. Let’s start to talk to the groundswell instead of just listening.

    Source: Groundswell, Expanded and Revised Edition: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies

Week3o: Social media and Travelling

Hello, everybody! I would like to start this by two simple questions for you guys. How do you prepare vacation trips (exclude business trips) in the recent 3 years? And can you prepare your trip without internet in recent a few year? I bet the answer is no.

The first step of preparing a trip is to decide transportation and hotel. There are so many flight tickets and hotel booking website giving out all kinds of deals to the customers. When they sell cheap tickets, rental cars and hotels, they are expanding their markets. The examples are Hotwire.com, Priceline.com, Groupon, Gilt, Cheapticket.com, and Bookit.com. Those are websites selling hotel deals, flight deals and car rental deals or maybe the whole packages. It is maybe the first time for some people to buy deals online. So before they do it, they might go to some bloggers’ websites to check out which website has the best deals and the best reputations. Social media is playing an important role in the step.

After you take care of your hotels and tickets, you will start to think what you should do in the new place you know nothing about. I am going to tell you how to use social media to travel according to my own experience. I went to Miami with my two other friends half a month ago. Miami could be considered as a whole new country for us because we had never been there before. However, we had the most amazing four days there. Thanks to the social media. We did our homework before we went there. We checked out all kinds of blogs and sources online and made a plan. We looked for some places those are the most recommended going. There are Miami downtown, Miami Beach, Key West, and Everglades National Park. There are some famous restaurants as well.

People who have been to Miami wrote about their trips on their blogs, and somehow they followed other people’s steps because they did research too. Social media affects the audiences in an extremely fast speed. It is unlike books, newspapers or magazines. It allows more people to get access because it is free to everybody. We can imagine that if one person wrote a blog about a place he went, and ten people read it and shared it. A hundred people will see those ten people shared the blog and goes on and on. That is how social media works in any field. The more people read about you, the bigger your market can get. Travelling cannot be accomplished without internet or social media. People need information from social media, and merchants can use social media to expand their market as well.