Week 5 Part 2

The business I am creating for this class (and possibly as a real thing if proven viable) is called Brew-Tea-Full. This is a subscription based company which delivers subscribers different teas and biscuits (cookies) every month. The teas will be of different flavours with the customers being able to pick and choose or hit the "surprise me" button to get a random selection of tea. The cookies will work in the same manner with them being based on very popular cookies in the UK. The business will be advertised as a British company as Britain is well known for tea and can give me a competitive edge. 

My target demographic are people aged between 21-35 as the people in this age range are more likely to use an internet based subscription based company, plus in the United States tea is growing more popular, especially with the younger generation. The psychographics for my business are people interested in tea and cookies as well as British culture.

Week 5 Part 1

I decided to go with more of a challenge on this assignment, given I know nothing about plants, I thought it would be interesting to look at the target markets of the two websites and see what I can learn.

Armstrong Garden Centers

This website looks to be about a garden centre that also does labouring work for customers as well. Typically people into gardening tend to be older/retired people as it is well known to be a great hobby for helping to keep people active while close to home. Also, in this demographic would be homeowners, this is typically people who are aged 25+ as they are more likely to have established a permanent address. This is due to the landscaping services offered as younger people don't have the time/interest to maintain a garden while studding/working or raising children. The psychographics are people who are interested in gardening, this is made obvious by advertising the type of plants they sell and their garden centre locations. The overall tone of the website is very bright and colourful to draw in customers, although I don't know much about plants, I do know people like bright and pretty plants and not shrivelled and dead plants!

http://www.ranchovistanursery.com/

This plant nursery is more of a B2B (business to business) company. They advertise their plants to resellers and wholesalers. Also they do events such as wedding events so their demographics will be couples who are looking to get married. The psychographics are people who are interested in plants, particularly cactuses..

The differences between these websites are fairly obvious as Armstrong is a B2C (business to consumer) company and rancho is a B2B company. Also Armstrong offers landscaping services which rancho does not, they may be very similar businesses in what they sell from a broad perspective but once the consumer dives into the details they will notice big differences in services offered. The only crossover between the businesses is the fact they both in the horticulture business. The overall tone of the website is far more simplistic, it wasn't very obvious as first who they catered to but after digging around I found the answer, it definitely caters more towards businesses rather than individuals.

Week 4 Post 2

1. EA Sports FIFA

https://www.ea.com/en-gb/games/fifa/fifa-20/ultimate-team/features

This website is effective because I regularly play a video game called FIFA 20 and it allows me to access my teams using their web application. Also, the website releases patch notes regularly to tell me what is coming up on the game. Finally, they have community posts where people discuss different aspects of the game and people can interact and engage with each other.

They make the website very simple and easy to navigate. Where a lot of game websites go wrong is by making the website not user friendly. FIFA makes it very easy for users to see what's happening on the game and post in their discussions boards.

The regular updates made on the website makes me keep coming back plus it's always good to keep up with the community posts as well. The way the website could be improved is by making the richest content more to the front of the website so it is easier to access for the community.

2. Reddit

https://www.reddit.com/

This website is effective because of the communities that exist within them. There is a constant stream of fresh content which makes it very addictive.

They split their website into different categories so people can easily find the subreddits they want to read, they also but of the top reddit posts on the front of the website.

What makes me come back is the fact their is new content added to the website all the time, you can very easily spent a long time reading posts or sharing your own insights.

What they can do to improve is make it more user friendly by not cluttering the front page so much and simplifying the navigation bars so users can find subreddits more easily. Finally, they should modernise the website as it looks dated in todays world.

Week 4 Post 1

1. http://jamilin.com/

The first problem with this website is that I have no idea what this is about from the first few seconds spent on the website. This is important because when someone clicks onto your website, you only have around 10-30 seconds to keep them there before they click off. The second issue I found was it looks very dated. The website looks like something from 2002 and needs modernising, I find old looking websites like this very tedious.

The first way I'd improve this website is by simplifying the front page significantly. I would add one big image with big text telling the visitor exactly what this website is about, I would then add sliders advertising some of the products and also add an about page to tell the reader about the business. Currently the page is cluttered with so much information that is very off putting. Secondly, I would modernise the images used and also remove the blue text for social media at the top of the page and instead add images of the icons at the bottom of the page.

http://www.roverp6cars.com/

This website looks like it's about to give my computer all sorts of viruses, in other words, very dodgy. I don't like the moving bars in the middle of the website with the very basic paint and text font. Also, with the Portugal promotion, the text with that background is painful to look at. Finally, this website is cluttered with utter rubbish, I appreciate the designer trying to ensure the reader that their website is about cars but I think they overly achieved because they seem to be shoving it down our throats.

How I would improve this website is by removing all of the images of the cars on the sides of the website to make it look much simpler, only one or two images are necessary to advertise the fact they're a car website. Secondly, I would change the background colours and the text font of the website to make it look more professional. I would look how car manufactures create their website and base the website design off that.

http://apple.com

Apple make it very obvious what they sell when I first click on the website because there is an iPhone staring me in the face and it takes up a lot of the screen. They also make navigation very easy for all their products by putting the links horizontally on top of the page. Finally, when the reader scrolls down they can see more of Apples products with high quality images.

My reaction to this website was refreshed, they have the correct amount of busy with it not being too baron nor too hectic. Also, it had plenty of imagines instead of text to show off their product.

http://www.toyota.com/

I like the fact Toyota put a video on their website to show their projects. They also make it obvious about what cars they sell with their prices included as well. They also use simple colouring and only highlight the important parts of their website such as their deals.

I think this website is very professional and it makes me more likely to trust their business and purchase one of their vehicles; if their website looked very unprofessional, as a consumer, it would affect my opinion on their cars as it reflects.

Week 3 Post 2

I have not got a specific business in mind so I will review business in sectors I am interested in and have knowledge about.

1. Dollar Shave Club

https://www.dollarshaveclub.com/

They are a subscription based company that sends you a starter kit and then razors and other bathroom products. They are a business that has boomed over recent years and are an international company serving the United States, United Kingdom, Canada and Australia.

The social media platforms they use are: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube and Pinterest (all are found on their website).

Facebook:

• 3,651,408 followers
• Post daily
• Last post: 02/09/2020

Instagram:

• 224k followers
• Post daily
• Last post: 02/09/2020

Twitter:

• 85.1k followers
• Post daily
• Last post: 02/09/2020

YouTube:

• 36.4k subscribers
• Post once every few months
• Last post: 02/07/2020

Pinterest:

• 14.2k followers
• Post daily
• Last post: 02/09/2020

Dollar Shave Club utilises social media very well by being active on most platforms. They use Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Pinterest consistently. However, YouTube is lacking in content which in understandable given YouTube videos are far more time consuming than posts.

2. LOOTCRATE

https://www.lootcrate.com/

They are a subscription based company that gives subscribers boxes containing random items from themes that the customer picks. For example, a gaming lootcrate will contain gamer items, it is a more randomised way of receiving items. They are an international company.

The social media platforms they use are: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube and Snapchat (all are found on their website). 

Facebook:

• 2,567,256 followers
• Post twice a day
• Last post 09/02/2020

Twitter:

• 543.4k followers
• Post twice to three times a day
• Last post 09/02/2020

Instagram:

• 738k followers
• Post twice a day
• Last post 09/02/2020

YouTube:

• 265k subscribers
• Post once every few months
• Last post 10/28/2019

Snapchat:

• Cannot see analytics

LOOTCRATE utilises social media well again and are extremely active on all except for YouTube. They use Twitter the most but Facebook and Twitter aren't too far behind.

3. Spotify

https://www.spotify.com/us/


They are a free/subscription based company specialising in music. Customers pay monthly to gain access to many songs on the platform. Spotify is one of the top music subscription businesses in the world.

The social media platforms they use are Instagram, Twitter and Facebook (all are linked on their website).

Instagram:

• 4.8 million followers
• Post daily
• Last post 02/10/2020

Twitter:

• 3.3 million followers
• Roughly 5 times a day
• Last post 02/10/2020

Facebook

• 22,231,906
• Post roughly 3 times a day
• Last post 02/10/2020

For a huge business Spotify doesn't use as many platforms as some of the smaller businesses but they are extremely active on the ones they are on, especially Twitter.

4. Home Chef

https://www.homechef.com/

They are a subscription based company that delivers meals to people every week. They are a national business.

The social media platforms they use are: Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube.

Facebook:

• 473,724 followers
• Posts daily
• Last post 02/10/2020

Pinterest:

• 4.8 monthly viewers
• Posts daily
• 02/10/2020

Twitter:

• 11.3k followers
• Posts daily
• 02/10/2020

Instagram:

• 147k followers
• Posts daily
• 02/10/2020

YouTube:

• Their subscribers are hidden
• Posts once every month
• 01/06/2020

They are equally active on every platform except YouTube

5. Starbucks

https://www.starbucks.com/

Starbucks is a huge coffee company which operates in almost every country.

The social media platforms they use are: Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, YouTube and Twitter.

Facebook:

• 35,609,351 followers
• Posts daily
• Last post 02/10/2020

Pinterest:

• 9.7 million monthly viewers
• Posts daily
• 02/10/2020

Instagram:

• 18.4 million followers
• Posts daily
• 02/10/2020

YouTube: 

• 250k subscribers
• Posts once every few days
• 02/04/2020

Twitter:

• 11.2 million followers
• Posts multiple times a day
• 02/10/2020

Starbucks uses Twitter the most but are active on most platforms and are the most active out of the other businesses.

I purposely compared smaller businesses with much larger to get a scope of how they behave based on size. I can say with confidence, that no matter the size of the business, they will all be very active on social media. This shows how important being active and posting is.

Businesses also use different platforms based on their demographics. Where LOOTCRATE has a younger demographic so they use Snapchat, other businesses like home chef will use Pinterest to show images of their meals to try and gain more publicity and therefore more subscribers.

To conclude all businesses see the vital importance of social media by being extremely active and caring about the number of follower, likes, etc. they receive.

Week 3 Post Comments

The blogs I have commented on:

Janae Virgil
Janda Slade
Hayley Raynor

Week 3 Post 1

When it comes to communication with businesses your experience can vary depending on why you want to communicate with a business. Should you want to enquire about a product/service or purchase said product/service a business will make it very simple for you most of the time.

However, once the product/service is purchased and you encounter a problem, this is when businesses suddenly become very difficult to contact. Business like to deflect you as much as possible; if you require assistance most of the time they will refer you to an FAQ board and will reluctantly give you a support email address or phone number. When contacting them response times tend to be long and if calling them, you spend much of the time talking to a machine.

Social media has somewhat helped the issue because tweeting a business negatives about the product or problems you have encountered can harm them and puts a spotlight on them to respond with a solution. Many of the responses consist of asking the disgruntled customer to direct message them as they don't want to flood their boards with a back and forward exchange. However, if many people are contacting businesses via social media it can make your message or post lost.

Whenever I share comments about a business I hail them if I love their product and write a recommendation. Should I have a negative experience I am honest about what happened but I don't write foul and harsh language as that doesn't solve any issues and makes them less likely to help find a solution to the problem.

Should I own a business I would want to be quite witty with my responses on social media as this can draw a lot of attention, especially for positive comments. However, if I receive negative feedback I would take a more serious attitude and try to rectify with my customer to show that the business is committed to good customer service as it's a lot easier to retain a customer than find a new one.

Week 2 Post Comments

The blogs I have commented on are:

Jojo Hassan
Hannah Miyamoto
Hailey Raynor

Week 2 Post 1

For this blog post I will be discussing social media in the personal and business world. Social media is a vital tool in the business and personal world and it is important to decide which social media websites are best. Personally, I am a big fan of Instagram for personal use; it is simple, filled with content and has more people who are of similar age using it as opposed to Facebook as an example. Also, Instagram is more photo based with the options to add stories as well. I prefer this because photos are worth 1000 words and has the potential to spark more insight as opposed to posts where I find many can be completely meaningless.

In terms of the business world, that can heavily depend on the type of business you run and the demographics. For example, if you're advertising clothing targeting women aged 35-50 the best social media site to use is Facebook due to more of that demographic being on there. However, if you're advertising skateboards which tends to be younger people aged between 11-25 you'd likely use a site like Snapchat or Instagram as more people in that age bracket use these sites.

Based on past research for other classes, all social media sites have their merits for both business and personal barring LinkedIn which is definitely more geared for businesses and professionals. A business will use social media in a slightly different way to personal accounts. Businesses will tailor posts to gain traction and attention to try and generate sales, analytics are often used a lot to measure engagement from potential customers and find out their demographics. Personal accounts tends to post more based on their own lives, to share with friends and family. However, some people do want to gain a following online and will use similar attention grabbing posts to try and generate likes and ultimately followers.