A Look Into My Life

Here I am, writing my last blog for this class. Not going to lie, I thought these blogs were going to be the death of me, but I actually enjoy them now. It took a while to get in the swing of things, but once I got into a pattern it became easier and I started to enjoy blogging. But as I'm sitting here, realizing Christmas break starts in one day for me, I'm trying to figure out where this semester went. Most semesters go by fast for me, but this one seriously flew by. It feels like yesterday it was the first football game, and now I'm packing up to leave for a month. It probably went by so fast for me because it was my favorite semester yet, and here's why. This semester I have done so much with friends. From taking friends back home with me for one of my shows, to just simple Starbucks runs, the time we spend together is always great. I have become so close to all of my friends this semester and I am so thankful for it. We hang out at least three times and a week,...

My last blog about the book. You can imagine my excitement to not have to blog about the textbook anymore, but I can't say I didn't learn a lot from both books we read. I've always known about social media on a base level. Like everyone else that uses social media, I feel comfortable with how to use the apps and how to post posts my followers like. But these books taught me more concrete information that will help a ton moving on. As a newly declared social media minor, I will use everything I have learned from this class and these books in the future if I can get a social media job. I appreciate everything I have learned about content creation and curation, apps to help me with social media, how to create calendars and so much more. I plan on using these, for now, on my own social media and my mom's business's social media. This will give me great practice for when I need to use it for a job. I have already noticed some changes I have made since the beginning...

I grew up in a house that was half dresses and girly and the other half camo and deer hunting. My mom owns her dress store and my dad is an insurance agent, but he films edits and produces hunting videos as well. He has done this for at least 15 years now, so basically it was a constant battle between wanting to wear camo or sparkles.  Then, in 2014, I started dating Anthony, who also loves to deer hunt. So, this is where my dad and boyfriend bonded over deer. Anthony even went hunting with my dad and ended up on one of the hunting videos. Side note, I guess you can say they had a great relationship because I don't know many guys that would go hunting, with weapons, with their girlfriend's dad. I'm joking, but seriously they LOVE hunting.  With hunting comes the constant checking of trail cameras. Trail cameras are cameras that people strap to trees in the woods. These cameras have SD cards inside and when it senses movement it takes a picture and stores it in the SD...

You can say I am SUPER excited for Christmas break because this break my three friends and I are going to Naples, Florida for a week. This was a very spur of the moment trip, but that makes it more fun, right? A couple weeks ago, I was contacted about modeling in Fort Myers, FL in January for a private buying show. Of course, I said yes, but my mom will be in Nevada, so she won't be there to travel with me. So naturally I tell my friends about it. Come to find out, my friend Emma has grandparents that live in Naples, FL, which is only around 45 minutes from Fort Myers. Emma asked her grandparents over Thanksgiving break if we could come stay at their condo for the week and they said yes! So, the Monday after break, we booked our plane tickets. We are so excited because we haven't had the opportunity to go on a trip just the four of us yet and we already know it's about to be a blast. January 4th through the 11th we will take on Florida. We plan on going to the beach a...

Chapter 8 is all about audience segmentation and analysis. Audience segmentation is the process of categorizing people into certain groups based on specific criteria. This is really important when running a social media account because each group of people should be marketed at in specific ways. For example, you wouldn't target younger males the same way you would target older males when it comes to clothing. I found this chapter interesting because I can use this information now for my mom's bridal and formal store. I run her social media most of the time and this will help me target the people I need to. Our target audience is high school females through around age 35. With having a larger target audience, we need to do audience segmentation to know exactly how to reach the people we want to. We shouldn't market to newly engaged women looking for bridal gowns the same way we would market high school students looking for prom and homecoming dresses. I also feel when yo...

With social media and the professional world intertwining more than ever, I am not surprised an app like LinkedIn has been created. LinkedIn is an app business professionals use to hire employees and promote their businesses. As a business student here at ONU, I took a course called Career Planning. In this class we learned basic job searching skills like how to make a resume and cover letter, how to dress and how to interview. After learning these skills, we created LinkedIn profiles. After we created the profiles, we had to connect with professionals in our field. (Connecting is basically adding friends.) Following this class, I have applied to multiple internships through LinkedIn. This process is so easy for both the business and the applicant. All I had to do to apply was upload my resume in the spot provided and all they have to do is put the resume in a system that scans for information. Although it makes it harder to get a job, businesses can really narrow down their applic...

I feel like I blog about dogs all the time, but it's because I have serious puppy fever. I almost rescued Sophia (I talked about her in one of my blogs in the past), even though I could only adopt her and her sister together. A couple weeks later someone brought a baby golden-doodle to my house so everyone could see her and I instantly fell in love. So naturally, I started looking for golden-doodle puppies and found two that I was super interested in. I called about them and almost bought one named Goldie, but my landlord said absolutely no dogs, so I didn't get her. I may or not have cried a couple times because I wanted her so bad. Now that I don't have any of the dogs I realize it probably is a good idea to wait until I'm graduated and have a house and a job to keep up with the dog, but my mom realized my excessive need for a puppy and brought my chihuahua, Louis Vuitton, up to school so I could keep him for two weeks. No I am not allowed to have a dog. Yes I have ...

The point that sticks out most in Chapter 6 is social media communication audit. This sticks out for me because yesterday we had an audit assignment due. Before this class, I had no idea what a social media communication audit was, but now I do and it is way more work than I ever imagined. When I read this section of the book I was still kind of confused about what it is. I understood why you ran one, but not how to make one. I learned how from the assignment we did in class. For this assignment, we were assigned a table with guides to our social media audit. We had to choose three companies in the same industry and analyze each one. I chose three different dress designers. (surprising, I know). Running this audit really opened my eyes to the best ways to run your social media. You can tell which companies are more successful because they have more money to pay for the necessary marketing tools on social media. One realization that made complete sense to me was Sherri Hill is one ...

I remember when I first downloaded Snapchat. I remember thinking "I have to look presentable every day now because people will actually see what I look like every day." For everyone that doesn't know, Snapchat is a social media app that started at just a way to communicate by sending pictures back and forth. It has now advanced into a form of social media. You can share stories, which are pictures or videos that everyone you are friends with on snapchat can see, and you can see different magazine type subscription stories. Now that I have had Snapchat for multiple years, I don't know what I would do without it. I snap my friends on a daily basis and it's basically the root of all my laugher. Now you can make snap groups, which means you can have multiple people in a group and you can send pictures to the group like normal group message, and I have so many with my friends. We send anything from drama we want to spill to TikToks in these groups and it is so much f...

They say the first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem. This is me admitting I have an addiction, but I don't know if just admitting it is going to fix it. I have an addiction to online shopping. It's a serious issue. My bank account is crying and my closet is overflowing. (I am literally bidding on a sweater on Instagram as we speak.) I find myself four pages deep on Shein.com or Amazon and realize it's too late to go back because you've invested so much time. I can't lie too much, I do tend to put a lot in my cart and never end up ordering them because I'm too lazy, but it's the times when I don't hold back and I do order the whole cart, that is the issue. I have a really hard time saving money and I blame online shopping and food. I hope I'm not the only one with this issue, and I just really wish it wasn't while I am in college because I'm extra broke. Maybe one day I will learn self control and can save money. I gue...

Yes, I did finish the book last week, but I do have three more weeks of blogging, so we're going back to Chapter 4. This is one I skipped when blogging about chapters from our book. The nest two blogs will go off of the skipped chapter before. Chapter 4 talks all about the different social media jobs out there thus far. This chapter really helped me because even though I am working for a Social Media minor, I wasn't completely sure what jobs would be out there. The main job titles the book explains are Social Media Community Manager, Social Media Manager, Social Media Coordinator, Social Media Strategist, Content Creator, Multimedia/Video Producer and Writer/Editor. All of these jobs may seem somewhat similar, but the book does a great job of explaining each position in detail. I just kept getting more and more excited as I read though this chapter. All of these jobs interest me so much and to think that because of the route I'm taking in school right now, I could end u...

Every college has their own system for homework and grading. When I was at University of Cincinnati and Ohio University-Chillicothe, we used Blackboard, but here at ONU we use Moodle. Personally I have found Blackboard easier to navigate, but it is not as technologically advanced as Moodle. One aspect I really like about Moodle is how they have made it into a social app as well as an educational tool. Here at ONU, we have an app for ONU students and facility. This app is connected to Moodle and not only does it have the education aspect, but also a social side. In the ONU app, you are connected with every student enrolled at the university. All students enrolled and have the app can post to the student wall or direct message each other. There are always funny posts about things happening around campus and its most popular for freshman students to communicate throughout the freshman dorms. When it comes to Moodle, the app links to your classes through Moodle, so the app directly not...

Its November 6th and I would be lying to you if I said I haven't started getting into the Christmas spirit. I may or may not have a Christmas tree, stockings and Christmas lights hanging in my room already. It's starting to get colder and Halloween is over, so why not get in Christmas mode a little earlier. I know, I know, I'm jumping the gun a lot, but I feel like the older I get, the shorter Christmas lasts. I remember when I was younger it felt like Christmas lasted forever and now it feels like it lasts two days. Not to mention, stressing about trying to get the money to buy everyone you love the best Christmas presents.  Don't worry though, I did not and will not forget about Thanksgiving. Who can not think about all the yummy food you get to enjoy and the week long break from school we get. I just like to celebrate Thanksgiving with my Christmas tree lit up, that's all.  In all honesty, this is my favorite time of the year. Even though it is getting...

I am finally on the last chapter of the book, Chapter 13. This chapter serves a lot like the conclusion of the whole book, but also still gives a little information. This chapter starts by explaining where social media is at this point in time. It talks about how it as reach a crazy max of possibilities, but what's crazier is the fact that it will continue to progress. Social media has changed so much so fast that even though we think it can't get anymore advanced, it's probably going to. Then the chapter goes on to explaining future trends and directions. It talks about the questions that need to be asked to improve social media and the two tools and platforms for social media purposes; virtual reality and augmented reality.  My favorite part of this chapter is the section written by students in the social media classroom seat. These are short sections about different students explaining how they use social media and how it has benefited them. It was really cool to g...

One of my new favorite activities is Birding. I found Bird's in Atlanta, Georgia two years ago and every time I go to any city that has Birds, it is a necessity. You're probably asking what Birds are. Bird is a company that has placed motor scooters around cities to help with transportation and help with the carbon footprint. Bird has created a fun yet helpful way to get around the city. It is super easy to use as well. All you do is download the Bird app, add a credit or debit card, then you're set. When it's time to bird, you pull up the app and scan the bird you are wanting to use. Once you scan it, it will begin your ride and you can ride for as long as you want. The more you use the app, the cheaper your rides become. When you're done, you select end ride and take a picture of your scooter to prove you didn't wreck it. This concept is so smart and a great way to show how technology and social media is growing everyday. Who knew you would be able to driv...

I have wanted a dog since my mom got a puppy two years ago. Being up here at school can be stressful sometimes and I just want a little puppy to cuddle when I'm stressed. I thought I found her, and I was so excited but let me tell you how my dreams were crushed. Yesterday, my friend Ireland told me about this chihuahua (my favorite breed) she saw at the Lima Humane Society. Naturally I look her up and find Sophia, the dog in the picture to the left. Instantly I am in love. My mom continues to tell me I don't need her, but I continue to tell her I do. I asked her how many retweets to get her and she said 4000. I'm not even close to the number of retweets that I need but decide to message the people and ask about her anyway. Everything was perfect. She is only a year old and the cutest little thing. I asked the Humane Society about adopting her and they told me they would only let me adopt her if I took her sister too because she would be too depressed if she separated fr...

Chapter 11 was very interesting for me because it was right up my alley. When my cousin and I formed our singing duo, we decided to kind of separate roles between the two of us. He would book shows and I would run the social media to get our name out. Some of the things this chapter explained I have already experienced, in the most minor way possible of course. The book explains the best practices to keep in mind are identify the platforms that can best serve your brand, have a strategy for all aspects, got loyal fans and ambassadors behind your brand on social media, and be aware of trolls and how they can take a toll on the celebrity. These are important because you want to create posts to get noticed or get people to use your product or service you're promoting, and these are the best ways to do so. The chapter also explains the crises that can take place in social media. An example would be responding to a current event and your audience taking it the wrong way, or not reco...

Okay, I don't know about you guys, but I have a serious addition to Starbucks . I am not a coffee drinker, but I love their pink drinks. It is the only caffeinated drink I like beside iced tea, and I drink iced tea so much it doesn't give me energy anymore. The pink drink is a strawberry acai refresher with coconut milk. If you haven't tried it, I highly recommend it. One thing that has helped a ton is the Starbucks mobile app. With this app you can upload money or gift cards and use it to buy drinks. For every dollar you spend, you earn two stars. When you earn 150 stars, you can get a free drink. I don't want to tell you how many free drinks I have gotten because the number is slightly embarrassing. Starbucks uses this app for more than just payment and earning stars, they use it to market. Throughout the week, I get notifications from the app telling me about happy hour or specials they have on drinks. This brings attention to the store and makes people want Star...

Yesterday I traveled to the Ohio Statehouse for Mascot day. Honestly, before we left, I thought it was going to be a long day and I was just going to be bored the whole time, but I was wrong.  When I heard about mascot day, I was very confused. I didn't know it was even a thing. But I guess once a year the state government invites the independent college mascots to the statehouse to meet the people working for the state of Ohio, and this year they invited the cheerleaders too. Not knowing what it was, I decided to take the risk and go. (I mean I did get out of my classes for it so how bad could it really be?). I ended up having a blast.  We all went into one room in the statehouse and as the legislatures walked by, we took pictures. But in between the pictures, we got to watch the mascots interact with each other and that was hilarious. Everyone was being so silly and messing with each other. By the end of the two hours, we were teaching the mascot for Mount Vernon Naza...

This week I read chapters 8 and 9 of "Social Media for Strategic Communication." My favorite out of the two is Chapter 9. Chapter 9 talked about creating, managing, and curating content. Something you never would have imagined to be part of a job description is creating content for social media. I always thought social media would be all organic and you would never need someone to create the content you posted, but boy was I wrong. This is a very important part of social media now and there is so much that goes into it. But not only do you create content for social media, you have the create content for the marketing of a product. The process is similar because you want to market your social media too, but most of the time personal pages won't pay for people to help create their content. Chapter 9 stresses the importance of having good quality content and how to create the content. This chapter ties into the content the speaker we had in class on Tuesday spoke about...

Let me tell you about one of my absolute favorite apps, Pinterest . Pinterest is an app that allows you to share ideas, inspiration and many more things with other people, or you can save it in a "board" for yourself. This is kind of in the realm of social media because you can see what your friends are saving to their boards, but it's also for people to get creative ideas on projects.  I find myself scrolling through Pinterest for no reason most of the time. I have my whole wedding planned, even though I'm not engaged, my future house and all of its decor picked out, keep in mind I'm only a junior so I still have a while, and I have a whole board filled with cute clothes that I plan on purchasing, maybe one day I'll have money to buy them all. I love the app because it gets me excited about the future and helps me become more creative. If I need to wear a cute outfit for something, Pinterest is always the first place I go. Recently I have had to craft a l...

Chapter 7 in "Social Media for Strategic Communication" talks all about how to write your social media posts. It explains that writing takes time and dedication. I never realized how much time and dedication you would need for social media until I started this class and had to keep up with a blog. These blogs are way more time consuming than I thought they would be, and I definitely have to think hard about what I am going to post. One point that really stood out to me was understanding the difference between tone and voice. I think these two things get mistaken for each other a lot and I like that the book really pointed out the difference and explained them clearly. They are interconnected, but they are not the same thing. Brand Voice is the uniformity in selection of words, the attitude and values of the brand while addressing the target audience or others; whereas, tone is the overall voice characteristics you want to interject within the content you are writing. I di...

The third week in October brings the Pumpkin Show in little Circleville, Ohio. This festival is extra special to me, lasts from Tuesday through Sunday and brings more people than you can imagine.  A question on Jeopardy the other day was about the Pumpkin Show.  Downtown restaurants get extra packed because people want a break from fried pumpkin food, they might want an alcoholic beverage or just to warm up. Most businesses have live music play too to bring more people in and give entertainment for that night. This year my cousin and I were asked to sing at a local business called Gibby's ! This meant a lot because they asked us to sing on one of the busiest nights so that implies that they really liked how we sounded last time and wanted to have a good band for one of the busiest nights. Blake and I are singing for four hours, which is two more than what we're used to, but we had fun learning the new songs and we have even more fun performing them. We are really hoping fo...

I told myself I wouldn't do it, but here I am, 1:00 in the morning, laughing my butt off while scrolling through the hilarious videos I see on TikTok. TikTok has been pretty popular for a while now, but I refused to download it because I knew I would become addicted. Now I have the app and literally cannot stop watching it. I lay in bed and not realize it has been an hour, and even though I wanted to get to bed early that night, I catch myself getting an ab workout from laughing so hard. I have even made one myself. For those of you that don't know what TikTok is, it is a social media app that you make videos on. It's a lot like the old app Vine, but you can do even more with the videos. The most popular way to use TikTok is to make a video using audio that is given to you. So basically, you are lip syncing to whatever the audio says. I have puppy fever more than you know right now, and of course one of the most popular types of videos are of people's puppies. I lov...

One of my favorite things to do here at Ohio Northern University (ONU) is cheer. I have been involved in cheer and gymnastics for as long as I can remember, and I love it just as much now. All through high school I was a base (someone on the bottom of the stunt lifting the flyer by her feet), but when I transferred here, I became a flyer. I love flying more than anything and I still get to base in some stunts, but the adrenaline of being thrown in the air is my favorite. We had practice last night, like we do every Monday and Wednesday, but last night we did my favorite stunt for the first time this year and it was a success. The stunt is called Nip Tuck. In Nip Tuck I am holding on to two girls, one girl holds one arm, while they are in a normal one level stunt on the side. Then my stunt group throws me in the air, I do a back flip, then they catch me standing in the stunt. The picture shows the ending product after the stunt. One of my favorite things to do as a flyer is flip in...

The last chapter we had to read was Chapter 5. This chapter talks about the research and information needed for successful social media. You want to research what to post so you can get the best reaction. If you post information that isn't true, then you run into your followers finding you untrustworthy and you will start to lose them. It is important to be informed and honest because social media changes so fast you don't want to lose your credibility. This chapter also talks about all of the metrics included in social media; basic, advanced, channel and behavioral. Then it goes into the two different rates; conversation and amplification. You can read about these in this book "Social Media for Strategic Communication." The book goes into detail on each one and how it applies to social media. I never realized how much actually goes into the research side of social media, but it makes complete sense after reading this chapter. If you are working for a business, ...

This past weekend was homecoming for Ohio Northern University (ONU). Homecoming is my favorite weekend because a lot of the alumni come back and I get to see friends that don't go to school here anymore. The whole weekend is filled with activities for alumni and it spans from Friday through Sunday. As an assignment in my Principles of Social Media class, I had to live tweet an event that took place during homecoming weekend. I chose to live tweet the football game against Marietta College. A lot happened before and during the game. A few individuals were inducted into the hall of fame and the band put on a good show for pregame, then the game started. At halftime they announced homecoming queen and king and the band played again, then the game finished. As you may know, I cheer for ONU, so it was kind of difficult to tweet and cheer at the same time, but the polar bears scored a lot, so I had great content to tweet about. ONU ended up winning 31-23. This was a huge win for the...

So, guess what? I GOT A LITTLE! I couldn't be more excited and I'm so thankful for getting the little I wanted. Last week I talked about the stress big/little brought, but I'm here to tell you it was all worth it in the end for me. I got the call two Tuesday's ago that I received Kimmy Gregory as my little and I was ecstatic! Her and I have so much in common and I couldn't imagine not being her big. From Tuesday to Sunday I had to keep it a secret and I gave her three clues to who I was, but what she didn't know was I was giving her fake clues, so she didn't know it was me. She told me so was so confused because she didn't know if I was messing with her or if she really didn't get the person she wanted. I was so happy she was still surprised because I was worried she already knew who I was. On Sunday we did the reveal. Her reaction was PRICELESS. She thought it was someone else so when we revealed me as her big, she screamed and hugged me. Her fi...

In Chapter 3 we learned about personal and professional branding. Branding is important because you want your voice to be heard and you want it to be heard in your specific way. Two examples we learned about were The Rock and Rosanna Pansino. The Rock has a very personal and family filled brand. He cares for his family a lot and that shows through all of his posts. He likes to update people on his everyday life so they can feel like they are a part of his life. Rosanna Pansino is a big vlogger and has created her brand through videos.  There are many things to think about when creating your personal or professional brand. You really need to make sure it is true to you so your followers can know they are following an honest person. It is really hard to keep track of someone's social media when you know they aren't the same in person. We even learned about the components of personal brand.  Personal brand is something that we all subconsciously think about when using socia...

Happy October! Today is October 1st and Twitter is going crazy. The trending hashtag right now is #October1st and posts everywhere are talking about "Spooky Szn." One of my favorite things about social media is how fast trends like this happen. People were raving towards the end of September about the fun October brings. So now that it is the first, everyone is super excited. People my age love October because the fall weather, football, Halloween movies and, of course, Halloween. There is nothing worse than hot weather when walking to class because you are drenched in sweat before you get to your class, so cool weather is so much nicer. College football is always a good time. It's almost like there is a college game on every day of the week. Disney channel is the move this time of year because it has all the classic Halloween movies playing all of the time. Halloween is such a fun time on college campuses because it is an excuse to dress up and party with friends or...

This week was crazy for me. In one of my previous blogs, I talked about recruitment and after recruitment comes big/little. This is very different from the potential big standpoint. 16 new members accepted their bid for Zeta Tau Alpha two weeks ago, and now it's time for them to get bigs. Each girl gets one big and it's based off of how close you are to a girl that doesn't already have a little. Well unfortunately this year there were 16 new members and 22 potential bigs. This means six girls weren't getting littles. Big/little pairs are really important in a sorority, so it is very disheartening to not get a little. I really thought I wasn't going to get a little and would have to wait until next year, until I met someone that I connected with on a deep level. This new member has been through similar life experiences and I have never met someone that I relate to so much.  I decided this is the girl I want as my little. Because decisions are made basically on th...

This week we started a new book and this book is more of a textbook. I'm not going to lie, it is harder to read because it is a textbook and not a regular book but oh well. Today I read Chapter 2 and it is all about ethics. I actually did find this chapter interesting because I have taken two different ethics classes and it's nice to see it put into the perspective of social media. A lot of times you don't really think a whole lot about ethics when just posting your next picture on Instagram because it's just an everyday thing, but it can affect you more than you think. If you are running social media for a business, you have to be extra careful. This chapter tells us about the importance of waiting for permission, following laws very carefully and educating yourself. If you make one wrong post it could completely destroy the business. This could be difficult in today's society. One post can be taken the complete wrong way and it could turn into a bad ethical si...

Let me tell you about the best application invention yet; Venmo. Venmo is an app you connect your bank account or your credit/debit card to and you can transfer money to and from your account by sending people money or receiving money from people. This app has been the biggest life saver in college. My first week of college I was buying a textbook from an upperclassman and the first thing she asked me was, "do you have Venmo?" I was so confused and just said no. The next day it felt like, I was getting food with a friend and she said, "you can just Venmo me." This is when I decided it was basically a necessity on a college campus. Now i don't go at least a week without using this app. I've noticed it not only reaching younger crowds, but older too. A lot of parents use Venmo to send their kids money while they're here at school. My mom actually Venmoed me one dollar the only day to tell me she has it now. (I wish it was a larger amount but hey, I...

This past weekend was recruitment weekend here at ONU. For those of you that aren't familiar with recruitment, this is a weekend full of rounds of girls and sororities where new members meet all the sororities and try to get a bid from their favorite to find their "home" in Greek life. Last year I went through recruitment to find my home as a new member, but this year I got to be on the other side of it. Going into the weekend all I could think about was how overwhelmed I was going to be and all the time recruitment was going to take up. And although it was overwhelming and time consuming, I had one of the best weekends with my sisters. Spending five or six hours with my sisters three nights in a row really gave me the chance to get to know some of my sisters on a more personal level and I am so grateful for it. I felt so connected to my sisters the whole weekend and it really made me remember why I joined Zeta Tau Alpha (ZTA). I got to spend so much time with my best f...

Chapter 10 of "The Art of Social Media" talks about a lot of "don'ts" when using social media. Some are obvious, some aren't, but they are all helpful either way. I have heard of a lot of people doing some of the things to make their social media better, but clearly, it's not making it better; only worse. A few of my favorite points Guy makes in Chapter 10 are don't buy followers or likes, don't ask people to follow you, and don't swear. He tells us that buying followers or likes makes you look worse because when you buy these you don't get the response you need to actually help your business succeed. Not to mention, being a young female on social media, I can easily point out the people that buy their followers because they always have a lot of followers, but very little likes. It honestly makes you look worse. He also tells us to not ask people to follow you. He basically says if your social media is good enough you shouldn't n...

This past week I was assigned to make a podcast interviewing a social media expert in my Principles of Social Media class. I decided to do my interview with my mom, Cyndi Newman. She is the owner of a small business dress boutique called She Said Yes! She purchased the business in August 2008 and has had social media ever since. She realizes the importance of social media and has a lot of experience using it, so I figured she was the perfect person to interview. The five questions I asked her were: 1. What is your target audience? 2. What types of posts have you found work best for all social media? 3. Do you use different social media platforms for different reasons? Ex. Does Facebook reach a  different audience than Instagram? Or do they all reach the same audience? 4. How has social media changed the dynamic of your business? 5. What are some positive and negative effects of social media in your industry? My podcast gives you all the answers so feel free to take...

So, let me tell you about one of the best and most exciting weekends I've ever had. It was this past May when my cousin, Blake, and I formed a duo singing group and decided to start booking shows and we also decided to think even bigger. June 22, 2019 Blake and I traveled to Chicago to audition for The Voice . Both of us have auditioned for The Voice and American Idol before but we decided this time to audition together instead of separately, and needless to say, it was a pretty successful trip. What a lot of people don't know is there are three or four rounds with one producer before you can audition for the celebrity judges. These pre rounds are really hard to get through because they see so many people, you really have to do something extravagant to strike the producer's interest. Lucky for us, our duo did what it was supposed to and we were asked to sing again then we were put through to the next round. Blake's sister auditioned for The Voice a while back an...

Planning events can be tough but getting the word out can be easier than ever with social media. I would say most popular events are annual and the best way to get people to come to the next event is market your current event hard. "The Art of Social Media" does a good job of describing how to socialize events. A couple points that stand out to me is creating a short hashtag that never gets old. For example, you could use a shortened version of your event name and the year. This was people can always remember what the hashtag is, and it keeps circulating. It wouldn't be hard to keep up with posts that are all using the same hashtag. You also want to stress the use of the hashtag. You want to use it for every post you post and have the people attending use it as well. You can also provide a live stream of the event. This could be in form of a live video like on Facebook or even just a live stream of posts like tweets on twitter. This would help keep your audience outsi...

Social media is so big for my generation, but I still hear about some parents not knowing how to use it. I'm jealous of those people. My mom started using social media when she let me have it so she has had the most popular forms of social media for a long time. I still have to teach her some things, but every once-in-a-while I catch her teaching me new things and that freaks me out. How can my mom be so tech savvy? The answer is her bridal and formal store called She Said Yes . My mom bought She Said Yes 11 years ago. A store of this nature means you have to keep up with social media because that is the best advertising for the teenage audience. She has had Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter from the very beginning of her business and has learned clever ways to market her store using these platforms. Although it's annoying having her constantly monitoring my posts at age 21, it's still nice to know she is keeping up to help build her business. She has found that social ...

When you hear someone is a model what do you picture? A beautiful girl with flawless hair, skin, makeup? Maybe someone that's really tall and slender.  Yeah, I did too, well until I had the chance to model myself. I never in a million years would have imagined that I could have the opportunity to model for anyone at all. I am 5 feet, 5 inches tall, I weigh way more than a typical model and I have more visible muscle than most girls do, but this didn't prevent me from booking my first modeling job in 2016. I was so excited because I had traveled to shows with my mom to buy dresses for her bridal and formal store for a few years already and every time I wanted to model so bad but never thought I would get the chance. Like I said before, I did my first show in March 2016 and I have continued modeling since. I have modeled for two dress designers; Rachel Allan and House of Wu . With a job this like comes traveling, but I can't complain. I have traveled to cities like Chica...

The next two chapters we read this week were Chapter 3 and Chapter 4. In Chapter 3 there were two points that I really agree with; be brief and be organized. The book touches on the "sweet spots" for the different social media pages and ways to organize your posts so they are easier to read, but it's also not too hard to figure out after using social media for almost nine years now. I have found that the shorter the caption on my Instagram post or the shorter my tweet is on Twitter, the more reaction I get because it's easier to just quickly react to while people are scrolling through social media. However, I could see how a business would be able to use longer post because they do have more information to relay to their audience. The book states the sweet spot for tweets is 100 words, blogs is 500 to 1000 words and Facebook is two or three sentences. I have also found when I post more organized and visually appealing posts, people will take more time to read it. ...

Keeping up with personal social media accounts is easy right? So how much harder can running a group or organization's social media be? This is exactly what I thought before taking over the role of social media manager for my signing duo that I have formed with my cousin. We decided to start singing together at the beginning of summer this past year for a singing competition in my hometown. We ended up winning the competition so we decided to not stop at this competition and began booking shows. One of our first steps in creating the duo was creating social media. My cousin isn't big into social media, so I decided to take it over. I created a little bit of a following on my own personal social media accounts so I figured it would be easy; plus, I'm working on my Bachelor's in Marketing and a minor in Social Media. This was right up my alley and it made me kind of excited to take on this role. But let me tell you, running a business type Instagram and/or Facebook is...

"You two should break up, you're too young to be in a long term relationship." "Why are you wasting your young teenage years being in a relationship." "You two won't last when college hits." These statements and questions are something I hear almost EVERYDAY. But let me give you a background as to why I hear them and why I couldn't disagree more. It was basketball season my freshman year of high school. My brother played and we traveled to watch him play at a school in our conference called Paint Valley. While he was playing, I noticed this super cute guy on Paint Valley's team wearing number three. So naturally I tell my mom and of course she knows his aunt. My mom messages his aunt and his aunt told him. A week later I received a direct message from Anthony, cutie number three, on instagram and the rest is history. February 22, 2014 Anthony asked me to be his girlfriend and of course I said yes. Five and a half years later we ar...

I have always loved keeping up with my social media accounts and I would have considered myself pretty knowledgable in social media; well I did until I start reading The Art of Social Media. I have only read through two chapters of this book so far and Guy Kawasaki has already listed many topics that have surprised me. One point that made me laugh was point one in chapter one, "Pick a Neutral Screen Name." I laugh because when I first created my Instagram (in sixth grade) I created the username @futureamericanidol' 12 year old McKenna didn't see a problem in it because it was cute for my age and I love to sing so it was a good username for me. Well then eight years later, I find myself not able to change my instagram name because people began to know me by @futureamericanidol and I felt connected to it. Guy explains in this point that you have to think years in advance when creating a username so when you, for example, are applying for a job, its easier to search an...

Do you remember the emotions you experienced when you were first moving into college? SO many emotions. Excitement because you get to live on your own but yet anxious because you won't have your parents right there. Learning how to live in a new area is scary, but unlike Ismail B. Ajjawi, I was just moving to a different city in my home state, not a whole country. While freshman began settling in at Harvard University on Tuesday afternoon, Ajjawi was dealing with many different emotions than any other freshman that day. Shortly after Ajjawi makes his way into Boston, he has to try and negotiate his way into staying in the U.S. After hours of questioning and extensive searching, they find Ajjawi's friends had made posts about politics that oppose the U.S. and because of the posts his friend's made, he now has his VISA revoked and was deported. The school states in this Crimson article  that they are trying to get this taken care of before classes start on September third...