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First Fridays Campaign Auburn University PRCM 4090 Allison Mynard, Halle Haynes, Leah Seay, Elaina Turley, Leah Beard
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Table of Contents Title Page
p.1
Table of Contents
p.2
Executive Summary
p.3
Introduction
p.3
Research
p.6
Client Analysis
p.6
Situation Analysis
p.11
Publics Analysis
p.16
Planning (Goals)
p.20
Implementation (Tactics)
p.23
Evaluation
p.24
Appendix
p.27
3 Executive Summary Since its inception in 1987, Opelika Main Street, a nonprofit organization in downtown Opelika, Alabama, has been dedicated to the economic and social growth of its area, by uniting business owners and community members through events and networking opportunities. First Fridays, an Opelika Main Street event, encourages community members to shop late and eat local by providing extended retail hours and unique dining opportunities. After conducting research of the event and previous public relations efforts, this campaign has been created to redefine First Fridays brand, raise awareness of the event, and create tactics to reach new audience members. If implemented successfully, this campaign will improve the overall quality of First Fridays and provide Opelika Main Street with a fresh perspective of strategic public relations tactics for its events.
4 Introduction First Fridays, an Opelika Main Street event, currently lacks strong branding and public relations efforts, which has resulted in a negative impact on the number of individuals who attend the event. The purpose of this campaign is designed to address this public relations problem by analyzing all past public relations efforts and creating new ways to implement strategic public relations tactics. The key elements of this campaign are research, planning, implementation, and evaluation. When doing research of Opelika Main Street and First Fridays, we found that First Fridays has previously utilized e-mail blasts, radio announcements, and posts on Opelika Main Street’s media outlets to inform the public about upcoming events. However, a lack of clear branding and continuous and effective communication have hindered First Fridays from being a purposeful and effective Opelika Main Street event. The planning of this campaign includes addressing the goals and objectives of First Fridays, and impending strategies and tactics to enhance the event. Some of the strategies and tactics provided by this campaign include addressing the strength and opportunities of First Fridays, re-branding techniques, and material to utilize when publicizing the event. The implementation of these tactics includes the creation of a First Fridays logo, a press release, two infographics addressing different audiences of First Fridays, the creation of a First Fridays page on Opelika Main Street’s website, ways to better advertise the event through social media and Opelika Main Street interns. The evaluation of this campaign provides Opelika Main Street with techniques to evaluate the campaign and determine its success according to the objectives, strategies, and tactics that the campaign has created. Some of the evaluation tactics that Opelika Main Street
5 can utilize to evaluate the success of this campaign include surveying First Fridays attendees, calculating the reach of all organic and paid advertising, and surveying Opelika Main Street merchants to gauge an overall increase or decrease of sales on the first Friday of every month. If implemented successfully, this campaign will provide both Opelika Main Street merchants and Auburn/ Opelika community members with a better First Fridays experience.
6 Client Analysis Client’s problem Opelika Main Street’s weaknesses lie within its inability to raise awareness, reach new audiences, and clearly define its brand to the public. First Fridays encourages community members of Auburn and Opelika to shop late and eat local. On the first Friday of every month at 6 p.m., stores and restaurants in downtown Opelika offer extended hours and specials to attendees. First Fridays has seen minimal growth due to its audiences’ lack of knowledge about the event and its purpose. Opelika Main Street desires to reach a larger number of community members, as well as college students, since its location is not far from Auburn University. Without a strategic public relations plan, Opelika Main Street has been unable to publicize First Fridays to the extent in which it would like to. In order to increase the number of individuals who are aware of and attend First Fridays, a public relations campaign is necessary. An awareness campaign will include research of the client’s target audience, an examination of previous public relations efforts utilized for First Fridays, and a strategic public relations plan for Opelika Main Street to implement. These combined efforts will increase the success of the organization. Organizational history Opelika Main Street is a subdivision of a major nonprofit organization, National Main Street, Inc. For the past 34 years, the National Main Street Center has equipped more than 2,000 communities with an organizing framework to preserve and revitalize each downtown community. The affiliated Main Street organizations that comprise the National Main Street Network have rehabilitated more than 246,000 buildings, produced $59.6 billion in investment, and created 502,728 jobs.
7 In order to revitalize downtown areas, this nationally recognized program uses a fourpoint approach, which works to improve the organization, economic restructuring, design, and promotion of each area. National Main Street’s guiding principles are different from other redevelopment strategies as it involves a comprehensive approach, incremental projects, community involvement, and a strong public/private partnership. Since its inception in 1987, downtown Opelika has experienced growth and beautification. Opelika Main Street is dedicated to continuing this trend by providing visitors with information about the area. Opelika Main Street’s successful events include, but are not limited to, the Opelika Farmer’s Market, On the Tracks: A Food and Wine Event, Christmas in a Railroad Town, Opelika is Film: Summer Movie Series, Holiday Open House, and more. According to Opelika Main Street’s website, notable accomplishments include: •
Investing over $18 million in building improvements during the first 10 years
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Partnering with the city on the planning and implementation of the Streetscape project
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Contributing to the process of saving The Railroad Depot and its restoration
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Receiving the “Keep Opelika Beautiful Beautification Award” in 1998
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Creating a low-interest loan program with area banks for building rehabilitation
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Developing additional special events, such as First Fridays
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Coordinating annual informational workshops and seminars
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Organizing an auction as a fundraiser to enable expansion of Opelika Main Street's programs
Organizational goals/ Client’s PR needs Opelika Main Street’s goals stem from its issues involving awareness, reaching new audiences, and clearly defining its brand. In regards to awareness, Opelika Main Street has made
8 it a priority to inform its audiences about what it is, what it offers, and its purpose. Additionally, Opelika Main Street works to reach a larger audience, specifically consumers outside the Auburn-Opelika area and freshman at Auburn University. Opelika Main Street’s audience lacks a clear understanding of what the event is, as well as its purpose, thus rebranding First Fridays is also a goal. Client’s definition of the issues Opelika Main Street hosts a multitude of successful events annually to drive traffic to the stores and restaurants of downtown Opelika. First Fridays shows the most room for improvement. First Fridays is an event, which occurs on the first Friday of every month. Since its inception two years ago, public relations efforts have been made. Pam Powers-Smith, director of Opelika Main Street, believes these efforts, including branding, have not been clearly defined. Others issues involve raising overall awareness of the organization and the events it hosts. Also, Powers-Smith discussed that Opelika Main Street struggles to reach new audiences outside of regular attendees. Thus, Opelika Main Street has continuously struggled to draw individuals to the event. Previous PR efforts/ Current PR efforts/ Role of PR To create overall awareness about First Fridays, Powers-Smith has made public relations efforts such as e-mail blasts, radio announcements, and posts on Opelika Main Street’s website, Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. All efforts have been used to inform the public about upcoming events. On Opelika Main Street’s website, a short description can be found in the calendar, but detailed information about the event is absent. Opelika Main Street’s Facebook page can be accessed to find announcements about the upcoming month’s First Fridays’ theme and
9 performances taking place during the event. For additional information, the public can access a separate Facebook page for the event. Instagram is an additional social media outlet that is utilized to actively reach and inform the public about events. Three pictures mentioning specials for the event can be found during the month of February 2015, which helped promote the event to the account’s 491 followers. Twitter is also a popular outlet that Opelika Main Street utilizes weekly to promote businesses. Social media efforts such as these have been and are currently being utilized to promote the organization and its events. Recently, Opelika Main Street has implemented themes for each First Friday event. For example, Powers-Smith decided to label the first Friday in January as “College Night” in order to attract Auburn and Auburn University Montgomery students to downtown Opelika. The implementation of themes for the events correlates with Opelika Main Street’s goal of increasing awareness. Effectiveness of PR efforts Even though Opelika Main Street has made use of social media, web, and radio outlets, a weakness has developed due to the lack of overall public knowledge of Opelika Main Street. Furthermore, First Fridays specifically fails to be supported by every business in the downtown Opelika district. Most businesses do not stay open for the event or offer specials, leading to one of the event’s major downfalls. Thus, an ever-present opportunity exists to further develop and improve the weaknesses associated with the event. Group assessment of PR needs Improvements can be made to social and traditional media outlets in order to clearly define First Fridays to the masses and gain a larger following. For example, event information
10 can be transmitted to target audiences via newspaper outlets, including sending information about First Fridays “Scale Back Alabama” to the Auburn University Plainsman and The Corner News to inform college students. This idea can be applied to radio stations throughout Auburn so each station is reaching different audiences about First Friday events. Research can be conducted to find how community members learn about each First Friday event and gather their overall perception of each event. Opelika Main Street can accomplish this by interviewing attendees and conducting surveys. Organizational culture Powers-Smith, co-owner of Flip Flop Foto, was selected from numerous candidates for the position of director. Powers-Smith served as secretary from 2001 until 2003 and president from 2004 until 2007. Powers-Smith worked with the Auburn-Opelika Tourism Bureau as Communications Coordinator from 1998 to 2002 and served as president of the Public Relations Council of Alabama from 2014 to 2015. Powers-Smith handles day-to-day operations for the organization. With the help of interns, Powers-Smith orchestrates numerous events, while facilitating a structured work environment that encourages open communication and idea sharing. Culture’s impact on campaign Opelika Main Street’s open culture has led to an inclusive public relations environment where ideas are shared among interns and Powers-Smith. Due to the organization’s acceptance of public relations efforts, Opelika Main Street is enthusiastic and prepared to assist with all campaign needs.
11 Budget As a nonprofit organization, Opelika Main Street’s public relations budget is minimal, and the organization utilizes social media and its website to promote events. Overall, PowerSmith uses a small percentage of the money from her budget to promote First Fridays in comparison to other Opelika Main Street events such as, On The Tracks: A Food and Wine event, which draws hundreds of individuals to downtown Opelika. Situation Analysis Problem, In Depth First Fridays currently lacks strong branding and public relations efforts, which has resulted in a negative impact on the number of individuals who attend the event. Since its inception in 1987, Opelika Main Street has seen a strong following from loyal target audience members at its annual events. However, First Fridays has not seen as much success as it would like, since the event is not clearly defined and marketed as other events. Therefore, this is the first time the organization has dealt with a situation like this. With the support of the community and excellent PR, most events hosted by Opelika Main Street are successful and result in attendance by a large number of individuals. The situation lies within the matter of publicity and appeal to the audience member’s needs. If more community members and surrounding publics were aware of what First Fridays offer, target audience members would be more inclined to attend the event. A lack of participation and knowledge of First Fridays has been caused by minimal social media use and other resources, which could be utilized to spread awareness about the event. While E-Newsletters, Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook outlets have been utilized in the past, due to lack of consistent posting and minimal engagement of target audience members, these
12 outlets could be better utilized to enhance event awareness. The situation does not involve relationships with other organizations that might be similar to Opelika Main Street. Problems often result from lack of all Opelika Main Street merchants and audience members participating in First Fridays. Rather, merchants pick and choose how involved they will be for certain months, instead of following a consistent attendance pattern. First Fridays’ mission is to draw customers to downtown shops and restaurants. However, the lack of attendance at First Fridays does not successfully market Opelika Main Street and the benefits it provides target audience members. A lack of attendance negatively impacts retailers in downtown Opelika who extend store hours to reach a larger number of customers. If Opelika Main Street cannot raise the average number of attendees at its First Fridays events, individuals who are unable to shop during normal store hours will not be able to visit stores and receive deals, resulting in a loss of visitors to the historic district. Thankfully, PowersSmith has identified this problem as an opportunity to expand First Fridays’ horizons and is positive about the event’s potential. Opelika Main Street’s research of feedback and audience demographics has been obtained by SurveyMonkey polls that have gathered visitor feedback on a variety of different events that inquire what attendees’ preferences about the events. Opelika Main Street also has the ability to keep track of the First Fridays’ Facebook page to see how many people are visiting the page each day. Information about its audience's preferences however, has yet to be researched. Questions from future research should include what visitors would like to see brought downtown, as well as what could be improved upon to attract new customers and visitors.
13 Internal Environment First Fridays is unique because it provides customers with extended hours to shop at businesses they may not have visited otherwise. This event also fosters positive relationships among retailers and restaurants in downtown Opelika by collaborating with the common goal of enhancing economic revenue in the area. Community members who participate in First Friday events receive the benefits of extended retail hours, discounts on regular priced meals, and free performances by local musicians. Opelika Main Street is limited in its communication resources because it is smaller in size compared to other Main Street organizations. In order to communicate upcoming events or update the public on news about downtown Opelika, Opelika Main Street utilizes Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Opelika Main Street also has a newsletter that goes out once a month to keep the public up to date on what’s happening downtown and in the organization. Opelika Main Street does not engage in extensive PR, especially because it does not have the budget for a PR department. First Fridays does not perform as well as other events Opelika Main Street offers to its publics. Event issues relate to the fact that the organization is a nonprofit and receives minimal funding. Therefore, there are not enough funds for it to house a PR department, which would help with raising awareness, branding, and overall performance. Currently, the number of participants determines the outcome of First Fridays in the event. It is hard to judge the overall outcome of each event because awareness is lacking. Conducting a survey could assist in determining the current quality of First Fridays. A survey would allow us to see how the public has perceived First Fridays, and allow us to get feedback on the pros and cons of the event. Conducting a survey would also help Opelika Main Street see
14 on how First Fridays could be improved and build an appropriate awareness campaign for the event. Over the next few years, it is hoped that First Fridays will gain more recognition. By enhancing social and traditional media outlets, our group could define First Fridays to the masses and gain a larger following. Making these improvements would not only be beneficial for Opelika Main Street, but also encourage a larger public to attend the events, which will help downtown Opelika continue to grow. External Environment Competition exists and fluctuates between Opelika Main Street and downtown Auburn. Auburn’s success is linked to Auburn University and its football program. When the school’s football program is thriving, game attendance increases, causing more individuals to be in town. In addition, people are more likely to buy merchandise and spend time in downtown Auburn. However, when the football program does not do as well, revenue, shopping, and activity in the area decreases. In comparison, because it is not as closely located to the university, downtown Opelika’s flow of customers is more constant, and often consists of community members and college students. Opelika Main Street’s growth over the past few years has helped Opelika become a more prominent area. Whether it was due to renovations in the area, new businesses, or unique events, Opelika Main Street has put itself in position to be a competitor with Auburn’s downtown area. Downtown Auburn’s prime location and association with Auburn University make it a popular spot for both visitors and locals; its reputation transcends time. The history of Auburn University lives on through iconic landmarks like Samford Hall, Toomer’s Corner, and Toomer’s Oaks, all of which are located in downtown Auburn. Landmarks, such as these, help generate
15 revenue and stimulate activity in the area. On the other hand, downtown Opelika is a growing community. Local community members and students find downtown Opelika to be a refreshing change of scenery. Thus, more than ever, people are making the drive to downtown Opelika to check out the shops and cuisine, and to experience the area’s unique events. Although the downtown areas are different, both promote family and student-friendly activities. However, downtown Opelika is becoming a popular place for college students to go for a nice, relaxing night out. Downtown Auburn gains resources from downtown businesses, property owners, residents, the City of Auburn, the Auburn Area Chamber of Commerce, and the Auburn-Opelika Tourism Bureau. Auburn also utilizes outlets such as The Plainsman, The Corner News, and other local news stations to increase awareness about its news and upcoming events. Auburn University’s Student Alumni Association also plays a role in its success as well. Downtown Auburn’s close connection to Auburn University provides advantages that downtown Opelika does not have the luxury of offering. Downtown Opelika could have university-sponsored events, but people might not come because of the distance. Thus, downtown Auburn will continue to associate itself with the university. Downtown Opelika creates unique opportunities and experiences to share with not only the community and college students, but also people outside the immediate area. Being unique and refreshing is what Opelika Main Street needs to embrace and use to its advantage. As mentioned, competition between the two entities does fluctuate, but is growing. Over the next three years, downtown Auburn will continue to be successful in drawing in crowds. Downtown Opelika has the opportunity to do the same if it focuses its attention on promoting events to new audiences.
16 Opelika Main Street’s goal is to preserve and restore downtown Opelika’s history. In addition, it also works to bring economic stability to the area. Auburn and Opelika community members support its work, thus there have not been any groups to oppose, hinder, or resist what Opelika Main Street is doing. Tactics utilized by downtown Auburn include anything associated with the city’s history or Auburn University. Because of its proximity to the university, it is easy for downtown Auburn to utilize strategies and tactics that link the two together. Recent tactics include the planting of new oak trees at Toomer’s Corner and working with the university to sponsor concerts downtown. Tactics, such as these, are not available to Opelika Main Street, which means it has to find unique ways to attract individuals. Revamping Opelika Main Street’s branding will help people understand more about the organization and give them a reason to visit the area. Redeveloping Opelika Main Street’s tactics and branding will result in an increase to its overall interest and appeal. Publics Analysis Despite being created solely to attract customers between the ages of 18 and 50 who are unable to shop during normal business hours, First Fridays now additionally draws in young children who may accompany adults to the event. Although event attendance is usually maintained from individuals ages 30 and above, First Fridays seeks to attract individuals between the ages of 18 and 25, due to its proximity to Auburn University. This public, individuals ages 18 to 50, has knowledge of Opelika Main Street as an organization, but limited knowledge of the First Fridays event. This lack of knowledge stems from minimal publicity and lack of consistent branding and marketing of the event. Attitudes about Opelika Main Street are positive, as residents in the Auburn/Opelika area are familiar with
17 the organization and events it promotes. These individuals, however, lack both positive and negative feelings about First Fridays, as a majority of audience members are unaware of what the event is and the benefits they could gain from attending. Information about both Opelika Main Street and First Fridays has been communicated to target audience members by the organization’s website, social media outlets, print advertisements, and radio broadcasts. Previous communication efforts about the organization have been successful in making its audience aware of its existence, but unsuccessful in branding and presenting a clear message regarding events like First Fridays. Opelika Main Street provides most of its information to its target audience through social media outlets like Facebook and Instagram, and through its website. Because of public relations interns who update sites, information about Opelika Main Street is promoted through media, but lacks consistent awareness of the events the organization offers. Once learning about events hosted by the organization, the target audience tends to show up and have high levels of participation. While public relations efforts have been made, the efforts have not been as effective as possible. Due to lack of knowledge about the event and its purpose, there are a limited number of regular attendees, and the event has seen minimal growth. The public lacks a clear understanding of Opelika Main Street and First Fridays. The issue arises in failing to clearly define its brand to the public. Many members of the public remain unaware of the themes each month and purpose of bringing business and recognition to the local shops and restaurants of downtown Opelika. Many are also unaware of the benefits the organization provides to them, such as discounts on food and shopping, as well as various prizes. There is a lack of acknowledgement and support from Opelika Main Street’s Facebook
18 and Instagram followers when the organization posts about First Fridays. Opelika Main Street relies heavily on social media to inform the public about events, however receives little feedback. On Opelika Main Street’s First Fridays Facebook page, an article from The Corner News was shared describing the event. Twenty-four people liked the post, while nine commented. In summary, the comments included praise for the event, but mostly from individuals who reside in Alexander City, Alabama, and Gadsden, Alabama. When it pertains to content on social media, the public seems to prefer pictures based on emotion rather than pure logic and fact. Mostly, all of the posts relating to First Fridays are fact-based. While it is uncertain of the reach pertaining to the radio and email announcements, we believe a survey should be distributed at the event and also to residents of Auburn and Opelika who do not know about First Fridays.
19 SWOT Matrix Strengths • Positive image because of its nonprofit status • Offers discounts and promotion • Mutually beneficial relationship with downtown businesses • Provides entertainment for families, community members, and students • Director’s connections help with various operations within the organization
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Opportunities Potential to partner with new merchants Better address the needs of the public Have more social media presence and reach
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Weaknesses Lack of funding Spreading awareness about events Branding issues Lacking social media engagement from its audience Gaining support from existing and potential merchants
Threats Similar events in downtown Auburn
20 Planning I.
Strategy Based on the results of our situation analysis and SWOT matrix, we have decided to use a S-O strategy for this campaign. This strategy will capitalize on the strengths and opportunities of Opelika Main Street to improve the organization, as the strengths and opportunities are most abundant in the organization. We chose this strategy from the matrix because we found the strengths and opportunities of Opelika Main Street’s First Friday events outweigh the weaknesses and threats of the organization. Strengths of Opelika Main Street include the following: •
Positive image because of its nonprofit status
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Offers discounts and promotion
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Mutually beneficial relationship with downtown businesses
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Provides entertainment for families, community members, and students
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Director’s connections help with various aspects of the organization
Opportunities of Opelika Main Street include the following: •
Potential to partner with new merchants
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Better address the needs of the public
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Have more social media presence and reach By utilizing these organizational characteristics for our campaign, we believe that the S-
O strategy will be the best option for allowing Opelika Main Street to utilize its best assets to enhance the company. II.
Goals Opelika Main Street’s goal is to preserve and restore downtown Opelika’s history. In
addition, it also works to provide economic stability to the area. First Fridays’ goal is to attract
21 customers, between the ages of 18 and 50, and to have them shop and dine in downtown Opelika after regular retail hours. This provides attendees and merchants alike with the unique opportunity to showcase and explore all that downtown Opelika has to offer. Our campaign has two goals that we would like to address. First, we would like to clearly define First Friday events through unique branding strategies. Second, we would like to increase awareness of the events through publicity and social media tactics. Our goals can best be defined as a reputation management goal because the problems lie within identity and perception of the organization. During the campaign, our tactics will focus on all publics, specifically individuals between the ages 18 and 50. We chose to do this because we desire to promote First Fridays as a family-oriented, all age group inclusive event to all publics. Doing this will increase event attendance, and make a larger number of individuals aware of the events, as opposed to only marketing it to a small portion of the public. Opelika Main Street desires to establish itself as an organization that promotes the growth of local businesses by engaging local consumers. Opelika Main Street also desires to promote First Fridays as an event that provides entertainment and opportunities for publics to shop late and local. This event is different from its competitors because it provides customers with the opportunity to shop late while supporting their local economy, as opposed to chain restaurants and stores in neighboring areas. III.
Objectives Our campaign will utilize informational and behavioral objectives:
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Objective 1, Goal 1: Goal one is to clearly define First Friday events. The attitudinal objective is to change, shape, or create positive attitudes among target audience members about First Fridays. We hope to increase First Fridays’ attendance by 40 percent by the
22 end of 2015. Once clearly defining and branding First Fridays through the various tactics listed below, this goal will be measured by a semi-annual poll sent to all individuals on the Opelika Main Street listserv and placed on the Opelika Main Street website. This poll will ask respondents if they know what First Fridays is. Below the poll, respondents will have the opportunity to state what they believe First Fridays is, give feedback about the event, or state why they have never heard about the event. Once this data has been collected, Opelika Main Street interns will be able to analyze if target audience members are aware of what the event actually is, and if not, determine better ways to promote what the event is and its purpose. •
Objective 2, Goal 2: Goal two is to increase awareness of First Friday events. The informational objective is to inform publics of what First Fridays is and to provide details of upcoming First Friday events. We hope to increase our reach by 50 percent by the end of 2015. This goal will be measured using monthly surveys distributed by business owners and Opelika Main Street PR interns at events. These surveys will ask attendees questions like “Where did you hear about First Fridays?” “What social media outlet do you use most frequently?” and “When there are new specials, how would you like to find out about them?” These surveys will be collected by Opelika Main Street interns at the end of each First Friday event and used to determine if awareness has increased, and if so what has been the cause of that increase.
23 IV.
Tactics
Goal 1 tactics: •
Create monthly press releases to send to local newspapers to promote First Friday events. These press releases will explain what First Fridays is, what it has to offer attendees, and additional event details.
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Design a First Fridays logo that will be universally recognized by event attendees and the public.
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Create a new infographic addressing the who, what, where, when, and why about First Fridays in a visually appealing way. This infographic will also feature First Fridays’ new logo design.
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Create a First Fridays page on Opelika Main Street’s website, that clearly defines the event and provides information for potential attendees.
Goal 2 tactics: •
Boost First Fridays event posts on Facebook because paying for additional ad space is costly, but boosting posts are more cost-efficient and will allow Opelika Main Street to reach hundreds of more audience members. This outlet is also where audience members are most active.
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Encourage local business owners to promote the event to their customers through word of mouth and event flyers. PR interns from Opelika Main Street will create infographics about First Fridays, and the benefits that business owners receive from participation. Once business owners have received this information, they will be asked to promote the events to customers by word of mouth and by displaying First Fridays’ materials in their businesses.
24 •
Have PR interns at Opelika Main Street address Auburn University students through oncampus organization visits. These visits will inform students about First Fridays, monthly themes, and benefits to attending the events. These visits should take place at the beginning of every academic semester at Auburn University. Evaluation The success of campaign can be measured by analyzing the following objectives, tactics,
and rationale of the campaign. Success of this campaign will be defined by an overall increase in awareness of First Fridays, an increase of revenue of Opelika Main Street merchants, and providing target audience members with a better understanding of First Friday’s mission and brand. Limitations to the campaign include: Goal 1: Clearly define First Fridays event Objective 1: We hope to increase First Fridays’ attendance by 40 percent by the end of 2015. Key Publics Addressed: Individuals ages 18-50 Tactic 1: Create monthly press releases to send to local newspapers to promote First Friday events. Evaluation: To evaluate this tactic Opelika Main Street will collect attendee e-mail addresses at events and send out a bi-annual survey to find out how they learned about First Fridays, specifically which medium This data should be collected bi-annually by Opelika Main Street PR interns utilizing Microsoft Office Suite and SurveyMonkey. Tactic 2: Design a Fridays logo that will be universally recognized by event attendees an the public
25 Evaluation: To evaluate this tactic Opelika Main Street will include questions about its logo on its bi-annual survey. Questions will include “Have you seen this logo before, and if so where?” This data should be collected bi-annually by Opelika Main Street PR interns utilizing SurveyMonkey. Tactic 3: Create a new infographic addressing the who, what, where, when, why about First Fridays in a visually appealing way Evaluation: To evaluate this tactic Opelika Main Street will conduct face-to-face attendees at each event inquiring what they information they knew about the event, in hopes that the infographic was influential in attendees understanding and desire to attend the event. This data should be collected every three months at First Fridays by and Opelika Main Street PR intern. Tactic 4: Create a First Fridays Page on Opelika Main Street’s Website that clearly defines the event and provides information for potential attendees Evaluation: To evaluate this tactic Opelika Main Street will use heat-mapping software on its website to determine how many individuals have learned about First Fridays through this specific web page. Examples of services that can be used to heat map gauge hits on the new page include Inspectlet, Mouseflow, and Crazy Egg. This should be collected monthly through Opelika Main Street PR interns. Goal 1: To increase awareness of First Friday events Objective 2: We hope to increase our reach by 50 percent by the end of 2015. Key Publics Addressed: Individuals ages 18-50 and Opelika Main Street Merchants Tactic 1: Boost First Fridays event posts on Facebook
26 Evaluation: To evaluate this tactic Opelika Main Street will calculate the reach of all organic and paid advertising on Facebook. This data can be collected each time a post is boosted on Facebook by the Opelika Main Street social media manager. Tactic 2: Encourage local business owners to promote the event to their customers Evaluation: To evaluate this tactic Opelika Main Street will ask a question on its biannual survey about where attendees heard about the event. If they select that it was through a business, they will have option to write in which business it was. This data can be collected bi-annually by Opelika Main Street PR interns. Tactic 3: Have PR interns address Auburn University students through on campus organization visits Evaluation: To evaluate this tactic Opelika Main Street will ask a question on its biannual survey about where attendees heard about the event. If they select that it was through an on campus organization visit, they will have the option to write what organization it was. This data can be collected bi-annually by Opelika Main Street PR interns.
27 Appendix Supporting materials All supporting materials with specific instructions for implementation of each tactic can be found in the documents in this book: Instructions for creating a survey can be found here as well as in the back of the book. •
Survey Software Tool for Free Professional Research | SurveyMonkey. (n.d.). Retrieved April 15, 2015, from https://www.surveymonkey.com/mp/take-atour/?ut_source=header
Instructions for creating a Facebook advertisement can be found here as well as in the back of the book. •
Facebook Ads. (n.d.). Retrieved April 19, 2015, from https://www.facebook.com/business/products/ads
Instructions for heat mapping can be found here. •
Crazy Egg. (n.d.). Retrieved April 20, 2015, from http://www.crazyegg.com/
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Stop guessing what your visitors want. (n.d.). Retrieved April 21, 2015, from https://www.inspectlet.com/
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Mouseflow - Session Playback & Heatmaps. (n.d.). Retrieved April 17, 2015, from https://mouseflow.com/
References • • •
First Fridays in Downtown Opelika. (n.d.). Retrieved April 15, 2015, from https://www.facebook.com/FirstFridaysOpelika Opelika Main Street. (n.d.). Retrieved April 15, 2015, from https://www.facebook.com/OpelikaMainStreet Sign up for Opelika Main Street e-mail updates !! (n.d.). Retrieved April 15, 2015, from http://www.opelikamainstreet.org/
NEWS RELEASE April 16, 2015 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact Information: Pam Powers Smith, Opelika Main Street Director Office: (334)-745-0466 Fax: (334)-333-3333 E-mail: director@opelikamainstreet.org
COMMUNITY MEMBERS ENCOURAGED SHOP LATE, EAT LOCAL First Fridays Event Comes To Downtown Opelika AUBURN, Alabama- Wanting extended shopping hours while supporting the growth of local businesses? Join Opelika Main Street as it hosts its monthly First Fridays event in downtown Opelika. First Fridays allows consumers in the Auburn/Opelika area to shop and dine during extended store hours while enjoying performances by local musicians. Individuals who attend First Fridays also receive the additional benefits of retail discounts and food specials. Each month’s theme provides attendees the opportunity to a variety of activities while shopping and dining. Previous month’s activities have included group yoga, movies on the green, and wine tasting. Restaurants partake in First Fridays festivities by personalizing their menus to correlate with each month’s theme. Discounts at retailers often include discount cards, 20 percent off of select items, and coupons for future purchases.
-morePam Powers Smith, director of Opelika Main Street, stated that First Fridays are events where individuals and families can come and go as they please. “It’s really great for those who work until 5 p.m. to have the opportunity to shop freely and grab a bite to eat while they’re downtown,” Power-Smith said. The overall focus of the events is to “shop late and eat local.” Each event takes place the first Friday of every month in historic downtown Opelika. These events are free to the public. First Fridays begin at 6 p.m. ! Opelika Main Street is a nonprofit organization dedicated to revitalizing the historic district of downtown Opelika, Alabama. P.O. Box 2464 Opelika, Alabama, 36803 -###-
First Fridays Tab on Opelika Main Street’s Website: By creating a First Fridays tab on the Opelika Main Street website, users will have the opportunity to gain information about First Friday events, learn about the mission of Opelika Main Street, and provide feedback for upcoming events. This tab will also reach audience members who do not use social media as a regular communication tool. On this tab, Opelika Main Street will publicize discounts and sales provided by retailers and restaurants, at First Friday events. Each month’s theme will also be displayed on the website. When creating this tab, consider the following suggestions to make your tab as beneficial as possible. • • •
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Using your previous hosting service and content management system, create a tab on www.opelikamainstreet.org. Title this Tab First Fridays Content for the tab: o Description of event o Purpose of First Fridays events o Current retailers and restaurants who participate in the event o Store and restaurant hours o Monthly themes o Discounts and sales provided by retailers o A list of upcoming musicians performing at First Fridays o Photos o A video encouraging individuals to attend o Add logo to all facets Add links to First Fridays Instagram, Facebook, Twitter
• This page should be updated monthly to assure current information is provided to viewers.
How to Boost your Facebook Page and Facebook Posts Importance of Boosting Facebook Posts Facebook is becoming an increasingly effective marketing tool for local businesses. By boosting ads, businesses are able to increase the number of media users and brand awareness, while also gaining new audience members. For nonprofit organizations, online media marketing is often more cost-efficient than producing print ads, such as billboards and newspaper clippings. Additional information regarding how to boost ads on Facebook can be found below. Information on boosting posts: •
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Before creating the ads, make sure to review Facebook’s advertising policies to assure the appropriate guidelines for the site are being followed. • Facebook’s advertising policies can be found at www.facebook.com/policies/ads Have the ability to choose the audience to which you wish to boost toward by targeting ads to people who “like” your page and their friends; it also can be based on location, age, and gender. • More information about this can be found at www.facebook.com/ads/manger/creation/creation/?act=212453278&pid= p1 Select the duration (from 1-7 days) of how long the post is boosted. At the bottom of each boosted post, you will be able to see the individuals reached, including the organic reach (the number of people who have seen your post in newsfeed and Ticker, or on your page’s timeline). Paid reach is the number of people who have seen your post through an ad.
Steps to boosting a post: 1. In the bottom right hand side of the post, click the Boost Post button 2. Select the target audience (this can be edited for each posts that you boost) 3. Select your total budget in U.S. dollars. Each price will estimate the number of individuals reach through that post 4. Select duration of the boost for the post 5. Select currency 6. Call 1-800-601-0077 for additional advertising questions
FIVE REASONS TO PARTICIPATE IN FIRST FRIDAYS
1. ATTRACT NEW CUSTOMERS
WITH EXTENDED HOURS, BUSINESS OWNERS WILL HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY TO APPEAL TO A LARGER AUDIENCE.
2. PROMOTE A POSITIVE PUBLIC IMAGE YOUR PARTICIPATION IN FIRST FRIDAY EVENTS DIRECTLY IMPACTS THE GROWTH OF DOWNTOWN
OPELIKA AND CONTINUES TO ASSURE THAT IT THRIVES ECONOMICALLY.
3. DEVELOP STRONGER RELATIONS WITH OTHER MAIN STREET MEMBERS
BY PARTICIPATING IN FIRST FRIDAYS, BUSINESS OWNERS WILL HELP THE SUC- CESS OF THE EVENT BY NETWORKING WITH OTHER BUSINESS OWNERS.
4. INCREASE REVENUE
WITH EXTENDED HOURS AND DISCOUNTS, CONSUMERS ARE MORE LIKELY TO MAKE PURCHASES
5. RECIEVE ADVERTISING COURTESY OF OPELIKA MAIN STREET
BY PARTICIPATING IN FIRST FRIDAY EVENTS, BUSINESSES WILL RECIEVE FREE ADDITIONAL PUBLICITY THROUGH VARIOUS MEDIA OUTLETS
SHOP LATE, EAT LOCAL
Script for Organizational Visits: War Eagle! My name is _______ and I am here to talk to you about Opelika Main Street’s First Friday event. Opelika Main Street is a nonprofit organization dedicated to revitalizing the historic railroad district of downtown Opelika. First Fridays is an event held on the first Friday of each month and is dedicated to encouraging community members to shop late and eat local. Throughout the night, individuals have the opportunity to hear live music by local musicians, receive discounts at stores downtown, and choose from a variety of customized menu items. More information about First Fridays and each event’s monthly theme can be found at www.opelikamainstreet.com or Opelika Main Street’s Facebook page. Go “like” our page to stay informed on what events we have going on. Thanks for your time and War Eagle!
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! How to Create a Survey A survey is a list of various questions created to gather information from a particular audience. A survey for First Fridays will indicate audience preferences and suggestions of what they would like to see changed. From the survey, appropriate adjustments and improvements for future events can be made. A survey could be shared via email to Opelika Main Street members and via Facebook for the public to access. Reasons to administer a survey: • Gain in-depth feedback from Opelika Main Street members • Information gathered from the survey will provide new ideas for upcoming events • Modifications can be made from negative feedback from responses
Steps to creating a survey from SurveyMonkey: 1.Go to www.surveymonkey.com and create an account To create a new survey, click +Create Survey in the upper right corner of your account and choose from the following options: • Build a New Survey from Scratch: Create a survey completely from scratch. You will start with a single blank page and will need to add and write the questions yourself. You can also use our Question Bank to access thousands of survey questions written by our methodologists. • Edit a Copy of an Existing Survey: Create a copy of an existing survey on your account. Themes, logos, logic, and other survey design settings will carry over to the copied version of the survey. • Start from an Expert Template: Use this method to start with a template designed by SurveyMonkey methodologists. The questions used in these pre-made surveys are written to reduce bias and utilize best practices for data collection. You can still customize the
survey and questions when starting from a template.
2. Create a Survey Once you create your survey, start by adding questions. You can choose from several question types in the BUILDER section of the sidebar, or choose a pre-written question from the Question Bank. When you add a question, take a look at the options under the Edit and Options tabs to further customize the question. If you started from a template, review the survey and see if there are opportunities to personalize the template. Most of our pre-written questions allow you to customize certain parts of the question text to ensure that the question is relevant to your survey. You may also want to add additional questions of your own, or remove questions that aren't useful to you. If your survey is long, distribute your questions across multiple pages. Respondents will feel they are making progress as they reach each new page, and it can help you organize your survey into logical sections.
3. Apply Logic After your survey questions and pages are already in place, it's a good time to apply logic to the survey. We offer several logic options you can use to control the behavior of your survey and enhance the quality of your data.
4. Customize the Design For example, you can use Question Skip Logic to control the path of respondents based on their answers to previous questions. Or, you can use Question Randomization to reduce order bias. After the structure of your survey is in place, and your logic is working smoothly, you can focus on fine-tuning the appearance of your survey with design and display options. You can show or hide elements on the survey page, add a logo, and create a custom theme.
5. Preview the Survey Always preview and test your survey before sending it to respondents so you can catch any mistakes or logic issues. For additional information on creating a survey, please visit: http://help.surveymonkey.com ! !
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First Fridays: 4 reasons you should attend Deals
Dinner
Enjoy discounts provided by restaurants and retailers only for First Friday events
Choose from a variety of restaurants that offer exclusive menu options specifically for First Fridays
D a nc i ng
Drinks
Grab your friends to dance the night away in historic downtown Opelika with a variety of local performers and bands
Wind down with some of your favorite local breweries and distilleries
Shop late, Eat local