Social Media Project (Clear)

I have to say that group work is not my favorite type of project, but I got lucky with the group I was with. They handled the situation professionally and got their parts submitted in a timely manner.

I enjoyed this project because I really enjoyed looking at the social media platforms in an in-depth way to see how a company like Chick-Fil-A used just about everyone of them in a competitive advantage.  Chick-Fil-A is a very popular restaurant that has an amazing brand image and awareness within the United States.  They had some issues a few years ago about gay rights, but used social media to reach their audience quickly to explain their situation.  They stated that they are a Christian company based on Christian values and when they donated to the so-called "hate group" they illustrated that they had no issues with who eats at Chick-Fil-A, they just liked what that organization was pushing.  They had no alliance with the organization and just supplied food for them.  I thought that they used their social media outlets very effectively and to this day, after researching with my group, I recognized why Chick-Fil-A has such a positive image in today's market.

It's pretty amazing how communicating through social media can make things a lot quicker.  I never met the people who I worked with personally, but we connected through those interfaces to get our point across about Chick-Fil-A.

We split the research rather evenly.  I took care of the Facebook and Twitter pages which were both very visual and were maintained by someone with Chick-Fil-A.  Those individuals would tweet back to customers and fans of the brand and even negative posts would be taken into consideration and the employees of the company were very good in catering to those individuals personally.  The sites also gave tons of information about the menu, showed where you can download coupons and made the brand image of Chick-Fil-A a more personal experience.  When individuals have the chance to get connected with a large company on an intimate level, it really improves the brand's image and market to a global audience.

Below are two snapshots of the company's Twitter and Facebook.  It's pretty amazing how they have come so far.

Week 11: Database (muddy)

Database software is not my favorite to work with.  To be honest, it seems a bit out of date.  When I was working with Filemaker Pro, I just didn't enjoy the entire process.  I appreciated professor Olson going in-depth with the tutorials, and it made a lot more sense in that regard.

I don't think that the features were too hard to get down, but the overall process was a tad tedious.  I feel that it was important to learn more about database software, but since I will be dealing with a more presentation-oriented career, I may be a tad bias.

I liked the organization factor of using this software.  When watching the lectures that professor Olson presented, I felt like this type of information was going to be a lot more enjoyable to work with than Excel.  To be honest, they were very similar and maybe that is one of the main reasons I didn't do as well in comprehending the software.  Even though I felt this way, I wanted to research and see if anyone else had any negative views on the program.  It seems I was not the only one.  This website Click Here, illustrated a numerous amount of pros/cons and it made me realize that these programs are becoming a lot less used than ever before.  Hopefully there will be some improvements in the user friendliness in the future of designing database programs.

For a more in-depth blog on my experience with the database project, please view my previous blog posts.

Week 13: Social Media (Clear)

Social networking is extremely important to today's society and how we communicate on a more intimate level.  Without social networking, it is obvious that it is harder to communicate on a global scale.  I have to say, it's fascinating that people 30 years ago didn't even have cellphones and were able to be as successful as they were.  I think that social media is perfect when used correctly and it's important to recognize that just because you have a good social networking page/site, it doesn't make the company successful overnight.  A lot of passion and creativity has to go into funding, creating and maintaining these sites and keep it as personalized as possible is ideal.  No one likes to speak to a computer.  When we receive telemarketer calls, how annoying is that?  People will become engaged when they want to become  engaged.  Giving them the power and time to invest in your product is ideal.  Most people that want to talk good about your product will do so.

As a Public Relations major, I have had a lot of experience with social media.  I use it on a daily basis to communicate effectively with clients and noticed that it's almost the easiest ways to do business.  When building a social media page, it's important to not be pushy, but get your name out there.  Even if the comments are somewhat negative, you can still turn this into a positive.  For example, when BP had their recent crisis with the oil spill, everyone wanted to hate them.  Now I am not saying what they did and how they handled the situation was ideal, but if you have noticed lately, they have done a lot with their twitter, Facebook and overall communication efforts through new media.  They have ways that you can donate to help fund small town people effected by the disaster and keep you updated 24 hours on how they have made a difference.  Eventually, BP will generate enough corporate social responsibility to improve their image and in the long run, gain back the business from those who were effected by their disastrous situation.

I enjoyed professor Means breaking down all the different types of social media and providing a background of their importance and strengths.  It's amazing that the richest companies and professionals in the world use social media so extensively and that should be a sign of how the world will be in the future.

Here is a really cool video on ways that you can improve your social media and get people to take your company or brand more seriously.  It's full of motivating texts and really makes you take social media seriously.  Let me know what you think.

Telecommunications and the internet (Clear)

I have to say that I thought I knew a lot about the internet, but this weeks informative lectures were extremely beneficial to me better understanding its beautiful complexity.  The thing about the internet being a group of large networks that are connected to gain more visitors was astounding, and how we have more information online than people is just crazy to me.  It was interesting to learn about the access providers and how many different types of companies profit from the Internet.

I'm a big fan of seeing how far society has come and when the first form of computing was introduced in the 1950's I am just astonished by how far we have come.  It's hard to believe that just 20 years ago, the internet made it's debut and I can't even tell you how we, today's society, could even imagine life without it.

I really appreciated learning more in-depth basics on URL, various protocols, and how IP addresses work.  I found that we have no privacy online whatsoever, and it was cool to see how the process of the internet works through a simple click of a button.  I also knew very little about "cookies" and it was interesting to see how using cookies is beneficial to some extent, but can also be very annoying as well.  I now know why when I make purchases online, my financial information is already updated.  This made me a little more cautious of how I should post my information.  It have gotten lazy in recent years, posting a lot of really personal information, when looking back, that may have been a bad idea.

I really enjoyed the videos that professor means posted throughout the interface.  The short video breaking down the history of the internet was really cool and I appreciated that visualization.  I also found that 4G, apparently doesn't exist yet, and I felt dumb for that one, lol.

Overall, this week was really informative and made me appreciate what we take for granted.  I look for to the innovative advances in technology and hope that the process is successful and becomes safer for tomorrow's youth.

This is a cool video on the next 10 years in technology by google.  Wow, what will they think of next?

Smarterer: Extra Credit (Clear)

So I decided to give Smarterer a try and wow.  This is a really cool way to teach yourself to learn popular software programs in a unique way.  I am obviously extremely interested in Facebook, so I looked into the leaders section of Smarterer and found that Aiko Stanley, was the leader and had a master level in the subject.  I decided to message him (which he never responded) and then wanted to see if I could test my skills against his.  Below is a picture of his score.  You can see mine in the picture above (which is my profile).

After taking the quiz, I felt that I knew a few things here and there, but struggled with it being timed.  Some of the questions were worded differently, which made me select the wrong answer, but it was cool because I retook it and wrote down some things that I wanted to learn more about and then googled proper ways to improve that misunderstanding.  I think this is a great social media outlet, but other than seeing this link in this course, I've never heard of Smarterer before.  It would be nice if it was a little more hands on, illustrating in a video format things you got wrong, and showing you how to properly make the right decision down the road.  I'm sure that the operators and creators of the software would appreciate that as well.  

Well, hope you all enjoyed reading this.  Have a great day!

Database Project: Filemaker Pro (Clear)

I have to say I was a little afraid of this project, but after going through professor Olson's steps, it was a lot easier to understand.  I liked the hands-on approach from using Filemaker Pro and appreciated its simplicity after obtaining further knowledge through more usage.  I have heard that Filemaker is not as helpful or user friendly as Access, but I didn't see the huge issue in its services.

I liked how you could categorize all the people by their county in which they lived.  This was a lot more professional looking and I thought it was helpful in organizing all that data.  The find options were a little strange and I wish those would be more easy to work with.  The sort button has to be the best thing about Filemaker Pro.  You can analyze a lot of data by the simple click of the mouse.  Picking the way you want to organize it was also a really helpful factor.

Before I took ISM 3004, I had no idea that database software like this was even used or existed before.  I have heard of Access (but didn't know anything about it), but since becoming a proud macbook user last year, I knew I had to adapt to using a program I was unfamiliar with.  But that is indeed the reason we as students take courses like this.  I look forward to more hands on projects, considering I struggled with Excel as much as I did.  Being able to manage your employees, salaries, even the dates a customer quits using your facility, is really important information to know as a hopeful future business person.

After completing the scavenger hunt, I viewed this video.  It helped me get a quick understanding of how to operate through Filemaker Pro more effectively, and perhaps it can help you guys use this software more effectively in the future as well.

Thanks for reading everyone.  Have a great weekend.

Filemaker Pro (Muddy) Week 10

I have to say that I appreciate learning about organizing databases, but these programs can be difficult to get started with.  I enjoyed analyzing data, learning about producing queries, which are ways to view the info from certain data sets.  Database software makes the process of isolating data easy, but the queries are still a bit strange when it comes to productivity.  

The reports sections were better in my opinion.  It looked more professional and after it's all analyzed and broken down, it is easier to work with.  There are several options of data that help you set up the report, but I wish it was easier to work with. 

There is no limitations on how information can be organized, sorted or displayed to produce a productive satisfaction the user.  I look forward to furthering my skills in database software, and building a more aware knowledge will defiantly help me in the long run.  

After I went through professor Olson's lectures, I did some more research and found this video, which was helpful in furthering my experience.