KAPLAN. Kaplan University. Social Media monitoring 2

In this blog post, I continue my research of Kaplan International and analysis of a Kaplan University's 2015 campaign, culminating in several recommendations for the brand in order to further leverage its social media presence.

Kaplan University is a department of  Kaplan International ,Inc

Kaplan University is an institution of higher learning dedicated to providing innovative undergraduate, graduate, and continuing professional education. The goal of campaign is to attract people to attend university's programs.

Let's have a look.

Presence in Social media

In the first part I have examined the presence of Kaplan International in social media in detail. Here is the short review of company's social media presence in general and Kaplan University in particular.

Social Searcher

Kaplan International

Kaplan University

It is obvious that Kaplan's management pays great attention to brand promotion in social media. Kaplan University Social media Website  Facebook Twitter  YouTube Google + In comparison with Kaplan International page on Google+,  Kaplan University is a much more popular resource. Kaplan University        Kaplan International Pinterest    Instagram Tapping the Groundswell Examples Social Searcher                                                                                   FB Feedback Complaints Kaplan University always answer on its main social media such as FB but it doesn't` pay much attention to other ones. Example Consumeraffairs Analitycs Social Searcher Statistics  29Sept -27Oct .2015 According to statistics, the time between at 1 p.m - 4 p.m. is the best time to  post on FB. We can see here that the  highest activity occurs between 2p.m - 6p.m. Most attractive content are pictures Audience geography Google Trends Comparing to previous metrics, Kaplan International focuses more on foreigners, and we can see that Kaplan University is more oriented on Americans. The analysys the company, maid on Alexa.com gives us the same picture . Target audience Kaplan University vs. EF Education In the first part I have already compared Kaplan International with one of the competitor, EF educational, using IceRocket. The result for EF educational was 0.17 posts per day and 5 posts total. For Kaplan University - 0.37 posts per day and 11 posts total. Let`s have a look on Google Trend now to compare Academic Study campaign of EF Education and Kaplan University campaign of Kaplan Recommendations The stuff of Kaplan is able to explain the services that they offer to everybody in their social media. They feel that there is a personal connection with the customers. They are prepared to respond to consumers on social media. They understand that consumers use all of the social media platforms to ask questions and complain. May be I can only recommend them to monitor  the social media space and pay more attention to the reviews on the other resources besides ordinary social pages like Facebook and Instagram In General I think that it's very clear for management of Kaplan how to use social media and tap this kind of engagement.

Zappos. Ubiquitous groundswell

The authors of the Groundswell,  Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff , told us that among the benefits  gained from working with the groundswell, there are changes in corporate thinking - you start to pay more attention to the needs and requirements of  your customers (215 Groundswell).

The future of Groundswell.... Ubiquitous Groundswell. 

 

 Social networks will connect people with those they care about. But "tapping the groundswell inside your company" (234 Groundswell)   means not only how organization can master the elements of  the groundswell thinking to transform how their company work with customers. (217 Groundswell).  The authors of the book wrote about the success of various company.

 

 

 

 

 

And I want to dedicate this blog to a well - known company "Zappos" . Firstly, because  this company is famous for its unique culture   

 

 

 

 

 Secondly, it is constantly cooperating with the customers in social networks,

 

it even  went ahead and created its own social network for potencial employees. I really think that it is the part of  future groundswell

 Zappos created a special social network called Zappos Insiders. People  who wants to work in the company are required to join the network.

There they will  communicate with current Zappos professionals in order to demonstrate their loyalty to the company and willingness to work there- in some cases publicly. And, perhaps, recruiters will notice potential employees'  zeal and invite them for an interview.
And even if they're not hired immediately, this social network gives them a way to continue to openly communicate with  chosen Zappos "ambassador."

Besides that, the website still has some common  elements, like a "Life at Zappos" section boasting about the company's mission and campus perks like parades, ice cream trucks, and live animals. 

The company also claims that it's mindful of privacy, giving people the choice to engage publicly or privately as they look to get a foot in the door. Ditching the cover letter and resume for a social network seems a bit surreal; not even Facebook does things this way. And it certainly requires  to jump through extra hoops, but Zappos seems to believe that social networks are the way to hire employees in the future. "We're hoping a lot of other companies jump on board. Zappos brings happiness not only customers, but also its own employees" said Michael Bailen, who heads talent acquisition for the company.

 

 

In addition, with the help of Zappos Insiders experts will identify those who will be hired. Not everyone will be happy, but still, those candidates who really want to work and fully share the company's vision, will remain connected. If companies can carry out such projects with their employees being involved with the groundswell, these employees, in their turn, will be involved in the companies' cultures and probably will communicate with customers through social networks more passionately.

 How do you feel about the fact that more and more companies are shifting their activities to the online sphere?

 

Charity and social networks

Have you ever donated money to charity? Have you ever done it  through social networks?

Earlier in my blog  I viewed  the topic of  using social networks for businesses, today I want to draw your attention to a delicate issue - charity.

 

 

The  reality is  that to the child, who needs  an urgent surgery, or  poor people who needs food  we need to collect money, almost by the whole world. In this case, social networks help a lot. 

You can often see posts with calls for help on their pages. The purpose of charitable organizations in social networks is to bring people together in order to help those who find themselves in a difficult situation, because life has presented them not with a pleasant surprise. All independent volunteers and charitable foundations are active in social networks. On their pages they report about the following:

• How the work plan has been implemented 
•What kind of events were held recently, and other information.

Basically, they submit information about the help provided.

  

 

 

 

 

  

But there are more charity ways  online.

Everyone remembers  Ice Bucket Challenge charity flash mob that blew up the Internet. 

Hundreds of thousands of people from around the world poured ice water itself, the whole process was recoded on camera and then uploaded to the Internet calling others friends to do the same. This way they tried to draw the world's attention to ALS, which is a terminal illness. Driven by the viral effect and the participation of Hollywood stars and Silicon Valley, donations have reached almost 80 million dollars during the first few weeks. Number of references of this flash mob on Twitter is correlated with the amount of donations made to the ALS fund. Ice Bucket Challenge reached its highest when Justin Timberlake did it. A few days later, Mark Zuckerberg did it too and started a chain reaction that lasted for a few days.

 

Another example

 Jimmy Wales, Wikipedia founder has launched a new project  in  UK  a social network "TPO". The purpose of the project is to help people to make donations to charities and elsewhere they want to.

As Jimmy Wales noted in an interview with Business Insider «It looks more  like Twitter, than Facebook». Here you can see how  the interface page  like at the  example of his profile. 

 

On TPO, as on any other social network, you can send personal statuses, follow your friends, send private messages, create groups, but besides that TPO gives an opportunity to send money directly to a particular fund or charity. However, unlike other well-known similar projects, such as Kickstarter, TPO does not have any transaction fees.

And, of course, I really like the next example

The first charitable social network in Russia. 

 The open version of an  application, allowing users  to donate money to charities through posting photos,  is now  available in AppStore. The project  called Mainpeople  has been  tested for three months. It is a charitable social network, that operates on the principle of Instagram: users can post pictures, like and comment on their  friends' post.

The publication of each new picture is a donation of 1$ and the account’s owner chooses the charitable foundation the money goes to. The mechanism is that if other users like the picture, they click «I'm with you» and thus  donate $ 1 to the selected organization. The number of clicks per person is unlimited and the amount of donations can  increase endlessly.

"We believe that you don't need to be rich and famous to do good. You also don't need to focus on other people's problems and get to the heart of their situations every day of your life. There are people who do it professionally. We can help them doing our daily routines. For example, uploading photos of a trip or discussing today's traffic", the creators of the project say

 

And I want us to say:

Let us think not only about business!

Let us try to make the time spent on social    networks benefit the world we live in!

And the world will become a little kinder!

 

As corny as it may sound....