Brid O' Connor

Digital Marketing Learning Portfolio Table of Contents Executive Summary ................................................................................................................. 2 Section 1: Instagram and Pinterest Marketing ..................................................................... 3 1.1 Introduction:......................................................................................................................... 3 1.2 Overview of Activity: .......................................................................................................... 3 1.3 Findings: .............................................................................................................................. 5 1.4 Conclusion: .......................................................................................................................... 6 Section 2: Blogging................................................................................................................... 7 2.1 Introduction:......................................................................................................................... 7 2.2 Overview of Activity: .......................................................................................................... 7 2.3 Findings: .............................................................................................................................. 9 2.4 Conclusion: .......................................................................................................................... 9 Section 3: Email Marketing .................................................................................................. 10 3.1 Introduction:....................................................................................................................... 10 3.2 Overview of Activity: ........................................................................................................ 10 3.3 Findings: ............................................................................................................................ 12 3.4 Limitations: ........................................................................................................................ 12 3.5 Conclusion: ........................................................................................................................ 13 Section 4: Gamification ......................................................................................................... 14 4.1 Introduction:....................................................................................................................... 14 4.2 Background to Dublin Bikes and bike schemes: ............................................................... 14 4.3 Market Research: ............................................................................................................... 19 4.4 Overview of Game: ............................................................................................................ 21 4.5 Conclusion: ........................................................................................................................ 25 Section 5: Google Online Marketing Challenge .................................................................. 26 5.1 Introduction:....................................................................................................................... 26 5.2 Overview of Activity: ........................................................................................................ 26 5.3 Findings: ............................................................................................................................ 27 5.4 Conclusion: ........................................................................................................................ 28 Conclusion .............................................................................................................................. 29 Bibliography ........................................................................................................................... 30 Appendices .............................................................................................................................. 31 1 Executive Summary The purpose of this portfolio is to showcase various digital marketing activities which were carried out as part of my postgraduate degree: MSc in Digital Marketing. The portfolio includes five activities detailing what was completed as part of each activity and any main findings discovered. While three activities were completed on an individual basis, we had to work as part of a team to carry out two of these activities. Teamwork was needed to complete the Gamification and AdWords sections. Section one gives details on how Instagram and Pinterest can be used in marketing. I carried out a test to see which photo sharing platform was more effective in advertising products and services. While conducting this study I adhered to best practices which include the quality of pictures to be posted and how many pictures to post a day. Blogging is outlined in section two. Music was chosen as the topic for the blog and eight different blogging styles were used. Included in this section are the types of content I posted and which blogging style was most effective in targeting music lovers. The third section highlights the importance of email marketing in attracting and engaging consumers. The aim of this study was to analyse whether or not email marketing is ‘dead’, or can it still be used to encourage consumers to interact with brands. Section four investigates the use of gamification in marketing to consumers. This was the first activity which required a group effort. This game was based on encouraging the people of Dublin to use the Dublin Bikes as a means of transportation. Finally, I was afforded the opportunity to work with a live client to complete the Google Online Marketing Challenge (GOMC). This was the second activity where we had to work as part of a team to carry out an AdWords campaign. Our client for this campaign was P1 Nutrition, a company who specialises in providing racing drivers with nutritional supplements entitled “race fuel”. 2 Section 1: Instagram and Pinterest Marketing 1.1 Introduction: This section deals with the use of both Instagram and Pinterest as a means of marketing. I wanted to analyse the power of social media, in particular photo sharing, for the promotion and sale of products and services. Both platforms were chosen because I wanted to test whether there was a difference between the two in terms of effectiveness. Hence, the objective of this section is to determine whether consumers are more likely to purchase a product after seeing them promoted on Instagram or Pinterest. To do this consumer interactions such as likes, comments and followers were examined. ‘Fashion’ was chosen as a topic as I am an avid lover of fashion and wanted to see what results fashion bloggers get from posting on Instagram and Pinterest. 1.2 Overview of Activity: I began this activity by choosing a topic which was of interest to me. Once a topic was chosen, in this case ‘fashion’, I set up both an Instagram and Pinterest account. Although I already have an Instagram account, it was preferable to set up one entirely separate to my personal one and which was dedicated solely to fashion and style. The username chosen for these accounts were ‘catwalk_culchie’. Both Instagram and Pinterest require the user to upload and share pictures to a platform on a regular basis. Videos can also be uploaded. However, photo sharing is more popular and videos have a limit of approximately 60 seconds (previously 15 seconds). The user can comment and like on other users’ pictures on Instagram but on Pinterest the user has the option to ‘pin’ pictures to your own board. Pinning a post is similar to retweeting whereby a picture gets posted to your page for your own followers to see. Boards on Pinterest are similar to folders. Users can create categories and pin or upload pictures under these categories. The categories for my Pinterest account include ‘clothes’, ‘make up’ and ‘shoes’. To search on Instagram the user clicks on the search icon on the menu bar. Alternative ly, one can click on hashtags under a post and search by hashtags. On the other hand, Pinterest is searched via categories. When a user clicks on a ‘pin’ a list of related pins are displayed. 3 The process of adding a picture to an account includes: Instagram Pinterest 1. Log in to account 1. Log in to account 2. Click camera button in centre of 2. Navigate to profile page menu bar 3. Choose pictures from saved photos or 3. Click on + icon at top of screen take a new one 4. Choose to ‘create new board’ if you 4. Add filter wish to save picture to a new folder 5. Select ‘pin from photos’ to upload 5. Write caption, add hashtags and locations, tag people and share to new photo social media 6. Click ‘share’ 6. Select photo 7. Click ‘pin it’ 8. Write a short description of the new photo and select board to add it to 9. Once a board is selected picture is automatically uploaded This activity cannot be completed within a few days or weeks. It is an ongoing activity. Pictures should be uploaded frequently i.e. at least once a day. Best practice recommends 2-3 posts per day. In terms of average time spent on the social platforms, more than the recommended length was spent navigating between both apps per day. This time was spent checking notificatio ns, following users and liking or commenting on other photos. Although Instagram and Pinterest can both be accessed via desktop it is preferable to use the apps as they contain more functionality and facilitates ease of use. 4 The images used were obtained from friends, celebrity profiles and fashion blogs. Hashtags used were altered depending on the picture in the post but #fashion #style and #catwalkculc hie were used in every post. 1.3 Findings: After testing various hashtags on Instagram I found that #fashion and #style produced the most interactions from users. #nofilter is also an effective hashtag. It is easy to gain followers organically by following and interacting with other users’ posts. However, I also found that by following certain accounts i.e. accounts with thousands of followers, it resulted in interactio ns with my account from people using bots. The use of bots may skew results in terms of marketing because they result in automatic follows. The person behind the account may not have necessarily seen your account or posts and may not have no real interest in what you are posting. I also found that more females interacted with my account than males. Although I have posted about male fashion, the fashion industry is female-orientated. As part of my study I asked people to start using a hashtag I made up as part of the account, #catwalkculchie. I used this hashtag for every post to try and motivate users to use it. The aim of this hashtag was to encourage user-generated content. For example, if someone were to use the hashtag it would allow me to feature them in one of my posts. Although it took a while for this to catch on, people have recently started using the hashtag. I found that Instagram is a very effective platform in marketing. Although I was not selling anything via my account, many people were commenting under my posts asking where they could purchase the products. In terms of Pinterest, I determine that it is less effective at marketing than Instagram. During the course of my study only four pins got reposted. I found that Pinterest is good for consumers to get ideas but it is not a platform where they can comment to seek where products can be purchased. However, many pins come with links which direct consumers to websites where products can be bought. Having said this there is still little interactions on these pins compared to Instagram. In terms of searching for posts and pins, it is also easier to search using hashtags on Instagram than categories on Pinterest. Finally, I tested time frames of when to post and discovered that evening times resulted in more feedback and interactions compared to the morning and afternoon. 5 1.4 Conclusion: It can be deduced that Instagram can be an efficient means of marketing goods to consumers. My findings have shown that comments are very powerful when it comes to advertising and selling products via social media. Many consumers comment asking information about the product and where it can be purchased. Hashtags are also a useful means of finding out what is popular and what consumers seek. Pinterest, on the other hand, is less successful in attracting consumers to purchase goods and services. Although links to website can be included in pins, it is hard to get people to interact with these pins. The use of photo sharing social media platforms were invaluable to me. It gave me the opportunity to enhance my social media marketing skills and allowed me to explore Pinterest, which I had no previous experience. I also learned that social media marketing cannot be achieved within a short time frame. It needs to be completed over a long period of time, with frequent updates. If I were to do this activity again, I would perhaps spend more time posting on Pinterest. I would try to link my pins with a website and test the click-through rates. Secondly, I would try to test more hashtags other than ‘fashion’ and ‘style’ to see what other ones are popular. Finally, I would like to see is it possible to gain followers on Instagram by solely posting pictures, and not following anyone. 6 Section 2: Blogging 2.1 Introduction: This section describes how blogging can be used in content creation and marketing. I chose to do blogging because I thought it would be an effective way to enhance my content marketing skills. Although content can be created through the use of eBooks, eNewsletters and case studies, I had no previous experience in blogging. The objective for blogging was to analyse whether it is an effective method of distributing content to consumers. The goal I set to help achieve this objective was to get people to my blog. This was measured through the use of Google Analytics which I had set up at the beginning. I hoped to have attracted at least five people to my blog after new posts had been released. I chose ‘music’ as a topic as it is something I am passionate about. As blogging requires multiple posts on the same topic I found that I would enjoy blogging about music. It is hard to blog about something if you do not have an interest in it. 2.2 Overview of Activity: Firstly, I researched blogging platforms. Even though WordPress is the most popular platform for bloggers, I decided to create an account with www.wix.com as their themes and design appealed to me. After setting up an account I began to design the layout of my blog which I entitled ‘Biddy Blogs’. After the blog was set up I decided what type of blogs I would post before writing my first blog post. I established that my blogs would be informational blogs to offer readers information on the music industry. Other types of blogs could have been educational or entertainment blogs. I kept my first post simple and wrote a list blog. The list blog was entitled ‘Top Hot Songs of the Week’ and as the title suggests, contained a list of songs which were the most popular at the start of November. For every list blog posted I tried to include a video of the number one song to try keep readers engaged. Out of the eight styles, list blogging and link blogging were the easiest. People love lists and I found that my latest link blog received a great response with 11 views. In total I did eight styles. These included: 7 1. List blog 2. Piggyback blog 3. Live blog 4. Link blog 5. Interview blog 6. Photo blog 7. Guest blog 8. Review blog Piggyback blogging involved writing about news related to music which was popular in the media in a given time period. Examples of this were when Kanye West’s prank audition video for American Idol got released in January and when Olly Murs made a few mistakes on the X Factor. I found these types of blogs the easiest and most interesting to write about because people were actively looking for these topics, and I could read other blogs and articles to see what they were saying. I found live blogging and interview blogging the most difficult to do as I did not have the opportunity to go to much music related events during the year and found it hard to find people who were willing to take the time out of their schedules for an interview. With respect to the guest blog one of my friends, who also has a music blog, blogged on my behalf. Her blog is about up-and-coming artists so I thought it would be a good idea for her to share her thoughts and ideas with my followers. In return I wrote a piece for her blog on tips to surviving concerts and gigs. To gain subscribers I shared my blog on music forums and Facebook groups. I also set up a Twitter account dedicated to my blog, @biddyblogs. I began following people who were big into music. I especially targeted the boyband lovers such as The Vamps and One Direction as my blog is targeted towards these personas. Initially I sent out tweets asking people to subscribe but then began sending direct messages to those who followed. To increase response rates I decided to offer an incentive for people to subscribe. After analysing my target audience I discovered that they enjoy winning prizes. Therefore, I decided to offer them the chance to win some music merchandise if they subscribed. Competitions are said to be the most popular means of enticing consumers to subscribe to emails, blogs, etc. The use of email marketing outlined in section three below was used in attracting people to subscribe. 8 Blogs were sent out in the evening time as this was the most popular hour for my target audience to be active on social media. It also meant that those who were working during the day were in a ‘private mindset’ and not a ‘working mindset’, thus being more open to receiving personal emails. 2.3 Findings: Blogs posted in January received the most views. Blogs released this month included three piggyback blogs and a list blogs. As previously mentioned, list and guest blogs were the most popular but the blog resulting in the most responses was the interview blog due to the email marketing campaign (Section 3). When the campaign was first launched in April 11 th , 25 people visited the blog in the space of two weeks. When the reminder email was sent out this number increased to 61 between April 25th and May 10th . In relation to the most popular time frame for people to visit and be active on my blog, 21:00 proved to be the most popular. Referrals were also more effective at bringing people the site rather than organic searches. However, this was not unexpected as the blog has only been set up less than a year and it may take some time for it to appear on the first page of the SERPS for certain keywords such as ‘music blog’ and ‘top songs’. 2.4 Conclusion: Although blogging may be an effective form of communicating with consumers for successful, well-known organisations, I did not find my blog to be hugely successful. An incentive was needed to motivate readers to interact and share my blog. Even Ireland’s biggest bloggers such as So Sue Me offers incentives occasionally to her followers by giving away pamper weekends and make up goodie bags. I also learned that blogging takes time. It requires frequent updates. Stale content loses consumer interest. If I were to do this activity again I would adhere to best practices in terms of when to post and how many times per day to post. I found it hard to keep my blog up-todate daily but if I were blogging professionally it may be easier to source new content. 9 Section 3: Email Marketing 3.1 Introduction: This section outlines an email marketing campaign I carried out. The objective of the campaign was to analyse whether email is still effective in targeting consumers or if it is ‘dead’. The goal I set was to increase interactions such as comments and shares of my blog, with the hope of creating brand awareness among those who are connected to my subscribers via Facebook. Although I send out newsletters each time my blog is updated, I wanted to enhance my relationship with subscribers and say ‘thank you’ for them subscribing by offering them a limited time offer. It is thought that regular newsletters and limited time offers are popular methods of helping businesses achieve their objectives. I chose to do an email campaign because I wanted to improve my email marketing skills and see for myself whether or not email can still be used in marketing and drawing consumers to a website. As part of our Practicum we are carrying out an email campaign for Enable Ireland as well as an AdWords campaign and Search Engine Optimisation (SEO). By completing the email campaign as part of my portfolio I hope that it will be of benefit to me during the Practicum and it will allow me to learn from my mistakes in going forward. 3.2 Overview of Activity: The first step to carrying out this email campaign was to set up a MailChimp account. MailChimp was the software used to create, send and track the email campaign. Once a MailChimp account was set up, the email addresses gathered from my blog had to be imported. To do this a new list had to be created. The emails which were previously downloaded as a CSV file were then uploaded to MailChimp. After emails had been imported, the following process was used to create the campaign: 1. Click ‘create campaign’ 2. Select ‘regular campaign’ 3. Select list to use for campaign i.e. the emails to be used 4. Enter campaign information such as name of campaign and whether personalisation is to be used or not 5. Choose theme to be used. Alternatively, no theme can be chosen and a basic email can be sent out 10 6. Design email- add in text and images 7. Select ‘confirm’ to send out email There are many different emails to send out with the use of MailChimp. An A/B test campaign could have also been used but I only had a limited number of email addresses which would have produced ineffective results. An A/B test campaign would have involved splitting the email list in two and sending out the same campaign to each group but with only one altered element. The most comment elements to test in A/B testing include the position and colour of call-to-actions (CTAs) and subject lines. All emails were permission-based and no emails sent out were unsolicited. They were also direct response emails as subscribers were encouraged to elicit a response by clicking the link in the email. The content of the email was to inform subscribers of the competition which I had set up as an incentive to get people to subscribe to my blog. It included instructions for the subscribers of how to go about winning the prize which was to interact with the blog. It was decided to personalise emails to engage recipients with the hope of producing better results such as more clicks on the CTA in the email. Personalisation in emails improves clickthrough rates by approximately 14%. Additionally, all emails made efficient use of subject lines and design. Keywords were used in subject lines and a minimalistic design was used to attract consumers. The overuse of design and images is said to take the recipients attention away from the main purpose of emails, which in this case is to get them to click the CTA and interact with the blog post to increase brand awareness and interactions. The first email for the campaign was sent out on Monday the 11th April after a new blog had been posted. After one week a second email was sent out on 18th of April to remind them of the first email. I chose to send the reminder out after seven days as this is the recommende d length of time lag. One email is not enough to engage consumers. A second email has to be sent out to remind them about the offer. As well as reminding those who had not opened or clicked on the link, reminder emails can be used to motivate those who did to check up on my latest blog posts and interact some more. A third email was also sent out when the campaign ended. This email was not used as a means to increase interactions with my blog or did not include a CTA. The final email was only sent out to inform consumers that the limited time offer had finished. It was also used to declare the winner of the competition. 11 As all recipients were in the same time zone and shared the same interests i.e. music, emails were sent out at the one time. The first email was sent out at approximately 09:00 on Monday 11th April while the second one was mailed at 18:00. I decided to send the emails out at differe nt times to see which time was more effective. This may be useful feedback if I were to do another email campaign. 3.3 Findings: Open rates, clicks and click-through rates (CTRs) were used as metrics. Open rates highlight the effectiveness of the subject line of the email while CTRs allowed me to assess whether the content of the email, including the personalisation and CTA, were effective in bringing people to my blog. There were 17 opens and 9 clicks in the first email. This can be compared to the second email which received slightly more opens and clicks at 18 and 11. The average CTR for both campaigns was 53% for the first email and 61% for the reminder. These figures were obtained by dividing the numbers of clicks by the number of opens. Although the industry averages for opens and clicks are significantly lower, this may be because only 41 emails addresses were used for the purpose of this campaign. 18:00 showed to be the optimal time to send out emails for this campaign. Most of the recipients were secondary level or third level students. Their ‘private mindset’ is when they read personal emails which may be after their day at college. It has been discovered that direct marketing campaigns are more effective outside of the working environment. If this email were to contain content related to business-to-business (B2B), the optimal time to send out the email may have been during the working day when employees are active on their work email accounts. 3.4 Limitations: The campaign was only active for a period of 30 days. Well executed campaigns take 60 days. Aforementioned, it was not possible to make the campaign last 60 days because the number of subscribers was low and the response rate was high compared to the industry average. While I tried to take advantage of the spacing effect, I did not see it fit to send out a second, third and fourth reminder due to the campaign only lasting 30 days instead of 60. If it were possible to gather more emails, it would have produced an even better response rate in terms of comments, shares and new subscribers to my blog. 12 3.5 Conclusion: Finally in line with the objective of the email campaign, I proved that email marketing is not ‘dead’ and that it can be used as an effective method of targeting consumers. My campaign performed better than expected and as a result there was more engagement with my blog. Within the first two weeks of the campaign I received 14 new subscribers. The blog also received six new comments within two days of sending out the reminder campaign. I learnt that email marketing cannot be done within a short space of time. Successful email marketing campaigns have to be carried out over a period of 60 days depending on the target audience. Reminder emails must be designed to entice people to open and engage with the email if they have not already done so. The spacing effect ensures the projected forgetting curve is avoided. I now realise that 41 people is not an efficient number of individuals to send an email campaign out to. The more emails gathered, the better for a campaign to gain more feedback and responses. 13 Section 4: Gamification 4.1 Introduction: The segment outlined below describes how the incorporation of some form of a game into a mobile app can be used in marketing a business. This is the first exploratory section of the portfolio which was a group activity. I chose to partake in this activity as I had never heard of gamification and sought to improve my knowledge of the concept. My personal objective for the group project was to learn how to apply game principles and design to non-game contexts. Primary and secondary research was conducted before developing the app. This research was used to gain insight into the Dublin Bike scheme and consumers’ perceptions of the scheme. 4.2 Background to Dublin Bikes and bike schemes: City bike sharing schemes evolved in the mid- 2000s with the development of mobile and GPS tracking technology which enables both consumer engagement and the distribution and availability of bicycles. In just over ten years they have become a key element in transit policy planning for most major cities in the developed world with almost one million bicycles now publicly available for shared use in 855 cities worldwide (Petronzio, 2015). The Dublin Bike scheme (now branded as Coca-Cola Zero Dublin Bikes) was officially opened in September 2009 as a public- private partnership between Dublin City Council and the advertising company JC Decaux, which is largely responsible for operating and maintaining the service. Today (from Dublin Bikes, correct as at 29 February 2016) the scheme has:  59,018 Current Valid Long Term Subscribers :  Acquired 1,390 Short Term Subscribers. YTD - FY 2015 c. 18,000  609,350 journeys. YTD – 3.7m in 2015 – (2015 average 10,136 per day)  14,027,948 journeys since launch  14 minutes average duration of bike journeys. YTD – same as FY 2015  96% journeys free (i.e. under 30 minutes). YTD – no change on average over 2015  Busiest day of usage ever - Thurs 8/10/2015 at 17,222 journeys 14 The scheme currently provides 1,555 bikes across 101 stations that are concentrated largely in the centre of the city as set out below (Figure 1). The blue area noted is a proposed area of planned expansion (Dublin Bikes, 2016). Figure 1 The scheme costs approximately €1.9 million a year to run and is funded though subscriptio n/ usage charges (€1.2 million) and sponsorship of €312,000 from Coca Cola with Dublin City Council paying the rest - €376,211 last year – as a subvention (Kelly, 2016). The annual subscription charge for long term subscribers is currently €20 with plans to increase it to €25 this year and then €30 next year which would generate an extra €580,000 (if all longterm members remained in the scheme) and enable the council to stop its subvention. Further funding will then be required for the planned expansion noted above to bring the scheme to the suburbs, which the Council say will require a €100 million investment over ten years and increasing the number of bikes to 5,000. Dublin Bikes – user profile: Murphy (2011) notes that such schemes introduced the bicycle as a means of everyday travel to a new group of travellers, increase transit use, decrease greenhouse gases, and improve public health. He also noted that bicycle- sharing requires less investment and is less expensive than other modes of transport. The operators of the Dublin Bike scheme make a range of data available to the public and developers that allow for the profiling of users. In the first detailed qualitative assessment 15 published, Delve (2011) noted that “use of the bike scheme is overwhelmingly dominated by males” (Figure 2). Source: (Delve, 2011) A more recent measure published on irishcycle.com looking at the period July/ August 2015 which shows similar results in terms of gender usage (Figure 3). Figure 3 This is not an Irish phenomenon and is consistent with findings in other markets quoted by Murphy (2011) who noted that “the majority of studies conducted find that males cycle much more frequently than their female counterparts”. Ogilvie (2012) likewise found that females 16 and residents in deprived areas are underrepresented among users of London's public bicycle sharing scheme. Murphy (2011) also discovered that cycling numbers decline with age. The most frequent users are those aged between 25 and 45 with a significant drop off beyond 55 years of age. This is reflected in mid- 2015 data for DublinCycles which shows that over 70% of users are aged between 25 and 45 (DublinCycles, 2015) (Figure 4). Source: irishcycle.com Murphy (2011) also found that “users of the scheme come overwhelmingly from middle- class and upper middleclass backgrounds”. His study looked for a possible association between cycling and income and found conflicting views in literature as to its significance, concluding that there does not appear to be a definite association one way or the other. Fishman (2015) noted that “bike share users have demographic characteristics that differ from the general population”, noting that in addition to a prevalence to be male and of higher average incomes, they are also more likely to live and work in the inner city and close to or within the BSP (Bike Sharing Programme) catchment area. Communicating with Dublin Bike users: In his study Delve (2011) found that almost 75% of Dublin Bike users had used the Dublin Bikes app to plan their journey with. This was unsurprisingly true for the younger target audience (Figure 5). 17 Figure 5 Source: Delve (2011) In the five years since then the use of apps has grown by a factor of 4.5 (Statista GmbH, 2016) and the age profile is rising with new young adults emerging as digital natives (Figure 6). Figure 6 Source: Statista In that context, the opportunity to further engage Dublin Bike users with communicatio ns technology stands out as a natural addition to their existing experience and one that would be of first nature to them. 18 The potential for technology to play a greater role in the value to consumers from bike sharing is already being explored by other bike sharing schemes. The Economist (2013) reported that GoBike in Copenhagen, one of Europe's latest bike- sharing schemes in 2013, were looking at bicycles with built- in tablet computers that could direct cyclists to local amenities and offers. Likewise, it noted that in Berlin cheaper "dockless" bikes were available which could be found by mobile phone. It concluded that such innovations could help broaden the appeal of bike-share schemes “beyond their current users, who are mainly young, relatively well- off men” 4.3 Market Research: Survey: We created a survey consisting of 32 questions to examine the potential of the proposed gamified app and to gain insights of our target. The first nine questions concern the general use of bikes, cycling behaviours and attitudes towards the described app. Next, we applied the Houston & Smither competitiveness scale (1992) by using all 20 proposed questions. We finished the survey with three demographic questions. The team gathered 21 responses to the survey, the analysis of which revealed the following findings: Demographics There was a fairly even split between male (52%) and female (47%) participants. The most common profession was students (81%), followed by employed (10%), self-employed (5%) and other (4%). The lowest age of the participants was 22 and the highest was 30. The median age was 24, followed by the average at 24.9. We tried to disseminate the survey amongst individuals that fit the description of our target audience via Facebook. Competitiveness The competitiveness items were answered on a True/ False scale. All participants answered every item, so there was no data missing. As for the males the mean was located at 14.37, compared to the mean of the females at 11.79. Both genders then are above the average competitive ness as proposed by Houston & Smither (1992) and are therefore very competitive. Thus, we feel that our target audience would appreciate a gamified approach, which includes multiple leaderboards and the possibility to 19 compare performances. This will increase the engagement with our application and the general motivation to do well in it. Cycling Behaviour Of our 22 participants, only 7 people (33%) owned their own bike. Reasons for not owning a bike were the preference for public transport, 61%, because it was either faster or safer. Safety in general was a problem, as many participants considered this to be a major reason for never trying Dublin City bikes in the past. However, of the people who currently do not own a bike, 85% answered that they would consider taking up cycling if there was an extra incentive. The most popular extra incentives were “being more active and healthy” (73%), “free products or services” (63%) and “helping the environment” (47%). This is a very promising result for our product. For one, offering free products or services can attract new customers and this exactly is the core of our gamified app. Also, our app includes health statistics, such as burnt calories, that accumulate over time to display a motivating number to the user. Although this does not solve the problem of safety concerns, it does create multiple extra incentives for the user. The individuals who own a bike mostly cycle 1-5 times a month (50%) for various reasons. Most active participants cycled 6-10 times (15%) or 11-15 times (25%) a month. The reasons for frequent cycling are fairly widespread. Leisure activities lead the charge with 46%, followed by collegiate reasons at 23% and job or unspecified reasons at 15%. Lastly, we asked whether or not our participants used Dublin City bikes in the past. The majority of people (81%) have never used them at the date of the survey. The open answer box revealed various reasons for this neglect. For one, people do not see the necessity to use the bikes, as there are faster and safer alternatives. Answers such as “Not necessary” indicate that the bikes are not seen as the first choice in transportation. Another issue is that it “seems a hassle to set up” or that customers are “not sure how the payment works”. The insights gained from this survey will be used to inform our approach to the game. 20 4.4 Overview of Game: The purpose of this Gamification application is to promote the usage of Dublin City Bikes. The benefit it will bring to users include reduced costs, a sense of achievement by moving up the levels, being healthy and receiving the feeling of satisfaction knowing the use of bicycles leads to a more environmentally friendly society. Through this application our goal is to motivate those living in Dublin to utilise the bikes more frequently whether it be for commuting to work or exploring the city in their spare time. With the increased usage of Dublin Bikes this will not only benefit consumers but the environme nt as well. The target audience for this app will be adults in work and students, keeping in line with profile of the Dublin Bike user community as previously outlined. Targeting the working population is particularly important because employers are increasingly looking to implement programmes that encourage employees to choose a more environmentally friendly transport option in getting to and from work. More and more companies are partnering up with bicycle organisations to encourage their employees to use bikes as a means of transportation. Students are very competitive individuals. They like the idea of competing with their friends and out performing others. Personas for each user group are presented in Appendix D1. In accordance with Bartle’s Test, the players of the game will be achievers. Achievers with this particular game can compete with others through the leaderboard and win prizes by moving up the level. For those who are the most competitive, they have the opportunity to partake in a St. Patrick’s Day road race to win a top prize. This race will see the top 10 cyclists of each leaderboard compete against each other. The race will be on the same route as the parade and take place before the parade commences so people are engaged. Whoever wins this race will win a prize of €500. We have come up with actions we want players to take during the game as a means of trying to promote Dublin City Bikes. These actions include recommending and sharing their progress to their friends via Facebook. As well as recommending and sharing their progress with others, players can show off and compete against others, and explore by being the furthest person to travel based on kilometres. These actions have been organised based on order of importance and are included in Appendix D2. Recommend and share have been included as the most important actions as these will be vital in increasing brand awareness for Dublin Bikes. 21 There will be several different leaderboards for the game. For each leaderboard, points and levelings are accumulative over the lifetime of using the app. One of the leaderboards will level players based on how frequently they will use the Dublin Bikes. Frequency is based on trips. Points are related to the levelling system. One trip is equal to one point, two trips is two points and so forth. A trip has to be a genuine journey on the bike. For example, one trip can be a journey to and from work. The second leaderboard we will have will be one for distance travelled. Again the points system is based on one point per kilometre. Once the user gains a certain number of points they will move up to the next level. Considering that everyone uses the Dublin Bikes for different purposes we thought it would be appropriate to have several different leaderboards to encourage more people to utilise the bikes. In addition, users have the opportunity to earn extra points if they share their progress and recommend the game to their friends. A maximum of three extra points will be allocated for each share and recommenda tio n sent. Those within level one to three will be categorised under “Fred & Doris”, these are the newbie cyclists and may not have had much experience when it comes to cycling. Level four to seven will be known as “Chaser”. Chasers see themselves as go- getters. Once they have a feel for the game they will be encouraged to outperform others. Finally, those who are ranked between levels eight to ten will be given the title “Roadie”. These players are devotee cyclists and seek to stay ahead of their competitors at all times. Avatars for each category are given in Appendix D3. 22 Rewards given at each level: Cyclists Level Points Rewards Level 1 1 Tea/ Coffee Coupon Level 2 10 Free Smoothie at Jump Juice Level 3 25 Free packet of energy bars Level 4 50 Free Salad at Chopped Level 5 100 Free backpack with water bottle and weatherproof Category Fred & Doris Chaser jacket Level 6 200 Voucher for Penneys Level 7 400 Discount at local cycling shop Level 8 600 Zoo Voucher Level 9 1200 Dinner for Two Level 10 2000 Spa Treatment Roadie 23 Events Events will only be held seasonally akin to scavenger hunts. There will be scavenger hunts implemented for each holiday. The scavenger hunt will vary based upon the holiday and will encourage users to explore different parts of the city and carry out fun tasks. These tasks will be either checking in at various places or purchasing specific items. These scavenger hunts do not interfere with the leaderboards but are meant to encourage group activities and encourage a more competitive side to our users. In essence, the events throughout the year pose an extra element to the game which present variety and extra challenges to long time users and newcomers alike. There will be different rewards at the end of each scavenger hunt. The reward will be related to the holiday. Cyclists must complete each task of the scavenger hunt to be eligible to earn extra points which will contribute to their position on the leaderboard. Technical Execution This Gamification will be part of the current Dublin Bikes App. To track the user on their journey, the user needs to activate the app by using it to get the bikes. The app will then track their route using GPS information on their phone. Checking in at the target location will end the tracking. The information about the progress and general account information will be stored in the cloud at a local server, hence users need to create an account to participate. Wireframes 24 4.5 Conclusion: My personal objective has been achieved. I now understand how to make a mobile app dedicated to marketing purposes. I have also learned that Gamification is different to a typical mobile application. Both are different in the sense that they incorporate different elements and different objectives. The purpose of a gamified app is for promotion while the typical app is for entertainment. Gamification has been valuable to me as it afforded me the opportunity to enhance my knowledge in marketing skills which I had no prior experience of. If I were to do this activity again, I would like to create an app and monitor its results. Unfortunately, we did not have the time or expertise to create the app but I thoroughly enjoyed designing it. 25 Section 5: Google Online Marketing Challenge 5.1 Introduction: The Google Online Marketing Challenge (GOMC) was the second group project of this portfolio. The GOMC is a programme which encourages third level students to use their analytical skills and create an AdWords campaign for a live client. The provision of a $250 budget is used to develop and run this campaign. Similar to the email marketing campaign, I chose to take part in this activity because, as part of our Practicum we have been asked to carry out an AdWords campaign for our client. As AdWords involves the use of money to be spent in ensuring ads are shown, it was vital that I had prior experience in allocating the budget across the campaign before being given money from our Practicum client. Secondly, I have completed the Google AdWords Certification and wanted to put what I had learned into practice. My personal objective was to see how effective AdWords is in advertising companies. The goal was to increase impressions and clicks to our client’s website: www.p1nutrition.com. 5.2 Overview of Activity: The first step in carrying out this campaign was to apply to Google to enter the challenge. After we were selected we were allocated a client. Our client were P1 Nutrition, a company who seek to be the “Red Bull” of motorsport. Their aim is to be the leading brand in terms of motorsport nutrition through the offering of ‘race fuel’ to racing drivers. Once allocated our client, we met as a group to brainstorm potential questions to ask P1 Nutrition in our first meeting. After questions were proposed we contacted our client and organised a Skype meeting. Once we had all relevant information needed we submitted a pre-campaign report to Google for approval. After being given a budget of $250 it was then time to set up the campaign. Setting up the campaign required the following steps: 1. Outline campaign objectives and goals the objectives for this campaign was to increase sales and conversions by increasing traffic to the website and increasing brand awareness. As for goals we hoped for five conversions, five email sign- ups and a 25% increase in website traffic per month. 2. Select which network to run campaigns we selected the Search Network to target those searching directly for motorsport nutrition to increase sales. The Display Network 26 was used to place advertisements on websites related to racing supplements to increase brand awareness. 3. Create ad groups the ad groups we chose were ‘race fuel’, ‘pre- race fuel’, ‘shake and take’, ‘drink bottle’ and ‘shaker’. 4. Select keywords we added keywords related to motorsport nutrition and motorsport supplements. We added ‘sport’, ‘nutrition’ and ‘supplements’ as negative keywords are these a very broad keywords. 5. Design the advertisements the text ad for the campaign was created. This ad contained a headline, a meta description and a URL linking consumers to the ‘product’ page for the sales campaign, and the ‘about’ page for the brand awareness one. 6. Advanced settings are applied we chose to use geo-targeting and target those in London, where the majority of their target market are based. We also targeted laptops as their website is not mobile optimised. Ad rotation was set to ensure the best performing ads were shown so as not to waste the budget on unproductive ads. 7. Allocate budget we sought to allocate the least amount of budget to the first week and increase it in week two and three. As this was our first AdWords campaign, we did not want to assign the most budget in the first week to mitigate the risk of an exhausted budget and the campaign failing. However, the budget was not adhered to as some ads and keywords performed better than others, thus making us adjust the budget to cater for this. After the plan had been drafted, we set up our campaign and let it run for three weeks until the budget was exhausted. During the three weeks we ensured the account was checked every second day to assure ads and keywords were performing as expected. When they were performing poorly we adjusted the bids. Following that we had to submit a post-campaign report to Google which detailed results of our campaign, including key metrics. 5.3 Findings: The brand awareness campaign did better overall than the sales campaign. It achieved 628,320 impressions and 478 clicks with a CTR of approximately 0.08%. In contrast, the sales campaign only received 84,223 impressions and 152 clicks. The campaigns had an average cost-per-click (CPC) and cost-per-impression (CPM) of $0.37 and $0.49, respectively. The brand awareness 27 campaign also used up most of the budget, $175.98, but this is a given as the campaign received the most impressions and clicks. For the awareness campaign, the second week performed the best with 398,320 impressio ns and 302 clicks. However, for the sales campaign the last week, week three, received the most impressions and clicks (Table 2). Campaign Clicks Impressions Weeks 1 2 3 1 Brand Awareness 18 302 158 31,967 398,320 198,033 Sales 57 44 51 18,550 28,502 37,171 2 3 Table 2 The pre-race fuel ad group was the most popular for the brand awareness campaign with 628,152 impressions and 478 clicks. On the other hand, the race fuel ad group proved most successful for the sales campaign generating nearly 45,000 impressions and 87 clicks. With regards to keywords, the top three were ‘motor racing’, ‘motor sport’ and ‘motorsports’ with a CTR of 0.04%, 0.17% and 0.22%, accordingly. 5.4 Conclusion: Our client did not have conversion tracking set up on their Google Analytics. We were therefore unable to track conversions. We should have made sure that this was set up before implementing the campaign. Knowing how many conversions the campaign led to would have been vital in measuring the success of our campaign and informing future campaigns. The GOMC proved invaluable to me in experiencing AdWords before setting off to run a big campaign for one of Ireland’s leading charities, Enable Ireland. With AdWords students need to take a “learn by doing” approach. As the activity is very mechanical, theory and completing the AdWords certificate is not enough to gain knowledge into the PPC (pay-per-click) environment. 28 Conclusion Completing this portfolio has proven beneficial to me in learning new digital marketing skills and enhancing previously learnt ones. I feel that this portfolio will be of importance in trying to find employment. It details some, not all, of the skills I acquired over my time at Dublin City University in the MSc in Digital Marketing programme. Previously learnt skills include Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), the creation of an eBook and a digital marketing plan. One of the main values received from this project was the application of theory to a real life scenario. The application of theory proved vital in ensuring activities could be carried out effectively and ensured best practices were adhered to where possible. Working as part of a team for Gamification and the Google Online Marketing Challenge (GOMC) allowed for shared knowledge and skills between each team member. By working with a live client it also gave me the opportunity to work in a professional environment whereby meetings had to be organised frequently with the client and there had to be open communica tio n in terms of how the campaign was progressing. Finally, I have proved that the activities outlined above are all useful for marketers, in particular digital marketers, in attracting consumers and getting them to interact with a brand. I found that photo sharing social media platforms and email marketing are the most effective in targeting consumers but AdWords and online advertising is effective in attracting individ ua ls as a paid medium. 29 Bibliography Delve, 2011. Dublin Bikes Survey, Dublin: Dublin City Council. Dublin Bikes, 2016. Coca-Cola Zero dublinbikes - latest figures. [Online] Available at: http://www.dublinbikes.ie/ [Accessed 10 May 2016]. Fishman, E., 2015. Bikeshare: A review of recent literature. Transport Reviews, pp.1-22. Houston, J. M. and Smither, R.D., 1992. The nature of competitiveness: The development and validation of the competitiveness index. Educational and Psychological Measurement, 52 (2), 407-418. Kelly, O., 2016. DUBLIN BIKES SUBSCRIPTION FEE SET TO INCREASE BY 50%. [Online] Available at: http://www.irishtimes.com/news/environment/dublin-bikes-subscription-fee-setto-increase-by- [Accessed [Accessed 10 May 2016]. Murphy, E. and Usher, J., 2011. An Analysis of the Role of Bicycle-Sharing In a European City: The Case of Dublin, Ireland. Irish Transport Research Network. Ogilvie, F. and Goodman, A., 2012. Inequalities in usage of a public bicycle sharing scheme: socio-demographic predictors of uptake and usage of the London (UK) cycle hire scheme. Preventive medicine, 55 (1), pp.40-45. Petronzio, M., 2015. Bike-sharing is taking off around the world. [Online] Available at: http://mashable.com/2015/04/07/bike-sharing-systems-worldwide/#JvoCiFe43ZqE [Accessed 07 May 2016]. Statista GmbH, 2016. Number of paid mobile app downloads worldwide from 2011 to 2017 (in billions). [Online] Available at: http://www.statista.com/statistics/241589/number-of-pa idmobile-app-downloads-worldwide/ [Accessed 10 May 2016]. The Economist, 2013. How do bike-sharing schemes shape cities? The Economist, 22 October. [Online] Available at: http://www.economist.com/blogs/economis t- explains/2013/10/economist-explains-14 [Accessed 10 May 2016]. 30 Appendices Section 4 Appendix D1 (target personas): John is a 28-year-old single professional who works in Dublin city centre and lives in Glasnevin. He dislikes public transport for getting into town every day and is looking for alternatives. Taking the car is impractical due to the price of parking and expenses associated with owning a vehicle. John works as a Digital Marketer with HubSpot. Martha is a 24-year-old single mother who works as a healthcare assistant in her local nursing home. As she is the only source of income in her household and has a young child who needs looking after, she cannot afford to buy a car or spend money on the bus and Luas daily. She prefers to walk places but as the factory is a 40 minute walk she feels it is faster to cycle. As cycling is not a passion of hers she feels it would be worth trying it out if there were an incentive. Sarah is a student at University College Dublin but lives in the city centre. She must travel to college everyday by bus. However, she does not like the bus as it is often unreliable, especially in the mornings when there is loads of traffic. She is currently seeking alternatives to the bus. By integrating some form of game into the Dublin Bikes app, she feels it will make her cycle to college more interesting as she loves competition and out performing others. 84 31 Mark attends Trinity as a part- time student. During the day he works as a finance consultant but in the evenings he attends classes. He finds it hard to get from one side of the city, where he works, to the other in the evenings with the traffic. He mostly uses the Luas to get from place to place but with the recent construction he finds it a nuisance. He is debating whether to sign up to Dublin Bikes or purchase his own. Appendix D2 (player actions): 32 Appendix D3 (cyclist categorisation): Fred & Doris Chaser Roadie 33