Marketing Plan

BSU Bears List
By Group 6,
Molly Viscarra
December7,2016

Section1:Executive Summary
The BSU BearsList Facebookpage needsmore awareness. We can dothisby tellingpeople
whatthe page isabout and helpingstudentsrealize they canmake moneyoff of the itemstheydonot
use anymore ratherthan justthrowingthemina closetor inthe trash. In our studywe foundthat
people are willingtospreadawarenessof the BSUBearsList Facebookpage if there were more
followersandmore advertisingof the page. We will implementourstrategiesatthe beginningof the
Spring2017 semester,startingwithtransformingthe BSUBearsListFacebookpage by givingita new
name (BSU Buy andSell),andchangingthe coverphototo somethingthat will grabfollowers’attention.
We believe thatbythe endof the Spring2017 semester,we will have 50% ormore followersthanwhat
we have rightnow.
Section2:Purpose of Study
The purpose of our studyof the BSU Bears ListFacebookpage is to see how we can gainmore
followerstothe page and howwe can increase followerinteractionwiththe page. We will increase
boththe followersandfollowerinteractionbycreatingmore awarenesstothe page inhopesthat
people willuse ittosell unwanteditems,andbuythingstheyneedfordiscountedprices. Thispage is
similartopageslike Craigslist,butitisbetterbecause the priceswill be lowerinorderforcollege
studentstoaffordthe itemsbeingsold.
Section3:BSU Bears List Current Situation
The BSU BearsList Facebookpage’stargetaudience isBridgewaterState Universitystudents
whoare lookingtomake some moneybysellingthingsthattheydonot needanymore suchasbooks
and furniture. Accordingtothe BSU BearsList Facebookpage,it has gained47 followersoverthe past
11 months. There isonlyone administratoronthisFacebookpage. We are currentlylookingtogain
followersonthe page throughdifferentmarketingstrategiessuchaspostersand advertisements.

Section4:S.W.O.T. Analysis
Section5:Secondary ResearchFindings
How to Gain Followers on Facebook
Accordingto Kolowich (2015) in “Howto Get Your FirstReal 1,000Facebook Fans”, there are six stepsto
take to get people tofollow and“like”youFacebookpage
1. Make sure youfill outyour Facebookpage completely,withoutleavingoutanypertinent
information(anAbout section,how touse the page,etc.).

2. Invite yourFacebookfriendstofollow yourpage usingthe “Invite”optiononyourFacebook
page.
3. Gain followersthroughothernetworkssuchasyour email andTwitter.
4. Optimize yourFacebookpage withasmanybuttonsas possible suchaslike,share,and
commentbuttons.
5. Use Facebookadvertisingtogrow yourfan base.
6. Imbeda “like”buttononotherwebsitessuchasblogsyoumay have thatleadpeople toyour
Facebookpage.

Porterfield(2014) talksabout howto gainmore followersonFacebookinherarticle “How to Attract
More FacebookFans(WithoutWastingYourTime!)”. She saysthat it isimportanttolinkyourbusiness
Facebookpage withyourpersonal Facebooksoyoucan share thingson bothpages. Porterfieldalso
says“usingFacebookto buildyouremail listwithyourideal audienceisaverysmart strategy”.
How to Increase Follower Interaction on Facebook
Accordingto BrandonLeibowitzof the PostPlannerinhisarticle “How To Increase Facebook
ContentShareabilityIn7 EasySteps”one of the bestwaysto increase followerinteractiononyour
Facebookpage isto make sure you are postingthe righttypesof posts. Accordingto hisgraph,the
poststhat getthe mostsharesand likesare questionposts,secondare image posts,followedbyvideos,
links,giveaways,andcoupons/discounts. LeibowitzsaysthatsharingvideosonyourFacebookpage is
alsoan importantwayto increase interactionwithfollowers. Makingpostingsatthe right time of day,
on the rightdays isalsoimportantfor businesseswhoare lookingfortheirfollowersto interactwith
theirpostsmore often.
AaronLee says inhisarticle “8 Surefire WaysToIncrease EngagementFacebook”thatcontest
are a great wayto get Facebookfollowers andfansengagedinyourpage. Lee says“notonlydoesthis
rewardloyal fans,butalsoit createsexcitementandwill getuserstovisityourFacebookpage
frequentlytocheckif theyhave won”.
Patel (2015) says inhisarticle “13 SecretsThat’ll BoostYour FacebookOrganicReach” thatthe
popularityof videosonFacebookisgrowingmore andmore throughoutthe years,sothisisdefinitelya
goodway to increase interactionwithfollowers. Patel sayssome tipsfora successful Facebookvideois
to keepitshortand to the point,make sure that it looksprofessional,andmake sure inthe firstfew
secondsthere isa lotof movementtogetpeople engaged.

Section6:Primary ResearchFindings
Focus Group Report
Summary of Project:
Group 6, Molly Viscarra held two focus groups involving various student populations represented at the
university, including males and females, marketing majors, communications majors, and most people in
their 20s.
Through the focus groups, we gathered information about how we can improve our Facebook page, the
BSU Bear’s List, and how we can get people to pay attention to the Facebook page. We also wanted to
gain more followers as well as a marketing strategy to grab our audience’s attention.
Introduction
Group #6 held two focus group discussions with eight students. The focus groups were conducted as
part of our project BSU Bears List Facebook page. Participants provided information via group
discussion.
The discussion was designed to gather information from the students in regard to the following outcomes:
1. Increase number of Facebook followers
2. Increase interaction with Facebook followers
Participant Demographics
8 of participants took part in the focus group:
 We had seven women in our focus groups and one man in our focus groups
 The ages of our focus groups ranged from 20 to 24 years old.

 Three of the students in our focus groups were management majors, two of the students in our
focus groups were communications majors, one student in our focus groups was an art major,
and one student in our focus groups was an education major.
Summary of Findings
Category 1: Social Media
Question 1/Answers relating to Category 1
Question: Do you have a Facebook?
Answers:
 Seven of the eight people we talked to in our focus groups had a Facebook.
 There was one person in our out-of-class focus group who did not have a Facebook, but we
thought that it was not really a big deal because he could still tell people knew about the BSU
Bears List Facebook, so that still contributed to getting the word out about the page.
Question 2/Answers relating to outcome 1
Question: How often are you on social media/What platform do you use the most?
Answers:
 Most of the people we talked to, seven to eight people, said they use Facebook and scroll
through it a few times a day; probably about 5-10 times a day.
 People also said that they use Instagram as well, but don’t post that much on that social media
platform.
 Few people said they used Twitter, but we did have one person who used Twitter the most out
of the three main social media platforms, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter
 One person said that she did not really use Facebook that often because she is too worried
about school and other things going on in her life, so she does not really have time to spend a
lot of time on Facebook.
Question: Do you follow any brands on Facebook?
 Of the eight people we had in our focus groups, little to no people said they followed brands
on Facebook
 If they did follow brands on Facebook, they were mostly restaurants or Facebook pages of TV
shows or movies they liked on Facebook when they were in high school or when they first got
a Facebook.
 In our in-class focus group most of the people said the pages they did follow on Facebook
were brands they were interested in. Sometimes they would find them on the “Suggested” tab
on Facebook or pages that their friends on Facebook have followed.
Category 2: Use of buy and resale websites or resources
Question: Do you use Craigslist for anything
Answers:
 A lot of people said they had used Craigslist to buy their first car when they were in high school.
 None of the people in either of our focus groups said they currently use Craigslist for anything.

Question: Do you feel safe using websites like Craigslist?
Answers:
 The girls who we had in each of our focus groups said they would bring someone with them if
they were to buy something on Facebook.
 The girls also brought up the point that people selling things on these websites may not be who
they say they are and people may lie. They also said sometimes they feel sketchy using them.
 The male we had in our out-of-class focus group said he would bring someone, but he would
feel safe.
Question: What do you normally do with books or things you don’t use anymore?
 About half of the people in our focus groups said that they don’t do anything with their books
once they are done using them. These same people said they would just put their old
furniture out on the curb for free for people to take and not sell it on a resale website.
 The other half of the people in our focus groups said they would sell their books back to the
BSU bookstore.
Category 3: Awareness of Facebook Page
Question: Do you know about the BSU Bears List Facebook page?
 All of the people in our out-of-class focus group said they did not know about the BSU Bears
List Facebook page
 For our in-class focus group the unanimous answer was “I only knew about it from this class”.
Question: How, if at all, did you find out about the BSU Bears Lit Facebook page?
 Of the people in our in-class focus group, two people said they knew about it because it was
posted in the AMA Facebook page
Category 4: Usage of BSU Bears List Facebook Page
Question: Would you be interested in using/”liking” the BSU Bears List Facebook page to sell your
things? (books, furniture, etc.)
 Every person in both of focus groups said they would be willing to use the page if there were
more people following it
 Since there is little to nothing on the Facebook page and only 47 followers, people said they
did not really know about it so, at this time, they would not be interested in following the page.
 One person, the same person who said she did not really use Facebook that much because of
school and other commitments, said, even knowing she could make some money from selling
her things on the page, she probably would still not like the page.
 A couple people said that they may use it the end of the semester when they are moving out
of their apartments.

Question: Would you use the page for more than just selling books?
 Every person said yes. They said they would also use it for furniture as well.
Category 5: Marketing Strategies
Question: What would interest you in liking the BSU Bears List Facebook page?
 Everyone that we talked to said they would be more interested in following our Facebook page
if they knew more information about it,
 They also said that if there were posters around campus promoting the Facebook page
Question: Do you think posters and flyers would grab people’s attention to the BSU Bears List
Facebook Page?
 Everyone said yes. They all said that bright colors would be good to use because that’s what
people gravitate towards.
Question: If we were to have a table in, say, the RCC, do you think that would grab people’s
attention and/or encourage people follow the BSU Bears List Facebook page?
 Everyone in both focus groups said that would be a great idea.
 The people in our in-class focus group suggested that it would be a good idea to hand out free
things if people followed our page.
 In our out-of-class focus group, some people said it would be a good idea to promote the BSU
Bears List page on other social media platforms, both personal and BSU related. They also
said it would be a good idea to promote on the actual Bridgewater State website.
Question: Would you tell other students about the BSU Bears List page/Do you think students would
tell each other about the page?
 Both focus groups said they would tell other students about the Facebook page and
encourage people to like it once it gets up and running with more followers.
Overall recommendations: Other recommendations we received from people, both in the in and out of
class focus groups were that the name of the Facebook page should be change and set it to a “buy and
sell” page. Everyone in each group said that the name “BSU Bears List” did not sound like something
associated with Craigslist. They also said that the name sounds like a club, and some people even
associated it with the Dean’s List at Bridgewater State. A couple people, including the professor, also
said that there is an option on Facebook pages like this to make it a “buy and sell” page, where we can
set it to that and people can know if an item is sold or not.
The one male we talked to said he thought that the BSU bookstore was “going to be
competition for the BSU Bears List Facebook page”, and said the bookstore may lose money if enough
people use the Facebook page. He also said “the bookstore may tell you to shut it down if they lose too
much money”.

Section7: Objective 1 Increasing Followers
1. We will promote BSU Bears List Facebook page on other BSU social media platforms like
Snapchat, Facebook and Twitter. Also, we will promote the Facebook page on the BSU
website as well. On these sites, we will tell people that our page is a place for students
to sell and buy items for discounted prices. Implementation: Promote BSU Bears List
Facebook page by snapping, tweeting, and posting everyday on different social media
platforms, and toward the end of the semester there will be higher frequency of
snapping, tweeting and posting. This will increase followers by 10% each
month.

2. Regularlyleave thoughtful commentsinresponse tootherpeople‘spostsonotherBSU
Facebookpages. We can also commentonpoststhat people make onourpage and make sure
to answercommentsandquestionsonourpage ina timelymanner. Implementation:Check
otherBSU Facebookpagesmonthlytosee whattheyare doingandread the commentstheyare
leavingonpostsontheirpages. We needto respondtothe commentsandquestionsonthe
BSU Bears ListFacebookpage within10 minutesinorderto keeppeoplesatisfied. Thiswill
increase followersby10%each month.
3. We will create posterstohangup inthe dorms andin buildingslike the RCCthathave a lot of
trafficflow. Whenmakingthe posterswe will use brightcolorsthatwill grabpeople’sattention.
We will getpeopletoreadthe postersbyusingcolorslike redand black,whichare the school
colors,so people will be drawntothemandwant to readthem. Implementation:We will hang
these flyersandpostersthroughoutthe school year,butmake abig tri-foldposterandputit on
displayona table inthe RCC closerto the endof eachsemester,possiblyinlate Aprilandlate
November. Thiswill increase followersby10% eachmonth.
4. We needtotransformthe BSU BearsList Facebookpage tomake it lookmore appealingtoour
audience. Thisincludeschangingthe name of the Facebookpage tosomethingthatstudents
will associate withbuyingandsellingitems. Forexample we canchange the name to “BSU Buy
and Sell”. We will use colorsthatwill grabpeople’sattention,suchasredand black. We also
needtochange the graphicinthe page as well tosomethingthatwill fitonthe screen. Also,we
shouldaddan “About”tab on the page thatwill tell people whatourpage isabout.
Implementation:We will change the BSU BearsList Facebookpage assoon as possible
(December2016) to make it more appealing. We will also make periodicchangestothe page,

maybe once every monthor once everyothermonth,orwheneverneeded. Thisstrategywill
increase followersby50%in6 months. Because of the low numberof followersof the page at
thistime,thisstrategywill probablybe the easiesttogainthe mostfollowers.
Section8: Objective 2 Increase Follower Interactions
1. To increase followerinteractiononthe BSUBears ListFacebookpage,we can make a video
tutorial onhowto use ourpage andwhat to use our page for. Followersonourpage will see
thisvideo,andtheycan like andshare itwiththeirFacebookfriendsorotherstudentswhogoto
BSU. Implementation:We will create thisvideoatthe beginningof the semester (January2017)
inhopesthat studentswill share itinhopesthatbythe endof the semestermore studentswill
knowhowto use our page. Thisstrategywill increase the numberof sharesby10% eachmonth.
2. Postingarticlesonthe BSU Bears ListFacebookpage will increase followerinteractionbecause
the articleswe postwill be onesthatBSU studentscanrelate toand that will evoke emotion.
Thiswill increase followerinteractionbecauseBSUstudentswill like andshare these articles,
especiallyif theypertaintothemselvesandotherpeopletheyknow. Implementation:We will
postthese articlesonthe BSU BearsList Facebookpage weeklyorevenafew timesaweekto
increase sharesonthe page. By postingarticlesonthe Facebookpage,itwill increase sharesby
10% eachmonth.

3. BSU studentswill likeBSUBearsList Facebookpage,share an article we postonour page on
your personal Facebookpage,andbe enteredintoaraffle foraprize. Thiswill increase
followersandfollowerinteractionbecausestudents willshare the articlesaswell assee the
articlesthatpeople share. Itwill alsoincrease followersbecause peoplewillwant“Like”our
page in orderto getenteredintoourraffle fora free prize. Implementation:We will holdthis
contestonce every monthor everyothermonthinorderto increase followersandfollower
interaction. Usingthisstrategywill increase followersandfollowerinteractionby50% in 6
months.
Section 9:Conclusion
By the endof our study,we foundthatpeople wouldbe very interestedinusingthe BSUBears
List Facebookpage if there were more followersandmore people knewaboutit. We needtoraise
more awarenessof the page and tell peoplewhatitisaboutso theywill use itona regularbasis.
Whendoingour focusgroups,people were verywillingtogive theiropinionsonthe page,aswell as
give ustheirsuggestionsonhowwe couldimprove the page. College studentsare alwayslookingto
make money,sothispage wouldbe the perfectplace tomake moneyas well asbuyingitemsthey
may needfordiscountedpricestheynotsee anywhere else. Thispage issimilartootherpageslike
CraigslistandAmazon,butitis easierforBSU studentstouse because itisright oncampus within
the BSU community. Althoughthe BSUBookstore maybe our competition,we feel asthoughonce
we get a lotof followersandthe page upand running, people will utilize the BSUBearsList page and
theywill reallylike it. We feel veryconfidentinourmarketingstrategiestogetthe BSU BearsList
Facebookpage upand running.

Sources
5 Ways to Improve YourFacebookEngagement.(2012,October10). Social Media Examiner
Retrievedfrom http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/improve-facebook-engagement/
How to GetYour First 1,000 Real FacebookFans[Infographic].(2015,June 24). HubSpot.
Retrievedfrom https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/get-facebook-f
fans#sm.0001x568096z5do7qzj20tkezzxed
13 SecretsThat’ll BoostYour FacebookOrganicReach.(2015, September27). Neil Patel.
Retrievedfrom http://neilpatel.com/2015/09/27/13-secrets-thatll-boost-your-facebook-
organic-reach/
How To Increase FacebookContentShareabilityIn7Easy Steps.(n.d.). PostPlanner.
Retrievedfrom http://www.postplanner.com/blog/how-to-increase-facebook-content-
shareability/

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