2. Eater SF (https://twitter.com/eatersf)
•An online publication that recommends restaurants and bars in San Francisco
•Other social media: Blog, Facebook, Google+, Pinterest
Example from laptop
Consumers
Design
Frequency
Fans from blog
Plain background
No video
Few rough photos
Rarely update
pictures
6-8 times/day is
good because
followers will see
plenty of choices
around the city
Marketers
Show the company logo
as a profile image
Less design
Frequently tweets
increase the number of
audience’s exposures
3. Eater SF (https://twitter.com/eatersf)
Example from
mobile phone
Consumers
Marketers
Strategies
Link Twitter to blog
to increase its
advertising exposure
Blog can provide
more information
Followers can’t
view information
instantaneously
Increase blog traffic via
other social media
Make money from
advertising fee
One trick makes
followers bored (wearout)
Tactics
Restaurants and
bars over the San
Francisco
Too short
explanation
Blog link on the top of
the page
Few hastags (#) and
add sign (@)
Lack of catchy words
4. Chaophraya Thai (https://twitter.com/ChaophrayaThai)
•Thai restaurant in England: Birmingham, Glasgow, Leeds, Liverpool
•Other media: website, Facebook
Consumers
Marketers
Design
Simple and
Consistency design
modern Thai design
Location of each
Eye catching vivid Restaurant on the first
orange
page and tweets
Nice food and
beverage pictures
Updated event
photos
Frequency
Unpredictable
tweet timing
No tweet on
Weekend
Below average when
compares to other
companies in the food
industry
Example
from laptop
5. Chaophraya Thai (https://twitter.com/ChaophrayaThai)
Consumers
Strategies
Tactics
Marketers
Communicate with
Customers, asking opinions
about the quality of food
and service to satisfy
customer’s needs and
Increase number of loyal
customers
Building relationships by
providing friendly and sincere
tweets to create the positive
image and personality
Too many tweets on
answering questions might
decrease an awareness of new
content
Ask for retweet
Note comments after @
to communicate with
followers
Note location after @ to
avoid location confusion
Emphasized catchy words
after # to get attention
Website links at the top
of the page and to other
interesting bloggers
Not overuse links to its
website
Short non-formal language
Always responds to followers
Example from
mobile phone
6. Thai Food in SF (https://twitter.com/ThaiFoodinSF)
Simple direct meaning, Easy to remember & explore
Intention: recommend food by pictures and comments
Content: restaurant types, business hours, locations, contact info,
new items, signature dishes, spicy rating, price, special promotions
Target industry: restaurants
Primary target: Thai food lovers who live in the San Francisco Bay
Area aged 18-35,e ager to try new tastes of different cultures, love
to share their favorites with friends through smart phones and
laptops, heavy users on social media
Secondary target: Thai restaurant owners and the restaurant
promoters, such as Thai beer outlets and Thai grocery stores, that
prefer to know consumers insights to promote their businesses
From
mobile phone
7. Thai Food in SF (https://twitter.com/ThaiFoodinSF)
Logo
Brand identities
1.
2.
3.
4.
Logo: chili = spicy taste, fork = meal,
Thai modern style in English font
“Thai Food in SF is a kind of eating tool
to be used when followers want to find
delicious Thai food”
Color: orange enhance human appetite
and it signifies mild to medium spicy
Also, orange makes the header and
links stand out to capture reader’s
attention
Background picture: Pad Thai is the
most famous Thai food in American’s
perspectives
Bright & colorful = fresh & appetizing
Biography: To use catchy word that
motivates reader’s curiosity and
imaginative actions
Overall page
Biography
8. Thai Food in SF (https://twitter.com/ThaiFoodinSF)
Purpose: introduce special menu of Sai Jai Thai
Strategy: use depiction words and keep them short
Tactics:
1.
Catchy words about food to increase positive emotion
2.
Mobile phone text feeling to make readers get message quickly
3.
# for readers to search keywords, @ for location
4.
Real address for readers who want to go to the restaurant
5.
Short link from tiny.com
6.
Link from yelp, one of the most powerful food recommendation media
7.
Real-time picture
8.
Posted around lunch time
Purpose: inform the restaurant’s sale promotion
Strategy: provide complete information
Tactics:
1.
# on emphasized words, @ location
2.
Emotion word
3.
Short words
4.
Mai Thai is the signature Thai cocktail
5.
Sale promotion word
6.
Specific location and time
7.
Short link from tiny.com
8.
Add picture of Mai Thai
Editor's Notes
I found companies involved in the food industry by searching from the specific areas. Therefore, my keywords are #san francisco, #sf, #thai, #thai food, #yummy, and #bangkok. Then, I selected two Twitter accounts having the most followers among companies that showed up after my search.
Eater SF
Eater is an online publication that recommends restaurants and bars in many cities in the U.S. Therefore, Eater SF is an Eater’s sub-site that provides content specifically in San Francisco. It publicizes news and activities via several social media such as blog (http://sf.eater.com), Twitter (https://twitter.com/eatersf), Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/eatersf), Google Plus (https://plus.google.com/+eater/posts), and Pinterest (http://pinterest.com/eaterdotcom/). On September 25, 2012, the Twitter of Eater SF has 5,727 tweets, 56 followings, and 19,564 followers.
Design
From the consumer’s perspective, the background of Eater SF Twitter is very plain as it has only one color, white. Eater SF twitter has no video and only a few rough snapshot pictures. Additionally, most of pictures are not often uploaded. For example, the last was likely to have been taken by mobile phone and uploaded on March 13, 2012. The overall design has nothing interesting. Most of the existing fans probably follow from the base media, its blog.
From marketer’s perspective, it is a good strategy to use Eater logo as a profile image because it makes Eater fans recognize and then follow. Less design may be ok on mobile phone when audiences are on the go. However, regular audiences who are not Eater fans may feel less excited and not impressed when they visit the Twitter on their laptops. Consequently, they probably turn to other companies’ pages.
Frequency
From consumer’s perspective, frequently tweets are the reason why Eater SF has numerous followers. Food and places are recommended around 7 to 8 times per day. As a result of hourly fascinating spots posting, followers have plenty choices. They may check the information when they feel hungry. For example, I can scroll back to search the type of food I like or the place that is convenient to visit such as Thai food and Sushi restaurants nearby my home.
From marketer’s perspective, frequently tweets increase the number of audience’s exposures. Even though 6-8 times per day is quite below the number of good Twitter accounts tweet, Eater SF creates an acceptable compensation by providing full information on its blog including beautiful pictures of food and place, signature dishes, many links, and other useful information for food lovers.
Strategies
From consumer’s perspective, Eater SF links its tweets to its blog. This may be a good strategy for laptop users because the blog is able to provide detailed information than Twitter. On the other hand, mobile phone users sometimes do not wish to leave the site and mostly need instantaneous information. The company intends to drag audiences to its blog to increase their advertiser exposure. This is good for them but wastes audience’s time. To have better content, the company might add some photos for mobile users to have a quick review. If they are interested in that food or restaurant, they can click for more information in the blog.
From marketer’s perspective, Eater SF strategy is to drive readers from Twitter as well as its other social media to the blog. Doing so, the blog will have higher traffic and the company will make money from advertising. However, linking to the blog is the only one trick the company offers and it makes readers bored. The company can either go to food events, or hold food competitions in cooperation with restaurants, bars, and advertisers to make all participants’ names be more well-known and have higher profits. For example, the company can quote the “sponsored by …” to promote its advertisers.
Tactics
From consumer’s perspective, a good tactic of Eater SF is that restaurants and bars that are posted cover many districts in San Francisco, so food lovers can try new tastes at new places. An example of bad tactic is a short explanation. Eater SF always posts only the abbreviation, the name of the food, or the place without location and pictures. To build more engagement with followers, the company should have voting, retweet, or asking opinion activities.
From marketer’s perspective, a good tactic is that the company put its blog link on the top of the page. Readers can see it easily and are able to find more information. Bad tactics are a few hastags (#) and add sign (@). Having these two symbols can increase the amount of searched content and number of followers respectively. Another bad tactics is the lack of catchy words. Food recommendation should motivate readers to explore the special dish or feel curios to try the dish. Possible words can be yummy, delicious, food, taste, and so on.
Chaophraya Thai is the Thai restaurant located in many cities in England including Birmingham, Glasgow, Leeds, and Liverpool. Its URL is https://twitter.com/ChaophrayaThai. The restaurant uses Twitter to communicate with its customers and also announce its activities to other followers. Other media are the website (http://www.chaophraya.co.uk/) and Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/chaophrayathai). On September 26, 2012, the Twitter of Eater SF has 2,027 tweets, 2,009 followings, and 3,250 followers.
Design
In consumer’s perspectives, the background is simple beauty and presents Thai graphic design in a modern mood and tone. This pattern is also used in the profile image but implements in more vivid orange to catch the audience’s attention. Food and beverage pictures are nicely done by photographers and they are able to make the viewers mouth-watering. Additionally, many photos of restaurant events are often posted such as grand opening, concerts, the in-restaurant atmosphere, and much more. Even though some of them are snapshot photos, it shows real time feedback.
In a marketer’s perspective, using similar Thai pattern design to both logo and background makes the consistency brand identity. Furthermore, it is good that the restaurant twitter has addresses of each city at the bottom left of the page because readers can select the place that they feel convenience to go. Due to limited space on a mobile phone, both the background and the restaurant locations can be viewed only on a laptop. Chaophraya Thai solves the problem well by adding specific locations when it tweets.
Frequency
In a consumer’s perspective, Chaophraya Thai’s tweet timing is unpredictable. The range of tweets is around 3-8 times per day and none on weekends. Even though the company tweets during its business hours, which is noon – 11p.m., less number of posting reduces the chance of content exposure. In other words, fed content from other companies often push Chaophraya Thai’s content out of the first page.
In marketer’s perspective, the restaurant’s frequency of posting is below average when compares to other companies in the food industry. A huge mistake is no tweets on weekends, the most peaking time that people dine out at the fancy restaurants with their friends and families. The restaurant can improve posting time by tweeting hourly or tweeting at lunch and dinner time.
Strategies
In a consumer’s perspective, the restaurant’s strategy is to communicate with its customers. It tries to introduce the brand by providing food photos, new menus, and the locations. Special discounts and events are also tweeted to get immediate reaction. Besides asking customer’s opinions about the quality of the food and service is always done by the restaurant to satisfy customer’s needs. As a result, loyal customers are always willing to leave messages and appreciate quick improvement.
In a marketer’s perspective, the restaurant is building relationships with its customers by providing friendly and sincere feedback. This creates a positive image and personality to the brand. However, the restaurant must realize that it has two targeted groups, existing customers and prospective customers. If it has too many tweets on answering existing customer’s questions, the restaurant might lose awareness from new customers who prefer new and relevant content.
Tactics
In a consumer’s perspective, good tactics are retweeting content and posting comments after the @ sign on accounts that have many followers. This could increase the restaurant’s name exposure and drive traffic to its twitter. Hashtag sign (#) is emphasized at catchy words to get attention, and at each to avoid location confusion. Another good tactic is useful links such as its website link at the top of the page, and links to other blogs when bloggers posted about its business.
In a marketer’s perspective, good tactic is that Chaophraya Thai does not overuse links to its website as often as Eater SF. Since the restaurant uses short non-formal language, followers can get the message and its purpose in a short time. Moreover, the restaurant always responds its followers and it will make followers realize that it does care about its customers. Then, the bottom line of this twitter is to have potential customers in the long term.
Laptop VS Mobile phone
Personally, I am addicted to my mobile phone rather than my laptop because I can carry on the go. Moreover, I prefer text to talk so Twitter is a perfect tool for marketers to reach my interests. When I need more information from some Twitter account, then I open my laptop and search for it. For example, some YouTube link is not available on smart phone so I turn on my computer.
I named my project the ‘Thai Food in SF’ because it is a simple direct meaning that is easy to remember and explore via search engines. My URL is https://twitter.com/ThaiFoodInSF. Unfortunately, I changed topic from the Paul Smith to Thai food, so I have no link to the blog. However, I assured the uniqueness of this name by searching it in namechk.com and found out that this name has never been taken in most social media such as Blogger, Wordpress, Facebook, Youtube, and Pinterest.
My intention is to create content from the perspective of the Thai people who are proud of Thai food. Therefore, in my social media, authentic Thai food will be recommended by sharing pictures and comments. Content will include restaurant types, business hours, locations, contact information, new items, signature dishes, spicy rating, price, special promotions, and other related content.
My target industry includes publication and restaurants, so I targeted two groups of audiences.
The primary targeted group is Thai food lovers who live in the San Francisco Bay Area. These gentlemen and ladies are young, aged 18-35 and eager to try new tastes of different cultures. They love traveling around the city and sharing their favorites with friends through smart phones and laptops. They heavily participate in the online world, especially on social media such as Facebook, Twitter, and so on. Since they are just about to set up their lives, they are very cost-effective with their shopping lists.
The secondary targeted group is Thai restaurant owners and the restaurant promoters such as Thai beer outlets and Thai grocery stores. These businesses prefer to know what consumers think in order to adapt their strategies and tactics. To promote their businesses, they welcome online social media that allow them to communicate with their customers. Even though they need higher sales and profits, they tend to be picky about their advertising and public relations budget.
Thai Food in SF’s brand identity consists of the logo, color, and background picture.
The logo is designed based on Thai food characteristics including chili symbolizing a spicy taste, Thai modern style in English font, and fork representing a meal. Overall design means Thai Food in SF is a kind of eating tool to be used when followers want to find delicious Thai food.
For color, I use orange tone because it can affect human appetite and it signifies mild to medium spicy. This is a result of the fact that most Americans avoid Thai food because they think it is too spicy. Hence, I replace red by orange to show them that actually the level of Thai food spice is adjustable. Furthermore, Orange makes the header and links stand out to capture reader’s attention.
Last, I select Pad Thai as my background picture because it is the most famous Thai food in American’s perspectives. The picture is bright and colorful since I want my Twitter mood and tone to be fresh and appetizing.
For the biography, my goal is to have followers, so the strategy is a catchy word that motivates reader’s curiosity. Consequently, my tactic is non-formal language that shows imaginative actions such as mouth-watering, spice up, follow the smell, and discover.
I created my Twitter since September 20, 2012, so I have 19 tweets, 29 following, and 6 followers on September 27. Since my goal is to have at least one follower, I started following many twitter accounts, which have similar idea about publicizing interesting food and restaurants, and hoped they will follow back. Doing so, I noticed that high viewer twitters have many hashtags (#). After that, I added too many hashtags and just realized from the class on September 26 that it is not a good tactic. Since then, I added only 1-2 #. To explain my tweets, I will focus on the two latest posts which are on September 27.
The first tweet’s purpose is to introduce the special menu of Sai Jai Thai restaurant.
My strategy is to use depiction words and keep the word short.
Thus, the tactics are:
Catchy words about food to increase positive emotion (yummy, most affordable, and authentic)
Mobile phone text feeling to make readers get message quickly (–in instead of –ing, w instead of with, and / instead of across)
Twitter symbol: # for readers who search from keywords and @ for location (# yummy, #thaifood, and @SaiJaiThai)
Real address for readers who want to go to the restaurant (771 O’Farrell/Larkin)
Short link from tiny.com to make the message short (tiny.cc/avgalw)
Link from yelp, one of the most powerful food recommendation media
Real-time picture from the restaurant to make my tweet appetizing
I posted around noon when readers may be looking for their lunch.
The second tweet’s purpose is to inform about the restaurant’s sale promotion.
My strategy is to provide complete information.
Most tactics are similar to the first tweet:
Twitter symbol: Hashtags on emphasized words (#happy, #half price) and @ location (Osha 4 Embacadero center)
Emotion word (happy)
short words (hr instead of hour, w instead of with, & instead of and, Mon instead of Monday, Sat instead of Saturday)
Mai Thai is the signature cocktail of Thailand.
Sale promotion word (half price)
Specific location (Osha 4 Embacadero center (lounge)) and time (5-9pm)
Short link from tiny.com
Add picture of Mai Thai
