Facebook Campaign Analysis

Semester Facebook Analysis 

I’ve taken over the Dixie State Softball page since February and I’ve enjoyed every minute of it! I do think that this was a successful campaign and I look forward to continuing to manage this page until I graduate next spring.

Likes

One of my goals was to boost the amount of likes to our page. The page started with 917 followers from my first post on February 3 and as of today we have reached 1,004. It was tough to promote a page that already had a solid following behind it, but I think through word of mouth and shares of our posts, people from everywhere have gained interest in our program through Facebook. 

Reach

The reach depended on what type of post. Videos and team activities definitely reached more people because of the attraction and tagging of others to view it as well.  The links to our game summaries and conference announcements reached our loyal fan base or what seemed like the same people who pay attention to our updates on a regular basis. Simple posts like on game days or weather delays were the least successful and I’m trying to think of more ways to make them more engaging. It was interesting because depending on what time of day I posted, would determine how big our reach would be. Posting during the afternoon or late at night was more successful than the mornings which was evident in the reach numbers.

Reaction, Comments and Shares

I was blessed to have a lot of positive reactions and comments on my posts. The support that our program receives is incredible and makes me want to do more creative things for this page now and in the future.  I would like to see more shares, but at the same time, our page is to inform. Shares consisted of us players and mostly family members wanting to brag about their niece or granddaughter to the world which is understandable J  

Page Views

I can see why our page views is very sporadic and tough to predict because there is a lot of down time and not every day is there something to post about. I wish I could go back to last year and compare the traffic, but overall I feel like we get a lot of interest from our followers consistently. 

Post Breakdown

Videos and team activity photos definitely have the most views, likes and reach among all posts. I think having a visual is much better than just words. I think that this is an area that I could definitely improve on- more substance. Before, each post was just the link, but what I have realized is that adding a personal touch can get people’s attention. For example, a simple hashtag got people using them on their shares or comments. I think that I did a sub-par job at giving our audience a behind-the-scene look at what being a student-athlete is. I share articles written by the DSU Athletics department and recognize conference accolades, but those are just highlights of our program. Although that is what followers want to read and respond well to, I think videos of games and players on a regular basis is just more entertaining and keeps our audience engaged and gets our name out to the masses as much as possible. There is so much more that goes into being a student-athlete especially off the field, so I plan on capturing the team at community service events or study hall just to give a different perspective.

Audience

I like how our fan base is fairly balanced between genders at 56% women and 43% men. The most popular age group was 18-24 women as well as a huge following from people 35-54 years old. I would like to appeal better to the younger population, but I realize that D I programs would most likely get more attention and interest than a small university in Utah like Dixie State. Based on my Facebook ad that I created, the cities and locations where almost identical. The majority of our audience is in Utah, but interest is scattered along the west coast and growing. Until our program gets more recognition nationally, I think this is the perfect audience that fits our program. 

Summary, Thoughts and Reflection

This page was a success, but as I continue to manage this page, I think there is a lot of work that can be done for better results. I was unable to get an Instagram account set up for this season, so I believe that cross promotion in the future will be a handy tool to help increase some traffic for our program on all social media accounts. We did share a couple of posts from Twitter that got decent acknowledgement, so I want to make cross promoting a priority and more evident in the future. I also was unable to do player profiles on our team this season which I am disappointed about, but I am assigned to do the end of the year wrap-up video which will be bittersweet. Also, I think that two of the three personas were met. I believe that the younger audience will come in time as our program gets more and more national recognition, but family members and community supporters definitely play a big part in the popularity of our page and we are grateful for their constant support through our season.