Evaluation: Emma

Website: http://nataliekrayworth.wix.com/socialmedia

I have promoted each app using the features that, I think, are the most important features of the site. I created an event on Facebook inviting people to discuss the results of the General Election the week after it had happened - The Facebook Event allows people to say whether they are going or not and is easy to use. When promoting Twitter I tweeted asking people for their opinions on the General Election , this means that people would have to use the search 'General Election' to find the tweet. I think this is an apt way to promote the app because the search bar makes it easy to find tweets either using hashtags or not. 

I did the same thing on Instagram allowing people to find the picture through the tags. On YouTube I decided to post a video from a concert that I had been to. I decided to do this because a lot of artists use YouTube as a platform to share their music which means there are a lot of music fans on YouTube. Sharing a concert video would allow people to connect with the band and the person who had attended.  Chats is a good feature that Google Hangouts uses. This is what I decided to focus on while promoting the Google Hangouts app. You can also draw on Google Hangouts which is another fun feature that I wanted to promote for the app. While promoting Skype I focused on the fact that you can use this while on your mobile and anywhere around the world. For MMS, I thought that promoting the fact that you can share images and videos would be a good way to get the app attention because teenagers want to share images. A main feature of Snapchat is the video feature - which is what I decided to promote.

I think that the content I created was effective in its aim, which was to promote these Social Media apps. The work that I chose to do surrounding these Apps and Websites shows off their most important, and sought after features so in terms of promoting the Apps I think that the content did a good job of showing what they're really about and how you can use them.

My target audience with the use of these apps are teenagers and young adults between the ages of 17-21 because this is the age that people would get interested in the Election and the people who don't have a lot of information about it. Social Media is a good way to learn things and to hear other opinions so I thought that this would be a good audience for me to target with the Apps. 

The website that I made is laid out very simply which means that it's easy to navigate. On the top of the page you can see the different Apps laid out which makes it clear to see and you can head straight to the page that you want to see. The colours are light and neutral which means you can easily read the text and the videos are set up so that they are simple to view. 

Some of the content was quite difficult to get - finding people to interview and to get them to express their opinions on the Election wasn't easy to do so I only ended up with one good interview that I could use on the website. Going along with this, I had to make sure that I only got serious answers on Twitter and Instagram which meant deleting anything that wasn't succinct enough or contained swearing.

To improve, I would probably choose a different subject that I used to promote the Social Media. The Election is a controversial topic, although important, so it was difficult to find people willing to take part and to interview. In terms of the whole project, if I did it again I would make sure that I had enough time to get everyone done to a better quality. 

Google Doodle

I created this Google Doodle to showcase how diverse and multicultural Google is. Google search has the option to search in multiple languages and Google Translate is a huge part of the search engine. When you're on the website you can also choose to read the website in a lot of languages from around the world. I thought that this really shows who Google is as a company and I wanted the doodle to really sum this up.

Digital Communications: Emma (Case Study)

Who created Snapchat?

Snapchat was invented by Stanford University students Evan Spiegel, Bobby Murphy and Reggie Brown. Spiegel is now 24 and with a net worth of $1.5billion is the CEO of Snapchat. Bobby Murphy is the official co-creator and co-owner of snapchat with his net worth matching Spiegel's. Spiegel and Murphy were a part of the same fraternity 'Kappa Sigma' which is how they met. Snapchat was originally introduced as an idea for a class project in Spiegel's design class. The sites name was originally 'Picaboo'. Later on into the project Murphy was brought in to code the application. 

When was Snapchat created?

Snapchat was first launched under the name 'Picaboo' in July of 2011 as an iOS application only and it's name later changed to Snapchat. The app really took off in October of 2011 as more people started to realise what the app was created for.

What was the purpose of creating Snapchat?

There has been quite a bit of controversy surrounding the purpose of snapchat as many people believe that it was created as an easy way for teenagers to send nude pictures without it hanging around on the internet. Spiegel denies these claims and says that he came up with the idea after thinking about how kids do not often get to be themselves on the internet for fear of their history being traced by future employers and that it is a fun way for friends to send funny pictures to each other (x). This was proven to be the reason that most teenagers were using Snapchat because in October 2011, Murphy and Spiegel noticed that there was a spike of usage between 9am and 3pm which meant that people were using this app as a tool to send notes and messages to their friends during school hours. Despite, in the beginning stages of the app, people thinking that it was all about sexting a lot of adults and young adults are changing their mind of this fact - According to Huffington Post only 1.6 percent of snapchat users have said that they use it to send sexts regularly and the second most popular type of snap to be sent is a selfie with the first being funny content (x).

How Does It Work?

Snapchat works by having a user take a picture or a video with the limit of 10 seconds. After this is taken they can then doodle over the image or add a caption to explain what is going on. Here are some examples:

Once this is done, the user can choose who, out of their contacts, they can send the 'snap' to or they can add it to their story which is available for all of their contacts to see for up to 24 hours and then it is wiped. If the user doesn't add the snap to their story then the person who they send it to can view it for up to 10 seconds. A 'replay' option is allowed once every 24 hours so if the snap is set to a quick timer then the user can view it again.

Companies can promote their businesses using Snapchat with make-up company Nars showing previews of their new collection using the stories feature. Snapchat also uses stories to showcase popular events that occur worldwide such as London Fashion Week, The Oscars and other award shows and Festivals such as Coachella. This helps users of Snapchat to interact with the app if they are at the event that is being shown or if they are people who aren't there and just want to see what is going on. The application has recently started using geofilters so that users can show where they are at that moment with Snapchat having stories solely for people in London, Paris, Dubai and New York in the past.

Advertisment:

Snapchat has a YouTube Channel which is the main vessel of videos that promote and advertise Snapchat and it's new features for example: The Geofilters. 

          

 These clips showcase the new updates and explain how to properly use them and to show what can usually be seen as a boring list of updates (e.g. ios) in a fun and interesting way that engages their users and sticks to what it is that Snapchat stands for - creativity and having fun.

This is another advert that is promoting Snapchat via the form of a print ad. The advert clearly shows what the application is and where you can download it from but more than that, the advert shows two girls having a good time, taking a funny picture and wanting to share that moment with their friends which is what Snapchat is about. The advert is funny, light-hearted and simple which are three qualities Snapchat carries throughout their branding.

Task 2a - Plan: Emma

Google Hangouts:

Snapchat:

My idea for snapchat is that I will host interviews about opinions on the election and who is happy with the result etc.

Facebook:

The Facebook event that I'll be creating will be asking people to come to take part in the interviews that I'm hosting.

Instagram:

My idea for instagram is that I will document what is happening during the interviews and then uploading it to instagram so that people can see what is happening.

Twitter:

On Twitter I will, again, ask for peoples opinions on the general election and what they think about the result. 

YouTube:

For YouTube, I will either upload a silly video which are popular on the site or I will upload the snap chats onto youtube so that they are easily accessible for people who don't have smartphones.

WhatsApp:

For the Media Messaging segment I'll discuss the election/the work that I'm doing with friends and get their opinions on it. I'll also share pictures to showcase the different features of WhatsApp.

Skype: