Week 6 Part 2

We all know by now that Facebook is a great tool for marketing your business. It is loaded with all kinds of different tools to give you a positive experience and maximize your potential clientele. But what are all these tools and how do they work? Now obviously I can't go over every tool at the moment, but we are going to focus on two amazing tools that everyone should know how to use and understand when using Facebook for your business.

Have you ever posted something on Facebook and wondered if anyone is even seeing your posts? Or if you have ran a ad with Facebook and were curious if anyone even clicks on the link to be able to read the full details or description. Well, look no further, we are going to talk a little bit about "Post Reach" and "Post Engagement", two tools that I would go absolutely crazy without. 

So, let's say I have just created an event on Facebook that this weekend Clipper Junkies will be doing $5 haircuts. Now I am spending all this money on this ad, I kind of want to know if anyone is even seeing my ad and if it's really even worth the money that I am spending. That's where "Post Reach" comes in. Post Reach is pretty self explanatory. It's the number of people that your post (or event, or whatever) has reached. It's how many people have seen it. Okay, so now you know that 100 people have seen it, but you really want to know how many people wanted more information and actually clicked on it. That's "Post Engagement". How many people engaged with your post. Whether they clicked on the picture or "liked" your post, or even commented. If they interacted with your post in any way, that's an engagement.

So as you can see, those two tools can be really powerful. Now there are a lot of things you can do to tweak how many people your posts are reaching, but that's for another day.

Week 6 Alternate Assignment

I started my Facebook business page for Clipper Junkies at the beginning of August of this year (2019). Currently, I have 136 followers and have a goal of making that number jump to 160 by the end of November. That's roughly 2 additional followers a week. Not everyone is interested in following "pages" so increasing my followers even by 24, is not always easy. So if you'd like to follow us I'd be so grateful! It just makes me that much closer to my goal! You can find my page on Facebook @clipperjunkies. I try to post a little something every day, but typically end up only posting around 4 to 5 times a week. Recently I recorded a video of my husband explaining all of the different products we offer. If you're interested in checking out that video, you can view it at: https://www.facebook.com/clipperjunkies/videos/2357598787627419/

Below I am going to evaluate a few of the other local barbershops Facebook pages.

Knuckleheads Barbershop-Oceanside

So right off the bat I tried to read their about section and there's nothing. Not a good move in my book. What if people want to know what your shop is all about? And it's only a maximum of 255 characters that you can write so it really wouldn't take you that much time to just fill it out. Also, they never post. They have 713 followers who deserve to know what's going on at the shop. I mean they do follow you for a reason. I guess their company name fits their Facebook style 💁😂

Short Cuts Barbershop-Oceanside

Well they were able to deliver their about section with no problem. They have 766 followers, a decent amount of pictures but don't seem to post very often. I feel as if it's really important to keep up with your page when you have a business, ESPECIALLY when you have that may followers.

Top Notch Barber Shop-Oceanside

Another about section is filled out. Yay!!! And they have a total of 819 check-ins and 367 followers. But, they do not keep up with their posts nor do they have a big selection of photos to view. That's a real bummer. They could potentially improve their business by even just making a post a week. Oh well, hopefully their clients come to my shop :)

Week 5 Part 2

The company that I am using for this class is Clipper Junkies Barbershop. My husband and I opened this barbershop on August 16th, of this year (2019). To be successful we need to understand who our target market is and I think I have a pretty good idea of who it is.

My target market is of course males of almost any age, who keeps up with their hair being cut on a regular basis. And I say any age because no matter your age, males will always need a haircut. I have seen fathers bring in their 4 year old boys every two weeks for haircuts, and I also seen men in their older years who cannot stand their hair to be longer than usual. So in my particular line of business, age really isn't a factor when it comes to targeting your market.

An ideal customer for my barbershop would be a marine from Camp Pendleton. Why a Marine you ask? Well, when you're a Marine you need a fresh haircut by the time you report for duty every Monday morning. That means that is a guaranteed $15 per week customer. Now imagine if every Sunday I was booked with Marines. I have 18 appointment slots available for that day and if you multiply those together, you'll get $270. That $270 is also not including tip. 

I would also like to mention that a lot of Marines don't get their hair cut on Sunday because of how crowded it is, so they go on Saturday instead. So this is another opportunity to fill up my Saturday's at the shop also. If I could fill Saturday's and Sunday's with Marines I think we'd be off to a great start. 

Now that we know who our target market is, we really need to focus on attracting those types of clients into our shop. As of this moment I am still learning how to accomplish this. But I do know that word of mouth is the bar far, the number one best way to market. 

Week 5 Part 1

In this post I am going to be giving you my opinion about two different websites and who I think their target market is, or at least who I think they are trying to target. I am going to be comparing Subway and Hungry Bear Deli.

Subway

When I first went to Subway's website all I noticed at first was a nice, sleek designed website. As you scroll down you'll see some nicely displayed pictures, the promotion of a few of their items and a few other things. I did also notice that they do a bit more advertising about Subway's Rewards and Deals. Just looking at the page you wouldn't be able to note who their target market was. But then I started clicking around and found some pages that explain a lot about Subway as a brand. To my surprise, Subway is very involved with our planet. Just as one example, Subway states that, "Our ambition is to reduce environmental impact and preserve our planet's health". If you click on their "Responsibility Page" you will see their website includes pages titled; Our Goals, Promote Well-Being, Preserve Our Planet, Our Communities, and Our Plan. With all of this said I feel as if Subway's target market would be the budgeted and healthy humanitarian. 

Hungry Bear Deli

First off, I would like to say that I am definitely going to head on over to Hungry Bear Deli in Vista and try it out. The pictures they display on their website look so appetizing. Like, I was literally starting to get hungry from observing their site. So hungry that I started poking around with their online menu to see what they offer and even went as far as to call my husband to tell him the next place were eating at. But, getting back to this assignment/blog post, that's all their website had to offer. A menu and contact information, that's it. No about page no nothing. So, I can't really give an opinion as to who their target market is. I guess the only guess I can make would be that their target market is anyone who's in the mood to eat. I really feel as if they should do a little research and try to hone in on their ideal customer and then target all of their efforts on attracting more of that type. 

Week 4 Part 2

When it comes to day to day life, I rely on the internet for many things. From websites for my schooling and business, to online shopping. And then you have those times you are bored and want to play online games. Today I am going to be going over 2 websites that I use daily and why I enjoy using them and also some things that I think can be improved with them.


First, we have https://www.godaddy.com

This URL will lead you to the website where I configure my website for my business. I am on this site daily updating specials, booking appointments and whatever else it is that I need to do. There are a lot of things that I like about it and a few things that I think could be better. First, I love how I don't have to link up a separate appointment app if I don't want to. The service I pay for with Go Daddy includes online appointments. I also love how it keeps track of how many visits I get. That's really useful. Now what I don't like and think can be improved is within the appointment section. I really wished the site would give you an option to mark specific days "appointment only", but it doesn't, so I have to just mark us as closed. I hate that! And the other thing that I don't like, is go daddy no having a specific app for business to be able to book appointments through. I have to go all the way in to my website and book from there, and it's a total pain in the butt.


My next daily website is https://www.facebook.com

I also use this website for my business. Facebook has a lot of tools to use for whatever business you're in. And when I say a lot of tools, I mean a lot of tools. Most things are pretty straight forward to use, but there is also a lot of things that are quite difficult to figure out. This would be a complaint of mine. I wish they had some kind of how to video to use some of these tools. It's like Facebook keeps adding things which is great but then it's also hard to keep up with how to use everything. It's definitely bitter sweet. But to be honest, I can't complain too much. Facebook in general is pretty easy to use and has a great design.

Week 4 Part 1

Have you ever visited a website and were just like, "What the heck is going on here?" Or what about when you visit a website that is just so nicely put together it's almost calming to use? In this post I am going to be comparing the good, the bad and the ugly between 4 different websites. 

My first website under review is: https://www.headhunterhairstyling.com/

     This is a five start website in my opinion. As soon as you launch the site, you are presented with a video of a haircut being performed. Straight to the point. You're not left guessing what this business is about. Next you'll notice that their logo is clearly placed at the top of the page, right next to the other pages that may be accessed on their site. Each page you click on has exactly the info that you wanted when choosing to click on that page. No more, no less. This page has simplicity and is very easy to use and understand. I also would like to add that their color scheme was beautiful. Calming and not busy. Out of all the websites to review, this was my favorite. 

Next, let's talk about: http://gatesnfences.com/

     Can we say NIGHTMARE? The initial feeling I got when I logged on to this site was overwhelming with anxiety. Seriously! I felt like I didn't even want to look at the information because there was just too much to look at and I didn't know where to start. They should have made several pages that were clearly marked with the topic of information. But instead they just had everything smashed together on one page. And, it was also really hard to see what was written because the font was microscopic. This website definitely needs some professional help. 

Another website under review was: https://www.pennyjuice.com/

     At first glance, I hated this site. The content looked pretty cheesy to me and to be quite honest I kind of thought it was a fake product they were trying to sell. Or like it was a fake website. But as I looked deeper within the site and understood what they were trying to sell, I started to like it. This companies target market is parents and kids. And when you market to kids you need color. This company did just that. From their website to their product, everything is very colorful. As far as ease of use, yeah, it's very easy to use. Simple and straight forward. Overall, I didn't have any problems with this site so I'd give it 3 stars. 

Another anxiety induced website: https://jamilin.com/

     If websites could vomit, this would be one that did. Like seriously, what the heck are people thinking? First off, I'm not diggin' the rainbow colors at the top of the page. It just doesn't look professional at all. Second, the pictures on the website are very disturbing. Some are repetitive and others are poor quality. And not to mention, they're smashed together. And why is everything located in the center of the page? Even if they didn't want the website to fully cover the page they could have expanded it a little bit. I don't there are just so many things wrong with this website in my opinion. My advice would be to hire a professional. 

Final Thought

When creating a website, please think about the people viewing it. Ask yourself  at least these questions:

• Is the font big enough?
• Is the color scheme relaxing?
• Is my website easy to use?
• Do I have several pages dedicated to one topic each versus everything crammed on one page?

Week 3 Part 2

1. American Deluxe Barber Shop
http://www.americandeluxebarbershop.com/

American Deluxe Barber Shop has Instagram and Facebook listed on their website for their other social media platforms. As for Facebook, they have posted anything on there since April 3rd, 2016. But Instagram on the other hand, is used a least one a week on most weeks. In my opinion, I think they should use Facebook more as it has a lot of advertising elements.


2. Pacific Coast Barber Shop
https://www.pacificcoastbarbershop.net/

Pacific Coast Barber Shop also has Instagram and Facebook listed on their website for their other social media platforms. Like American Deluxe, Pacific Coast also does not utilize Facebook either. Their last post to Facebook was on April 18th. As for Instagram they don't really use that platform much either. The last post to Instagram was on April 26th and seemed to only be used sporadically.


3. Johnny's Barber Shop
https://website--613026851620315786348-barbershop.business.site/

Well, there's not much to say about this one. On their website they didn't have any kind of other social media sites listed. I really think that is a bad more on their part. In today's world most everyone relies on social media for business listings and reviews.


4. Top Notch Barber Shop
https://topnotchbarbershop.wixsite.com/oceanside

Facebook and Instagram are both listed on Top Notch's website but they don't really use either. The last Facebook post from them was on September 11th, 2018. Instagram was last posted to on August 20th and before that was July 20th. They also don't seem to utilize their platforms.


5.  Short Cuts Barbershop
https://shortcutsbarbershop.business.site/

This business didn't have any social media platforms listed on their website so I really can't comment anything about their social media posting habits. However, Short Cuts does post "updates" on their website as if it were a social media site. Their last post was on August 31st and before that was August 23rd. They seem to post about 2-3 times a month which is not a lot.


After researching a ton of my competition, I have realized that the majority of the other Oceanside barber shops don't even have a website. I got lucky with being able to find the 5 that I did. I have also come to realize that I'm in pretty good shape as far as utilizing my social media platforms. I make it a point to post every day or at least 5 times a week. I believe keeping up with your social media sites say a lot about the type of business you are.

*** The blogs that I commented on are:
https://csit155-fa19-sque.blogspot.com/
https://csit155-fa19-agau.blogspot.com/
https://csit155-f19-angelina.blogspot.com/

Week 3 Part 1

I know that I am a day late in posting for my blog, but I must say that it's a good thing I waited until today to post. If I would have posted yesterday, then I wouldn't really wouldn't have had much to say. But, today was literally the worst day EVER that I have had in communicating with a business.

So as many of you know, I have recently opened up a barber shop here in beautiful Oceanside, and when doing this I have had to complete a lot of steps to be able to get my business up and running on social media sites. Tonight, as I still try and get over my frustration, I am specifically going to talk about Google and their terrible customer service.

When you open a business, you want everyone to be able to find your location, phone number and information about your business, right? So how do you do this? You go to Google for businesses and list your business and all its information so that it will show up in people's google searches. But first, before it can go live on Google's site, you have to wait for a postcard to be mailed to the physical business, which holds the secret ingredient to make your business go live on google search. A magical number is on this postcard and it is used to verify your business. Let me just say, I HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR THIS STUPID POSTCARD FOR NEARLY A MONTH. Read on to hear my horrible experience with google.

Finally fed up with waiting (they say it should take only 5 days to arrive and I have been waiting since August 16th), I decided to call them and see what the heck is going on. Oh but wait, you can't call, there's no number to call for your specific problem, but you can send a direct message and they will get back to you. So I did just that and I must say I literally received a call back withing like 30 seconds, so that was fantastic. So after explaining my problem to them a few times because they didn't seem to fully understand English, there was nothing that they could do for me at that moment, I have to wait for an email from a supervisor that will take anywhere from 24 to 48 hours, but the supervisors were only available Monday-Friday from 9am-5pm. It was 4:49pm and I was furious. Like what the heck? This is Google!!! A huge company!!! And you're closing 11 minutes early!!! And you're only available Monday-Friday? I'm really confused as to how google thinks that this is good business.

So now that you've heard my little rant, I'd definitely have to say that I have had a terrible experience with communicating with a business through social media. I mean this is the closest I've come to communicating with a business through social media.

If this were my business, first, I'd make sure that I didn't close early when I was scheduled to be open. Second, if my company was huge like Google is, I would always make sure that we were staffed 24/7 for technical issues such as the one I am experiencing.

Cross your fingers for me ya'll, I really need either that email or that stupid postcard.   

Week 2 Part 2

I commented on:

https://csit155-fa19-agau.blogspot.com

https://csit155-fa19ccollins.blogspot.com/

https://csit155-f19-angelina.blogspot.com