The organization I have chosen is the program that I currently

intern with, KSU CARE Services.

Organization Description

The Campus Awareness, Resource & Empowerment (CARE) Services

organization was created in 2013 as a result of the increasing population of
students at Kennesaw State University who identified as homeless or food
insecure. In 2014, CARE Services was able to establish a foundation for
donors to contribute to students it served, and now has expanded to
encompass GEAR UP Georgia (Priority Model) and KSU Americorps
VISTA Network. They also provide four programs to support these
communities, and these include: The Pantry, ASCEND Program, and
Emergency Assistance. In their website they state their mission as, “Our
mission is to provide access to food, temporary housing, and other
supportive services to foster students’ realization of a healthy, stable, and
dignified life academically and professionally. Furthermore, to serve as a
model of professional excellence and effectiveness by upholding core
values of social justice, equity, economic sustainability, and mutual
partnership.”
I believe their Instagram targets two audiences: students and donors. A
majority of their posts are geared toward the demographic group of
students aged 18-23, both male and female, homeless and/or foster care
youth, and students in the ASCEND program at KSU. This is because
this organization posts a lot of on campus resources for discounted
school items, KSU services, and pantry recipes and shopping. For this
specific post, the demographic it is geared towards is towards older age
groups or donors, usually around the age of 30-60 years old, both men
and women, people who are a part of a non-profit or already organized
donor organization, and close to Kennesaw to drop off these specific
donations. The psychographic qualities of this directed post is for those
who want to give back to their local community or those who want to
support the food insecure students at KSU.
I believe the persuasive goal of this Instagram message was to
persuade either students who are able to donate or local donors to
provide food the the “LLV Pantry Wish List” which supports the ASCEND
Program students who live in the Living Learning Village (LLV). The goal
was to present the need for food and have a very accessible list of foods
that most people have on hand to donate. The caption of this post is a
major part of the persuasive message, because it makes the
demographic who is seeing it feel motivated to give back to their
community to support local food insecure students. I feel like by saying
in the caption, “Thank you for caring,” they were able to connect with the
viewer by making them feel like their donation or support to the
organization would make them care for the students who are a part of
this program and their community. I think this is an example of the
Lovenotes (lovemarks) that was mentioned in the concepts discussed in
“The Persuaders.” Lovenotes pay attention to emotional appeal, or
pathos, within a message to evoke an emotional response and action
from the viewer. We can also see how this message aligns with the
Sales Funnel. They first started out by putting out a graphic with the
awareness of the LLV pantry needs, and then the caption sparks an
interest in the viewer by explaining how the CARE program provides
donated food items to the students who have experienced
homelessness and/or the foster care system. From there, it is up to the
viewer whether or not they decide to donate, but with the message and
the emotional pull from the caption, they have provided those who make
the decision to donate and take action with multiple ways to get in
contact with the program in order to donate to the organization.

What helped me determine the target audience was within the caption
where they said, “Please consider making a regular contribution to their
house pantry!” Many younger demographics do not have the ability to
continually donate these kinds of items. Most adults who regularly give
back to the community are always looking for these kinds of posts in
order to continually help an organization. I think just the simple fact of
the request for donations was a large factor of why I believe this post
was made for an older crowd who has the ability to donate these kinds of
items. This post was also posted on their Facebook, so I believe this was
another clue that they were trying to also reach an older generation
because most people over the age of 30 are more comfortable and
active on Facebook. They also have many donors on their Facebook
page who probably get notified when they post, so they would instantly
see this message.

I work for this organization, and these kinds of posts always increase
donor drop offs! Looking from the outside of the organization, I think this
message works very well in persuading the target audience because of
their great use of the Sales Funnel and the Public Information Model. To
circle back to my previous explanation of how they used the sales
funnel, I think the execution of raising awareness of all of the needs from
the students by posting easy-to-donate items was a great way to catch a
donor’s attention. With them including the purpose and the ways the
program supports students in the caption was a great way to spark
interest in the user, and with the provided link in the graphic they could
learn even more about the organization as a whole. This also describes
how they used the Public Information Model to push out the needs of the
organization, rather than focusing on providing services for the students
like they usually do. Straying from their normal posts to appeal to donors
is a great way to use the Public Information Model to let the viewer see
the needs of students in the program. Lastly, I still believe that they used
a touch of Lovenotes within this message by making the viewer feel like
by contributing they are a part of the community at KSU. By saying,
“Thank you for caring,” they have already made the viewer feel as
though that they are in support of the organization and their decision to
donate makes a big impact. I think this organization does a really great
job of providing services to students, and does an even better job of
appealing to multiple types of donors.