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Leo's Solar Panels Social Media Campaign Plan

Isabella Riano

Saint Leo University

MKT 310: Integrated Marketing Communication

Theodore Framan

June 6th, 2023

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Overview

Leo's Solar Panels is a new business. I will start a social media campaign on different

mediums to promote its products. I must plan and do my research for this effort. Below is an

outline of my plan.

1. Residential Customer Social Media Usage

An essential first step is to analyze if my customers have a positive social media

experience. I will consider all constructive criticism and use this information as a guideline to

develop ways for increased engagement and interaction.

 Metrics. My sales have been decreasing every month by about 15-25%. In January, I

had 600,000 sales. In February, I had 520,000; in March, I had 400,000.

 Analytics. Although I have had many sales, I would like to return to having more than

500,000 sales in April. I believe some reasonable goals I could set are to increase

sales by a tiny percentage every year, given that my decreasing sales rate seems to

make the expectation of rising sales drastically unrealistic. However, social media

presence can significantly impact customers (Clow & Baack, 2021). Therefore, I hope

that with this solid social media plan, I will be able to retain my current customers

and gain more customers.

 Feedback. My customers mention that my product satisfied their needs. Therefore, I

will continue having solar panels for them. However, they note that they would

recommend a greater variety of houses because they only work for huge homes. In

my social media campaign, I will announce that I will launch Leo's Solar Panel

Collection, which will include six different sizes and a guide to how big houses or

apartments must be for each. My goal is that with the greater variety of sizes, I will
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attract more customers and offer different options to my current customers if they live

in a smaller place.

2. Residential customers:

Residential customers are homeowners who purchase a good or service in the business's

area. It could be a family, a group of friends that live together, or an individual customer

(Residential Customer Definition: 619 Samples, n.d.). Many people can think of all residents of

an area who pay their monthly electricity bills for critical equipment in their house to work.

Therefore, for Leo's Solar Panels, the residential customers I have chosen are students who

live within 30 miles of Saint Leo University and are renting an apartment off campus. They are

undergraduate or graduate students between the ages of 18 and 25. These students are low-

middle class to middle class and struggle to pay for their tuition, room, and board. Thus, they

have considered investing in solar panels for more inexpensive electricity bills.

3. Theme, story, and goals

Theme. The theme is consistent with my other IMC plans: save money and live greener. This

short sentence communicates the company's primary goal of helping residents pay less for their

electricity bills while protecting the environment with no greenhouse emissions. J.D. Power and

Associates revealed that a positive social media presence increases customer satisfaction (Clow

& Baack, 2021). Therefore, with my social media campaign, I will ensure that customers see the

slogan "save money and live greener" and learn more about how to take care of the environment

and spend their money more wisely. Moreover, I will promote financial literacy workshops and

share beach cleanup volunteering opportunities with organizations such as Keep Pinellas

Beautiful. I aim to help customers with my products and show them that going "greener" and

being financially assertive is a lifestyle I hope they enjoy.

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Goals. The following are the goals for my business:

● Launch the "save money and live greener" ad campaign on Instagram in Q3 2023.

● Increase follower count on Instagram by 10% each year for the next three years.

● Increase sales by 5% each year for the next three years.

● Recruit three highly qualified student ambassadors to help us with my social media pages

by Q3 2023.

Story. As mentioned in the social media checklist, engaging stories and real-world

applications can be pretty compelling on social media. Therefore, I will share my personal story

and let users share theirs on the Facebook blog. My account is that I used to live on campus at

Saint Leo University. Still, when I got a car, I started thinking about being more independent and

getting ready for the future, when I will have to commute to work rather than having a dorm

where I work. Therefore, I decided to rent an apartment in Wesley Chapel, but it started getting

more expensive than living on campus.

I would also allow residents to share their stories on a Facebook group named "Leo's

Solar Panels." According to the Indeed Editorial Team (2022), creating positive interactions with

customers and encouraging current customers to interact with each other usually positively

affects their satisfaction with the brand. Social media can be a practical resource to update

customers on discounts and create giveaways and contests where they can participate and

enhance their interactions with each other. My goal is that my customers become a part of the

story, and they can also share their greener and money-saving lifestyle. I am confident that by

sharing my personal story and allowing college students like me to share theirs, I will create a

strong community that my customers will cherish.

4. Mediums to Be Used
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● Instagram. The average Instagram age is 18-24 years old (Shepherd, 2023), which is

very close to my customers' 18-25 years old. Therefore, I believe this will be a very

effective platform for reaching my audience. Instagram offers the option for paid

sponsored ads that allow businesses to choose specific audiences. I would promote a flyer

and quick Reels sharing people's stories to an audience living in San Antonio, Florida;

Wesley Chapel, Florida; Tampa, Florida; Zephyrhills, Florida; and Land O'Lakes,

Florida, going to Saint Leo University, passionate about the environment, and aged 18-

25.

● Facebook. As mentioned earlier, Facebook is an excellent platform for creating a group

where people can share their stories. I will make the customer experience more

personable with the group and give information about the green lifestyle and financial

literacy.

● YouTube. YouTube shorts are a very effective way to keep the audience engaged,

especially when content sharing is consistent (Maiorca, 2023). Therefore, I will share the

highlights of my own story and customer's story about my product and their lifestyle with

Leo's Solar Panels in the community.

● Lions Pride Media online article. Saint Leo University's school newspaper allows local

businesses to pay for advertisements. According to their website, 90 percent of the

student body has read the newspaper. Therefore, I would organize my budget and set

some money aside for the advertisement manager to write an article about my company

and social media campaign for the students.

5. Campaign Specifics
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My reach will be of a small community, given that there were about 2,274 students at

Saint Leo University as of the fall of 2021 (Saint Leo University [Review of Saint Leo

University], n.d.). However, I can also reach campus faculty and staff so that they inform

students living off campus about my products. As explained in the social media checklist,

one must not rely on one platform when posting. Therefore, I will post on the three mediums

I have chosen at least once a week to keep consistency. I will also promote the online article

published in Saint Leo's newspaper on all my social media platforms. By clicking the article,

I can see how many people have read it at the bottom. I will conduct this check at least once

a week and record any progress. All social media platforms have analytics, especially with

public and business accounts. A company must know how its customers interact with its

content (Rouse, 2023), so I know it will be vital for me to know how well I am doing with

my campaign. However, I do not know how to read the graphs. Therefore, one of the

qualified students I will hire will be someone certified in Google Analytics who can help me

monitor all of them by the end of each week.

6. Manner and Tone Reaching the Customer

Every brand purchase is emotional (Hammond, 2008), so all advertisement tools used to

reach customers should make them experience emotion. For example, if a customer buys

food, they may be excited that they are going to eat something they find tasty. Therefore, the

advertisement should portray the food's high quality and good taste. For my promotion, I will

reach the customers through my own story and by allowing them to share the story. The tone

will be empathetic, as through my own experience as a college student struggling with

finances and finding it hard to take care of the environment, I can understand how my

customers may have similar struggles. As mentioned in the social media checklist, it is
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effective as a personable tool where customers can share their experiences. I believe the

Facebook group I will create will be a constructive way for customers to talk about their

experience with my product and connect with other customers who have also had positive

experiences. More than having a group of people buy Leo's Solar Panels, and I want to have

a community of students who support each other and share the experience of saving money

and living greener.

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References

Clow, K. E., & Baack, D. (2021). Integrated advertising, promotion, and marketing

communications (9th ed.). Boston: Pearson. ISBN: 9780137344345

Hammond, J. (2008). Branding Your Business : Promoting Your Business, Attracting Customers and

Standing Out in the Market Place. Kogan Page.

Indeed Editorial Team. (2022, September 30). What Are Customer Interactions? (Benefits and

Tips) [Review of What Are Customer Interactions? (Benefits and Tips)].

https://ca.indeed.com/career-advice/career-development/customer-

interactions#:~:text=Interacting%20with%20customers%20allows%20businesses,their

%20experience%20with%20the%20products.

Maiorca, D. (2023, February 11). Is It Worth Posting YouTube Shorts? The Pros and Cons.

MUO. https://www.makeuseof.com/posting-youtube-shorts-pros-cons/#:~:text=YouTube

%20Shorts%20is%20an%20excellent

Residential Customer Definition: 619 Samples. (n.d.). Law Insider.

https://www.lawinsider.com/dictionary/residential-customer

‌Rouse, M. (2023, May 5). What are Social Media Analytics Tools? - Definition from

Techopedia. Techopedia.com. https://www.techopedia.com/definition/31753/social-

media-analytics-tools#:~:text=Social%20media%20analytics%20tools%20are

%20essential%20in%20running%20a%20successful
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Saint Leo University [Review of Saint Leo University] (n.d.) U.S. News.

https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/saint-leo-university-1526#:~:text=Overview,a

%20semester%2Dbased%20academic%20calendar.

Shepherd, J. (2023, April 15). 24 Essential Instagram Statistics You Need to Know in

2023 [Review of 24 Essential Instagram Statistics You Need to Know in 2023]. Social

Shepherd. 24 Essential Instagram Statistics You Need to Know in 2022. (n.d.). The

Social Shepherd. https://thesocialshepherd.com/blog/instagram-statistics#:~:text=As

%20of%20October%202021%2C%20the ‌