FFS Student Case StudyA report on student success on marketing efforts for Midwood High School Alumni Association 75th Anniversary Jubilee.

Report by Kenny Soto, FFS teacher/cofounder.

The problemCompany

Midwood High School Alumni Association needed help in getting a minimum of 400 attendees for their 75th Anniversary Jubilee occurring on Oct. 15th, 2016.

Context

Under the supervision of Futures For Students professors, students were tasked in learning about digital marketing by marketing this event to Midwood High School graduates.

Problem statement

Midwood High School Alumni Association wanted to gain as many attendees as possible utilizing a $5,000 marketing budget on Facebook & free advertising using Google AdGrants.

Challenges: a deep-dive

Challenge 1

Expand audienceUtilizing Midwood High School Alumni Association’s email list to increase the top of the marketing funnel on Facebook.

Challenge 2

7-day activesOn a weekly basis, students were tasked with creating paid and organic content that would bring engagement on the Facebook page up.

Challenge 3

Increase conversionUtilizing paid ads on Facebook and Google Adwords (using the free Google AdGrants program), students had to increase RSVP’s for the event.

SolutionMore event registrations and

attendance.

Utilizing the skills of Richard Marquez, Leonardo Guzman, Armoni Boone, and other students—we created a marketing plan to gain event attendance on Facebook and Google Adwords.

Implementation

Feb - March

Learn personal branding techniques, social media advertising, & landing page optimization.

April - May

Learn about User intent, Google adwords accounts structures, and keyword research.

June

Optimize Facebook paid advertising based on audience interests and ad scheduling.

July

Optimize Google ads using Single Keyword Ad Groups and match types.

August

Increase boosted posts on Facebook to maximize shares & comments.

Challenges: a deep-dive

Challenge 1Student Tasks:Study client’s brand messaging to determine past results and access

audience response.Create ad copy and images for paid advertising.Do keyword research to find search queries were user intent was

transactional.Optimize ads after each test to gain more clients, ad frequency, increase ad

relevancy score, and ultimately gain more link clicks.Create organic posts on the client’s Facebook page to increase engagement

and create leverage to ask for event registration from the client’s audience.

ImpactResults from:

Facebook

Google Adwords

Eventbrite

Facebook Marketing Results (insights)

Challenge 1Student Results:- Total page likes increased from 558 to 1,242 due to student’s use of

alumni email list.- During the last month of student involvement, engagement on the page

went up by more than 300% due to audience engagement in comment replies, influencer outreach, and strategic listening.

- Increased average comment count from 6 to 23.

Facebook Marketing Results (paid ad metrics)Challenge 1Student Results:- Using less than the allocated budget, students were able to:

Gain 7,906 clicks at an average CPC of $0.51.Paid likes were a total of 480.Post likes were 4,530.Shares were 422.Comments were 598.Average cost per engagement (page like, post like, shares, and

comments) was $3.04.

Google Adwords Results

Challenge 1Student Tasks:Using a technique of campaign organization called Single Keyword Ad Groups

(directly attributed to an article from Klient Boost) students optimized ads to gain 54 clicks at a Click through rate of .84%.

Students learned about using longtail keyword research to get competitive keywords at low costs.

Eventbrite Results

Challenge 1Student Tasks:Student’s learned about landing page optimization to maximize conversions

on the eventbrite landing page.At the end of the project there were 209 tickets sold.