Want To Be A Polar Bear?

When I was an incoming freshman, I loved watching videos on the schools I was looking at and seeing what life was like on campus and in the town. I got inspiration for my promotional video from thinking back to this time in my life, and realizing that prospective students might listen more to a current student than some random voice telling you what Ohio Northern University has to offer. I felt like by giving my personal prospective and informing people about the daily college life here at ONU it would help get a better glimpse into the campus lifestyle. I created a promotional video using Videolicious which consisted of me going around campus and Ada showing the places I feel like prospective students and parents would benefit most from. I decided to share popular places that students like to go to including food options, the gym, and even an academic building. By giving some specific information about each of these places during my video, I hope it gives people a closer look into what Ohio Northern University is made of.

What Really Matters To Your Business?

This week in my social media class, we transitioned over to a new book entitled, "Measure What Matters" by Katie Delahaye Payne. This includes online tools for understanding customers, social media, engagement, and key relationships.

Chapter one begins by talking about measurement. Social media is so much more than meets the eye. It is less about media and more about the community in which you do business.

What really matters to your business?

Only a handful of businesses actually measure what matters. Most organizations would say that "their customers" are what matter the most to them. They are partially right, but it's not the number of customers and employees that matters, it's the relationship that your organization has with them that matters. Good relationships lead to good profits. What really matters, is your relationships and aggregated outcome of those relationships: your reputation.

This is just a glimpse into Chapter One and what the book, "Measure What Matters" has to offer. I am looking forward to reading further into the book and learning more about not only social media, but the power of measurement behind it.

Wish App

As a college student, I am always looking to save money and not go broke every week. I am sure my fellow classmates can agree. Being a college kid is not cheap, especially when it comes to wanting those cute new shoes or a new outfit along with just trying to get through the week.

That's where the Wish app comes in. Wish is basically a bargaining website. Wish takes prices of items from basically every category, and cuts down the price by a lot. I have had a great experience when using the Wish app, and suggest it to everyone! For example, I saw a cute shirt I liked at a store, and found it for only five dollars on Wish! It arrives within one to two weeks and I have found no problems with my packages yet.

Here's how it works.

Wish is pretty self explanatory. It is just like online shopping on any website. First, you go up to the search bar and search for a category or a  specific item, then you search through those items to find the one you're looking for.

Just like any other shopping site, Wish provides customers with reviews from real people and a poll on how the item fit them. It shows a poll taken by customers who also bought that item telling whether they thought it fit tight, just right, or too big. That way you can get a better idea of the size you need. I think this has really come in handy because we all know that some shirts look better online than in person.

Altogether, this app has been great for me. I was hesitant at first because of how cheap everything was it almost didn't seem real, but it was! You should download the Wish app today and start shopping. You will be amazed at the prices you find for great products. Let me know what you think!

Ohio Northern Women's Tennis vs. Wittenberg

Some of you probably know this already, but if you are new to my blog, I am on the Ohio Northern tennis team. Tennis season recently started for us, and this past Sunday was our first home match. Unfortunately, it was too cold to play outside, so the team traveled to Lima, Ohio to Westwood Tennis Center. These are considered our "home courts" when we need to play inside due to weather purposes. Ohio Northern challenged Wittenberg that night at 6pm and ended with a victory! I actually played in the match myself, so not only was I live tweeting during the event, I contributed to it as well. Check out my Storify to get a recap of the whole match from beginning to end!

Every Major Has Its Struggles

There is something that has been bothering me for a while now and has come up in conversation quite often with people I associate with. I am a communications major with a minor in graphic design and I get told day after day how easy my major is. I get weird looks when I tell people I have a lot of homework and projects, or when I tell them I am stressed about something due.

I get the same answer so often. "How can you be complaining? Your major is so easy".

Things like this make me mad. A lot of my friends are Biology or Pharmacy majors, and I know it is difficult, but it bothers me when people think anything that's not Pharmacy or Biology is easy.

In my opinion, every major has its own struggles. For example, I am terrible at science. It is not my strength and I give a lot of credit to my Biology and Pharmacy friends who have to take a million classes for it. I would definitely struggle through that and they handle it very well. However, a lot of people don't realize how much hard work and time is put into art projects and graphic assignments on the computer. I think every major is unique, and each has a different form of hard work. If college was as simple as "drawing and coloring" everybody would do it. It's not as easy as it seems.

Of course, some majors are more difficult and require more studying than others, but that does not mean that every other major is a walk in the park. Every college student has their own struggles and dealing with those late nights and several cups of coffee just to cram for a test or finish a project. I know there are several different majors in my social media principles class, so I am interested in knowing if anyone else deals with the same things. I would love to hear your thoughts!

What Pinterest Is All About

This week in my social media class, we are moving on to Chapter 6 of "Social Media Marketing Workbook 2016". We begin to look at one of the most popular social media platforms, Pinterest. Pinterest allows people to create "boards" related to different topics they are interested in or things/events they need ideas for. Pinterest is about shopping. Consumers use it as an "idea board" for their college dorm room, wedding, or their next family reunion. Pinterest is incredibly strong in the female demographic. Pinterest makes it easy to "pin" ideas to your "board," and each pin can be instantly clickable to a blog or shop to make it easier to find.

The best way to understand Pinterest is to grasp the concept of an "idea board."
What is an idea board you may ask? For example, if someone is planning out her ideal wedding, first she signs up for Pinterest and creates a profile. Unlike other social media platforms, not a lot of information is displayed in a Pinterest profile, pretty much just a profile picture and a very brief description.

Next, she should download and install the Pinterest button. Once installed, she can now search Pinterest and begin "pinning" things to her "board" that she sets up. For her wedding, she may make a board labeled "wedding ideas" and begin searching for wedding dresses, rings, decorations, etc.

As you can see, Pinterest is easy to set up and anyone can do it. I have found a lot of success with my Pinterest, and it has enabled me to find different ideas for events I am participating in. It is a little taste of your personal brand and easy access to remembering ideas for future events. What does your Pinterest board consist of?

Thoughts While Returning From Spring Break

Coming back to school after Spring Break is never fun. You reminisce on your past week at wherever you were spending your break, and remember all of the good times you had during it. For me, this is completely accurate. I had one of the best Spring Breaks of my life and I'm sad it had to go so soon.

As I returned to campus this past Friday, reality hit me. I am now back on Ada time. Here are some thoughts I had now that I am back on campus and off break.

"When am I going to unpack?"
Personally, this is one of the hardest things about coming back from vacation. I hate unpacking with a passion. I already had a lot of things I needed to put away in the first place, so I was dreading doing this already. I basically set my suitcases in a corner of my room for about a day and a half until I could mentally prepare myself to do this. I also came back with more stuff than I brought, so finding places for that was another thing I needed to think about.

"What tests do I have this week?"
Of course nobody really wants to think about school when they are on break. So, when you get back from break, that's when you really start to remember your priorities, this being school. Luckily, I had the whole weekend here to study and get my stuff in order before returning back to school.

"I miss the warm weather."
This was definitely the first thing I thought of when I got off the plane in Cincinnati. I was in Hilton Head the whole week with high temperatures, so coming back to mid 20s was not a fun time. Going from wearing shorts and a t-shirt last week to layers this week is sad. Seeing the snow today made me miss it even more and gets me excited to be back down south for the Summer.

Even though I do miss my Hilton Head trip, I am happy to be back to a routine. It just gets me more excited for the trip I have planned next year, and the warm weather I will get this Summer. I can get through this! Did you have warm weather for your break? I would love to hear about it!

What is Uber?

I usually post about social media around this time of the week, but I thought I would change directions a little bit. As I mentioned in a previous blog post, I am on Spring Break right now in Hilton Head Island, South Carolina. This is a fairly known city yet is unfamiliar to me. I also do not have a car here because my team and I flew by plane. An app we have found that comes in handy for being in a place you don't know how to get around in is Uber. 

Uber is an app that anyone can set up on your phone. It is simple. All you do is download the app, create an account, plug in your credit card information and plug in your location along with the location you are looking to go to. The app will notify a designated Uber driver near you to pick you up from the location you plugged in. It usually takes only a few minutes for them to arrive. For example, if you have a large group like me, you can pay a little extra for an XL car. The standard size seats up to four people. Uber has a downside. It is usually only available in big cities and can get pretty expensive. The later it is at night, the higher the price gets. 

In the long run, I would suggest this to everyone! I have found it to be successful and safe. It tells you who your driver is and shows a picture of their car and their face. This is all through the Uber company, and the driver will have an Uber sticker on their windshield to indicate it is them. I have found this app useful when I visited Chicago, New York City, and Tampa. These are all big cities that I was unfamiliar with and it is an easy way to get from one place to another without the hassle of a subway or bus. I would love to hear about your experiences with Uber.

How Twitter is Unique

Do you have a Twitter? Have you contemplated getting one but wasn't sure what made it worth your time? Twitter is a social media site like your basic Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest. However, it is unique.

A similarity that Twitter shares with other social media sites is being able to "like" posts and "follow" other users. This is how you can communicate with others and get attention to your own page. Twitter  allows you to "retweet" posts you like which will show up on your own page. Posts on Twitter can be found more easily by using hashtags. By clicking on the hashtag, it takes you directly to the post related or other posts related to the hashtag. 

In fact, Twitter becomes more visual and Instagram becomes more textual. These two social media sites are on a collision course.

Twitter is the most open of all the social media. Anyone can set up an account in minutes for free and immediately start tweeting. There isn't as much privacy on Twitter like there is Facebook or Instagram. Anyone can listen in to your page and can easily find and read your tweets. They can even contact you without pre-approval. This has its flaws, though. It means that anyone can see what you are doing, so you need to be more cautious of what you post. Twitter is noisy. There will be many things happening at once and a lot of interesting stuff, so being able to focus on your own page and your possible customers and any marketing opportunities is important. 

According to "Social Media Workbook 2016", Twitter is a great opportunity for everyone and easy to set up. By having a Twitter, you are able to look for more marketing tools and create your own profile to promote your personal brand as a professional. How do you feel about Twitter?

How To Survive Spring Break with a Big Group

Being in a big group no matter where you go means lots of opinions! My tennis team is currently on Spring Break in Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, and there are ten girls here. This means lots of opinions and compromising. Here are a few tips I have learned throughout this week to be able to survive being in a big group in one house for Spring Break.

1. Make a Grocery List

Since we are here for a whole week and there are so many of us, we can't eat out every night, so we went to the grocery store on the first day to get food to keep at the house throughout the week. Not everyone likes the same things here, and we have a couple girls that are gluten free, so we can't get whatever we want. We had to make out a serious grocery list where each girl wrote down a few things she would want and then we went by that. This keeps everyone happy, and each girl will get a few things that they specifically asked for. 

2. Pack Light 

After being here for a few days, I came to realize that I packed way too much. Because I am living in a tight room in the house with four girls, I don't have as much space for my stuff to go. I could've gone without a few shirts and shorts that I had packed to save space in my suitcase and room.

3. Compromise

This goes along with the grocery list. Compromising with a big group like this is key. Everyone knows when you get a group of girls together, there more than likely will be drama. Fortunately, we haven't had much this trip, but making sure you compromise with each other and not have one person be the leader of everything is important in order to have a fun and enjoyable trip!

I hope these helped you get a better idea of what I am doing this week and what to do if you are ever in the same situation as me! Have a great rest of your break! What are you doing this week?