Golden Through the Tweets

Posted on by Sydney Golden

Part One: Influence

My overall presence on social media and knowledge in the sphere increased exponentially during this course. While my numbers aren’t as strong as I feel my knowledge or reach shows, I feel comfortable with what I learned in Twitter, WordPress, Sysomos, and Instagram, and in going out into the real world and cultivating my personal brand, or a brand for a client or company.

On Twitter, my following grew by 11, from 123 followers to 134 followers. I unfortunately lost a fair number of followers throughout the semester, but that could have been for any number of reasons (especially as Twitter was going through some rebranding of their own and whipping out bot or fake accounts who could have been following me as well). I really like how my voice on Twitter has changed throughout the semester – I used to exclusively retweet or post personal tweets venting about the political process, climate, or legislation. I used twitter as my personal, anonymous, online rant. However, I believe, through this class, my twitter has become a hub for interesting information related to politics, pop-cultures, the advertising world, or interesting tidbits. The viral content challenge pushed me to learn the ins and outs of Twitter ads and campaigns, and the Twitter analytics feature really showed me where impressions were most popular or decreased.

My Klout score jumped two points, from about a 52 to 62. This was a huge jump in my Klout, which I am attributing to my increase in tweeting about once a day, created an Instagram account, and overall grew my presence. Additionally, I became an expert in 16 more topics since creating my Klout account at the start of the semester.

Overall, I think what worked was staying true to my voice and the narratives I like telling. Being genuine will create trust and interest, and that is what I look for when personally looking for content to engage with.

Part Two: Execution

Below are my 10 most successful tweet of this semester. I think it is a great bunch that perfectly sums up my time. They touch on being a senior and the whirlwind of emotions related to that, politics, pop-culture, and, as always, my unconditional love for Dominos pizza.

The assignment for this tweet was to geo-tag and plug Newhouse. I was thinking about a good tweet to target at recruiters, but everything seemed very inauthentic and forced. I accidentally clicked on the gif button and this was the first gif to pop up. I thought it perfectly rounded out my experience: dedicated, serious, a little sadness around the eyes, but applauding and supportive of everything I have achieved or done socially. And, it seemed to resonate with three others who liked the post.

The assignment for this Tweet was around Google maps and the 360 experience so many other apps are producing. I immediately thought, there is nothing more authentic to me than my being from Santa Monica. And at the time I was just itching to get home before thanksgiving break and feel the warm sun instead of the budding, freezing Syracuse winter. I took a screenshot of downtown Santa Monica (making sure to include the ocean, Montana Ave., and Palisades Park. Then the copy told people why I tweeted this photo, in navigation lingo, and included hashtags that connected the emotion and meaning of the tweet to the picture and words. My home friends, who I rarely see anymore, were so excited that they liked and tweeted at me.

This tweet began my viral content challenge, and the success of this tweet foreshadowed the success of the challenge. My meme was tapping into the high-maintenance culture of people coming out with all of these random dietary beliefs or ideas. What makes it the most humorous is the dog’s human like qualities in the picture (and the internet loves doggos), it is on a plane, and the juxtaposition of the situation related to the dog. The title of my web card reads “When your high-maintenance child is being high-maintenance,” and the copy of the tweet is the copy of the meme itself, which is “my child is gluten-free, dairy-free, and allergic to the ground. This tweet taught me to make a web card, which I learned is an invaluable skill.

This was not an assigned tweet, but regardless one of my favorites related to the class. My Periscope challenge was a blind make-up challenge where Tomar and myself were the models, where Sydney and Alexi blindly put make up on our faces. Gabi assisted them, while Summer filmed and narrated their success. It was so fun and I was laughing the entire time. So may people tuned in and we received so much positive feedback. I tweeted this picture out to show everyone what they missed out on if they didn’t tune in, and the response shows me that people loved it as much as I did!

I saw the movie Marshall with my parents over parents weekend and absolutely loved it. Not only was it a great film, but it started so very important conversations, especially considering the current political climate. The assignment was to tweet out a Twitter Moment, and when I saw this moment about Marshall, I wanted to continue the conversation. Especially because the movie did not get as much buzz as a box office blow out.

Another tweet about senior year (she says jokingly, but secretly wishing she could be a senior in college forever). The assignment for this tweet was to create an original hashtag and tweet it out. My hashtag was #SlippinIntoTheMoment, and I came up with this because I was singing lyrics to a song with my friends, and wrongly got thought the lyrics were “Slippin into the moment,” and was profusely made fun of. When I saw this assignment, I thought it would be such a great hashtag, it was original, and authentic to my brand. I wanted to pair it with a gif, because gifs seemed to have resonated with my audience, and this one perfectly showed the dualism between absolutely loving senior year and enjoying it, while it also moves so quickly and it is often a year of “lasts.”

I am so thrilled this was one of my best tweets because this is one of the best causes, that is so near to my heart. As part of my sorority, we have a national partnership with St. Jude Children’s Hospital which is one of the best causes, children’s cancer. Our Philanthropy event is called Delta Diner, and held on campus in October. This was the fundraising page for it, which I tweeted out for an assignment in this class that was sharing an account you are passionate about. It was retweeted four times, which I would attributed my tagging the two organizations and the hashtags.

This was another one of my favorite tweets. Dominos is my favorite brand and a personal passion of mine. I am known to all of my friends as a Dominos lover and huge supporter. This gif was too funny, and is actual life footage of me when the Dominos tracker changes from “quality check” to “delivery.” This was when I first discovered that my followers liked gifs, and that gifs were great, mindless added content to a traditional worded tweet. This tweet was also a great lesson in that you don’t always have to tweet for a specific reason – passion tweets are great and well received.

This tweet involved a very serious issue to me that I wanted to bring life to. There was a suspected shooter on USC’s campus the day after the Las Vegas shooter. In reality, a USC professor was just heartbroken from the Las Vegas shooting, a little intoxicated, and misunderstood, that someone jumped to conclusions and thought there was a shooter on campus. I think that Twitter is incredible and a great hub for information, but this was a lesson in checking sources and not jumping to conclusions, especially when something is so sensitive and safety is on the line. I think the hashtags are what garnered the high engagement for this post as well.

Obviously a great tweet for obvious reasons, as I am a birthday queen and think it is the greatest, most important day of the year. The assignment was to use the hashtag #ICYMI, which we learned in class was “in case you missed it” and was a great introduction into discussing things that might be a little outdated, but you still want to make them relevant or resurface them. In this case, I didn’t want anyone, especially in the Twitter sphere to forget about my special day. People love birthday so I received some love and a reply from this tweet.

Analyzing each of these 10 tweets really brought to life what a great semester it has been, especially in my personal growth. As an overall suggestion, I think gifs produce the highest engagement with my audience, as well as doing research into organizations or hashtags that people could be following related to events or topics.

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