Week 14 Blog Post:




Displayed above, I created 3 advertisements. The banner advertisement is for Twitter or any placement where it can be used such as my website, Facebook, or even Instagram. The larger picture is the Facebook advertisement, and finally the square advertisement is targeting Instagram users. These advertisements will be effective because they have an aesthetically pleasing but attention grabbing look. It also has limited text and has a simple objective. The objective of all these advertisements is to expand my social media through targeting the 18-30 year old individuals. I believe that although these ads don't really show what they might be receiving, I was trying to make the most effective details to entice a potential client that will visit one of my social media pages to learn more.

An objective could be any of these: brand awareness, reach, traffic, engagement, app instats, video views, messages, and store traffic. I feel as if the objective that makes the most sense for personal trainers would be reach or traffic. This is because once a potential client has been reached it really is up to the personal trainer to reel the client in. Although engagement, messages, or video views might seem important, those don't really bring clients to you. Those type of objectives do increase your overall reach though. In conclusion the most effective objective is reach.

Week 13 Blog Post 2:

As far as designing and implementing ads for social media using the principals of good design specifically regarding banner ads, I would use clear and concise wording, keeping it simple, aesthetic design, and making the banner ad instantly readable. Essentially regarding other social media advertisements, I will need to create a simple but eye catching advertisement that displays an example of what the results will be if you join my training program and even also giving a small but informative ad.

The sort of advertising that my business could use include any form of social media advertising really, but I believe that the most effective advertisement would be previous client statements explaining why they enjoyed my business and why they recommend others to try it. Other advertisements that can be effective are YouTube videos that display a short overview of the specific exercises to act as a teaser and have them wondering and looking forward to my training session! I believe I should use these advertisements at least once a week, slowly building a more consistent reach, then I believe posting an advertisement daily will be the best.

There are a few different formats for Facebook ads, video, photo, slideshow, carousel, and dynamic product ads. The most effective formats for my business would be video, photo, and slideshow formatted ads. The reason for this is because these types of ads each serve an effective purpose in displaying different information or products in the fitness industry. I would use photo advertisements to effectively display an outfit, supplement, or specific form for an exercise. Video formatted ads can be very effective for informational videos explaining exercises or diets. A slideshow can be very effective in displaying information and pictures of clients or exercises targeting specific areas. Again, regarding ads in general, I believe that once a week for any type of these advertisements will be the perfect amount to serve as a reminder and bring in new clients.

I have never used Instagram boost but I feel like if I used more hashtags and used a boost I'd really reach a lot of new users that I wouldn't have before.

Week 13 Blog Post 1:

1. I researched the top 5 personal trainers as of 2019. They all actually use the same social media platform as their main form of overall advertising, which in this case it's Instagram. I listed their names and Instagram pages at the end of this paragraph but I just wanted to explain what I found. Throughout scrolling through hundreds of posts, all of these personal trainers actually did many key things in common. They were posting almost everyday, their content was always something new, if it was an informational video it was kept short and to the point, and finally they all had some sort of theme or flow through their posts that can be noticed just through their smaller images. They all also advertised their packages at some point or had a website in their bio where their followers can purchase any of their services.
- Ben Bruno @benbrunotraining
- Katie Crewe @katiecrewe
- Jen Widerstrom @jenwiderstrom
- Kira Stokes @kirastokesfit
- Joe Holder @ochosystem

2. Scrolling through personal trainer pages on Facebook and YouTube, the only videos or posts that really draw my attention are labelled with capital letters and/or have a short informative message. Their call to action on Facebook and YouTube is the same as in Instagram but is seen much more often. They make their packages or services readily available especially things such as diet or workout plans that are claimed to be custom per individual can easily be found by many personal trainers using these platforms. They do use imagery and it is effective to a certain extent. Sometimes the images aren't relative to the post and just show someone working out which I don't even look at the picture anymore. I wouldn't say those ads are annoying but I don't think I'm alone on this but any post that is asking me to buy or pay for something makes me less inclined to purchase from them because I already know how to do that, in other words I didn't read their post to buy something from them necessarily.

3. Comparing the impact of traditional advertising to advertising done on Social media I would notice that many things are similar yet just digitized versions of traditional advertising methods. For example Craigslist or Ebay are like the magazines you used to buy and sell things. There are many other similarities but what I like to notice is that content created now isn't really the same. Society now gets bored really quickly and therefore you cannot really post anything unnecessary because people will view your business or content as pointless or too much therefore receiving no reach. Advertising done on Social Media, although specific methods must be applied to use effectively, is much more effective in my opinion because of the amount of possibilities it can provide you as a business. Especially the fact that it's free means that if you have been a business for a long time and the word of mouth has brought you many clients then Social Media will definitely bring you even more!

Week 12 Blog Post 2:

I researched personal training groups on Linked In and didn't really find much. The few group were businesses or individuals that would teach continuing education units to maintain your certification for being a personal trainer. The other ones weren't really groups but businesses that help personal trainers gain more clients by teaching them specific methods. Facebook seemed to the more useful personal training social media group. I found a few local personal trainer groups and joined them to see what kind of upcoming posts they will have. Analyzing their previous post made me realize that this social media group can actually help me understand what clients want and how they view their personal trainers. It seems as if they do meetups every month and I might actually join in one day!

The second option I researched was Yelp. Although I couldn't really find any really popular personal trainers in San Diego, I researched bigger cities such as LA, NY, and San Francisco. I found multiple personal trainers with hundreds of reviews. I think Yelp definitely has an impact as it would be the first thing to pop up when you google your name or fitness name. This would allow prospective clients to validate hiring you as their personal trainer based on the reviews. I feel like Yelp can be detrimental to the success of a personal trainer if he/she doesn't have that many reviews because one bad review can mess everything up. Therefore I will definitely be creating a Yelp but after I have built a strong relationship with at least 20 of my clients. I think Yelp is more important to some businesses however specifically in the fitness world it's not that important because most personal trainers do not use Yelp. I think most don't use Yelp because of the same reason I said, it's key to have a strong client base otherwise having one unhappy client that can post everything you did wrong can make your Yelp business page useless.

Week 12 Blog Post 1:

After reading the lecture, the additional online marketing tools I believe could be important to the growth of my business would be Yelp, YouTube, and Spotify. Yelp will be beneficial for receiving reviews from previous clients. YouTube can help me have previously recorded workouts for clients to watch as they try with my supervision. Finally Spotify can only be helpful when clients ask me for my workout playlist. I would integrate them after the New Year as I'm in a transitional stage of my life and can't focus on my business at the moment. The specific methods would be simple, in other words I would ask a few of my closest clients that I have built a meaningful relationship with for a review on Yelp. YouTube videos I can start recording now to have a bunch of content for the future! I do not have anything to post on the discussion because I will never really use a business location on google maps unless I buy my own fitness studio which won't be for a few years at least.

Week 11 Blog Post 2:

I commented on these blogs:

https://csit155-fa19-stephanied.blogspot.com/

https://csit155-fa19-bkarp.blogspot.com/

https://csit155-fa19-apagatpatan.blogspot.com/