Art is Important

When I was younger, I never thought I was good at art. I couldn't paint, I couldn't draw anything literally anything. I loved being in the art room playing with different textures and patterns but I had convinced myself because I couldn't do the traditional types of art I wasn't good and art wasn't for me. Well it took me a few years (pretty much until college) to realize this was wrong. You can be artistic and creative without having to be able to draw like Van Gogh.

Being able to express yourself through art is so important for everyone but especially young children. Everyone can paint, draw and create beautiful art and learning that at a young age opens so many opportunities. "In a study conducted by Judith Burton, Columbia University, research evidenced that subjects such as mathematics, science, and language require complex cognitive and creative capacities “typical of arts learning” (Burton, Horowitz, & Abeles, 1999).  “The arts enhance the process of learning. The systems they nourish, which include our integrated sensory, attentional, cognitive, emotional, and motor capacities, are, in fact, the driving forces behind all other learning” (Jensen, 2001)" (http://www.katyisd.org).

Children should be exposed to all different types of art. They should be able to understand early on that they are creative and artistic even if they can't draw or paint traditionally. There are so many other art fields that require creativity. 

This semester I will be exploring and understanding the importance the arts and how schools are implementing and how schools can better implement it. Funding for the arts are always the first things to get cut and that is wrong. Kids needs the arts to grow and learn and to even excel in other subjects. Cutting the arts first is hurting not only the student's but the communities as well.  

Bio

Hello, I am artsyblogger, a recent (well kinda recent- graduated last May) quinnipiac grad, who loves all things art and design. Currently, I work for an education company as a product designer creating programs and textbook designs for grades k-12. It is exciting and rewarding to design art and educational materials for children to learn from. I live and work in Boston, MA! 

When I am not designing, you can find a camera attached to my hip. I love to roam around the city finding fun and secret places to shoot. Boston has so much beautiful little details around every corner. I'm also a avid tea drinker. My favorite has to be the classic green tea although I do switch it up occasionally.

I look forward to learning and exploring in this class!

Past Work Sample

One piece of writing that I really enjoyed writing was the ICM501 final paper. This allowed us to explore something within the field of social media that we were passionate about. Writing about things that we are passionate about really allows us (or at least me) the opportunity to feel interested and motivated to write a great essay.

Coca-Cola Social Media Marketing

Social Media has become a revolutionary way to market a product. With the rise of smartphones, more and more people are connected on all forms of social media including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc. By using these platforms to market products, companies are able to connect with the consumer and allow them to share their opinions and responses. One company that has found this technique effective is Coca-Cola. By creating viral videos and promoting their new campaign with a hashtag, they have grown and increased revenue to their business. These campaigns include the Share a Coke, Friendly Twist and Coke Hug Machine. Each of these initiatives use social media to cause consumers to feel more connected to Coca-Cola and its products, which then boosted the company as a whole. 

Coca-Cola’s most popular campaign, “Share a Coke with…” has increased its sales by 2%. This campaign printed names on the bottle that would say “Share a coke with Jim” or “Share a coke with Friends.” As The Wall Street Journal explained, “The idea was to get consumers to buy personalized bottles and cans not just for themselves, but also for friends and family” (Esterl, online). This small campaign that started in Australia in 2011 has grown to more than 70 countries (McQuilken, online). People specifically buy coke when they can find their name on the bottle, whereas before they would just buy it if they really wanted one. By creating a personal touch on such an iconic brand, it allows the consumer to want to buy the product. This was a new and creative way to market that was not seen in any other company before. Coca-Cola also created a hashtag #shareacoke and promoted it on advertisements and on the bottle. This way when someone found a bottle with their name they could post a picture and use the hashtag. This hashtag has been used in 680,000 public Instagram public tags. The #ShareaCoke hashtag was tweeted 235,000 from 111,000 fans (Hepburn, online). On Twitter, the hashtag even broke a record on September 17 with more than 107,500 mentions globally (Journey Staff, Online). This is a new and effective way to use social media. This is exactly what Jenkins talks about in “If it Doesn’t Spread, It’s Dead.”

In this emerging model, consumers play an active role in “spreading” content rather than being the passive carriers of viral media: their choices, their investments, their actions determine what gets valued in the new mediascape. Re-centering the discussion on choices consumers make, rather than choices media companies make, forces advertising and entertainment companies to pay closer attention to consumer’s motivations and thus to design content which better aligns with their interests; it will also allow companies to adopt policies which sustain rather than repress this desire to help circulate relevant material throughout their social networks. (Jenkins, 22)

Here Jenkins emphasizes the importance the consumer has on marketing and advertising on our new media climate. When companies pay more attention to their customers, they make more money because they are putting out products (like coke bottles with names on them) that people want and are drawn to.

In Henry Jenkins’ book, companies that have the most gain from spreadable media are those “who want to build strong emotional connections with their consumers” (102). In coke’s case, people get excited to see their name and want to find their friend’s name and their favorite character’s name. By creating an emotional connection, consumers are more likely to invest and feel satisfied with their purchase. One man was particularly excited when he saw his children’s names on a coke bottle. “We don't drink Coca-Cola, and our shopping habits aren't generally characterized by what economists call present-biased preferences, but when we saw our children's names, side by side, they seemed to call to us. Impulse control vanished. Overwhelmed by sentiment, we simply had to have those bottles” (Carter, online). This is a prime example of how emotion directly affects customer’s decision to buy a product. The man even says he normally doesn’t fall into advertising schemes, but his excitement over seeing his children’s names threw this all out the window.

Along with Share a Coke, Coca-Cola has also created several videos that have gone viral. The most popular video, Coca-Cola Friendly Twist, has been viewed more than 9.6 million times, and that is just one of many video campaigns they have posted. According to Webtrends.about.com, a viral video spreads on the Internet because people react emotionally to it: “In terms of the Internet, a piece of content can spread just like a virus if people become “infected” when they see it. The infection usually comes from evoked emotions that spur the viewer to share it, so they can relate with other people and discuss how they feel” (Moreau, online). This is exactly what happens in the Friendly Twist video.This campaign puts a refrigerator of cokes on a college campus, but when you go to pick one up you can’t open it without using someone else’s to twist the top off. This revolutionary idea was created to encourage college freshman to interact with each other. It is important for the freshman to reach out and start talking amongst themselves in this age of cellphones and lack of communication. This concept shows how Coca-Cola is not only trying to market their product, but help change society into being more involved and connected with one another. People really responded well to this video. One viewer, Sean Van Staden, responded saying, “Not a fan ok (sic) coke but this marketing campaign was just sheer brilliance!!!” (Youtube.com). People are more likely to buy the product if they see the company is working on helping not only their business, but also society and people as a whole. This is also a new and unique way to market a product and allow the costumer to want to invest in their initiatives as well as their merchandise.  

Another video, Coke Hug Machine, was another creative way to make their product fun and interactive. This video shows a coke vending machine that says, “hug me,” replacing the traditional logo. The idea is that you have to hug the machine to get a free coke. This specific video was placed on a college campus in Singapore and drew a lot of attention. In the video, people start watching as people go up and hug the machine to get a free coke. At first, the campus seems empty and gloomy, with lonely students focusing only on schoolwork. Once they see the “hug me” machine, they go up to it, wrap their arms around it, and smile as a coke pops out. Instead of people sitting on benches by themselves, the students start talking to each other to try to figure out what is going on. This is similar to the effect that was seen in the Friendly Twist video. People start taking pictures and videos of this happening and posting it on social media, creating some free advertising for the company. Along with this, the company wants to spread joy to others. Leonardo O’Grady, ASEAN IMC Director, for The Coca-Cola Company, states, “Our strategy is to deliver doses of happiness in an unexpected, innovative way to engage not only the people present, but the audience at large” (Kosner, online). Just like with the Friendly Twist campaign, Coca-Cola is attempting to make a change in how people think and act. The company hopes this will help people, but also their business: “In other words, they hope it goes viral throughout Asia leading to outbreaks of random hugging, all with the Coca-Cola brand in mind” (Kosner, online). The lightheartedness of the campaign makes people like the company more, bringing some humanity to a corporate business. These fun little video campaigns create a buzz on social media, get their new products out there and show that they are trying to change society.

These different marketing campaigns increased Coca-Cola’s revenue as well as their presence on social media. Social media creates a free advertising platform that if used well can really help market a product. With more people on their phones and fewer people watching television and listening to the radio, social media has become the main way companies reach their customers. As seen in the Share A Coke campaign especially, people felt emotionally connected to their product, which led them to buy more bottles and want to promote it online. By allowing people to respond on forms of social media, companies are able to gage their products to a wide range of people. By finding exciting, creative ways to engage customers Coca-Cola has given their customers a new perspective on their product.