social media beyond class discussion .• demonstrate W r i t i n g

For the organizational campaign, I chose Amazon because of its versatility. For the social media portion, I thought 2 posts for Facebook, 1 post for Instagram and 1 post for Twitter would be fine.

The minimum word count is 1,500. Times New Roman with 1′ margins

Apa formatting with no direct quotes (only paraphrasing)

A reference list of the articles used

Goals:

For your final paper, you will apply what you’ve learned this semester to a real-life

communication scenario. Your final paper will help you meet the following goals:

• Develop your knowledge of social media beyond class discussion.

• Demonstrate how the knowledge you’ve learned this semester can be used in real life.

• Effectively communicate messages on social media through stakeholder analysis,

platform identification, and two-way communication.

• Improve your ability to synthesize and articulate your thoughts in writing.

You need to pick one of the below scenarios as the basis for your paper. Your final paper will

consist of creating social media content (i.e. Facebook posts, Twitter tweets, Instagram photos, etc.) as well as analyzing the effectiveness of what you created based upon what you’ve learned this semester from the readings and class assignments. You won’t actually be posting what you’ve created on social media, but instead coming up with hypothetical content that would be appropriate for the communication scenario that you’ve selected.

Campaign Scenarios:

Please choose one from the following three campaign scenarios:

1. Organizational Campaign

Imagine you’re in charge of the social media accounts for an organization. Your organization can be a small business (i.e. Death Wish Coffee, Bread from Brooklyn), a corporation (i.e. Apple, Amazon), a non-profit (i.e. Make A Wish, Things of My Very Own), or a professional

association (i.e. National Communication Association). Your organization can be real or

fictional. Your goal is to design effective two-way communication that is relevant to your

stakeholders.

2. Political Campaign

Imagine you’re in charge of the social media accounts for a politician. Your politician can be

holding a political office or can be running for political office. Your politician or candidate can be elected to or running for local, state or federal office. Your politician can be real or fictional. Your goal is to design effective two-way communication that is relevant to your stakeholders.

3. Health Campaign

Imagine you’re in charge of the social media accounts for a healthcare entity. Your entity can be a local doctor or hospital, a governmental health department or agency (i.e. NYS Department of Health, the CDC), a health insurance company (i.e. MVP, Aetna), or a public health campaign (i.e. mental health campaign, anti-smoking campaign, anti-bullying campaign). Your healthcare entity can be real or fictional. Your goal is to design effective two-way communication that is relevant to your stakeholders.

Instructions:

Your paper needs to be at least 1,500 words (excluding your reference section), double spaced,

and attached as a Word document. You will not be penalized for going over 1,500 words. There is no maximum word limit. You must use Times New Roman 12-point font and 1” margins. Only write your name at the top of your paper and number your pages. You need a clear

introduction and conclusion with transitions between paragraphs. You need to use APA for this paper which includes in-text citations and a reference list at the end of your paper listing all your sources.

Your paper needs to contain all of the following elements:

1. Introduction: Your introduction gives a preview of what you’re going to discuss in your

paper. The last sentence in your introduction should be your thesis statement. (1 paragraph)

2. Thesis: Your thesis statement is your main goal for your campaign. Your thesis should

synthesize your four social media posts in some way. Your four posts should connect in some way to each other, all related to the goals for your campaign. Your thesis should be the last sentence you write in your introduction paragraph. In addition, your thesis should be written after you’ve created and analyzed your social media content. The rest of your paper will provide support for your thesis statement. You need to think about how each section of your paper relates to your thesis and connect each section to your thesis as you write.

3. Campaign Description: In this paragraph, you need to provide a basic description of your campaign. This includes the following: Which scenario did you pick? Why did you pick this scenario? Who is your organization, politician, or health entity? What is the main goal for your campaign? (1 paragraph)

4. Platform and Stakeholders: In this paragraph, you need to state the platform or platforms you will be using for your campaign as well as a justification for why you’re using this platform(s). You can use the same platform for all your posts (i.e. four social media posts all on Instagram) or you can spread them out on several platforms (i.e. one on Instagram, one on Twitter, and two on Facebook).You also need to include a description of your primary stakeholders and explain why your selected platform(s) is a good strategic choice to target these stakeholders. (1-2 paragraphs)

5. Social Media Content: This section of your paper is your opportunity to be creative. You

need to write at least 4 actual posts (hypothetical social media content) that would appear on the platform(s) you selected for your social media campaign. These posts should emphasize two-way communication as that is the goal for your campaign (although one one-way post is fine). In addition, your posts should connect or relate to one another in some way. Don’t tell me what you’re going to say, but actually say it, word or word as if it was going to appear on social media. This content should be written within the actual text of your paper. This includes written text and/or images. You can use social media generators; however, you need to focus on the text and writing effective text that encourages two-way communication rather than the comments, shares, likes, etc.

6. Analysis: Your analysis is your opportunity to justify why you think the content that you

created is effective communication for your campaign. In your justification, you need to include content from at least two different course readings to support your choices. Please note that the minimum is two readings, but I highly encourage more than two to ensure your analysis goes deep enough. Do not use direct quotes, but instead paraphrase content from the readings to help support why your content would be effective. Make sure you use APA in-text citations when you paraphrase. You do not need to do outside research for this part of your paper. Instead, the course readings should guide your analysis. You will be graded on the accuracy of the description of the information from the readings, and the appropriateness of your selected readings for analyzing your social media content. In addition, you will be graded on the quality, depth, and insight of your analysis. How you structure this part of your paper is up to you. You can either write all your social media posts and analyze them together or you can write each post and then analyze it separately. (approximately 3-4 paragraphs)

6. Conclusion: Your conclusion wraps up your paper highlighting your thesis, your main goals for your campaign, and why your social media content is effective. Your conclusion should not introduce any new information. (1 paragraph)

7. Reference List: This is the last page of your paper. It includes a list of all your sources that you used in your paper, in alphabetical order by the first author’s last name. The source citations must be in correct APA format. This section should begin on a new page. All the sources that you cite in the reference list must appear in the body of your paper. The reference list does not count towards your word count.