1 / 0

Capstone Project

Capstone Project. Sarah Orscheln and Beth Carpenter. Background research. Explaining MilitaryHomes.com : providing targeted listings in military-heavy areas, and services to assist in finding a home. Our role: increase hits or add value to increase hits later? . Initial goals.

kyrie
Download Presentation

Capstone Project

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. Capstone Project

    Sarah Orscheln and Beth Carpenter
  2. Background research Explaining MilitaryHomes.com: providing targeted listings in military-heavy areas, and services to assist in finding a home. Our role: increase hits or add value to increase hits later?
  3. Initial goals Strategize direction of blog. Provide content and rewrite existing content. Explore social media usage, including Twitter Provide ideas for how to best market site, including possible redesign advice
  4. Site as is
  5. Comparative research
  6. Findings Well-designed websites aren’t common in this genre. Sites like militarybyowner.com are doing well despite a not particularly well-designed site. The demographic is particularly reliant on basic forum sites for community purposes. Sites like MilitaryOneSource.com are popular because they provide a one-stop resource (also a popular Facebook group.) Ads are targeted at women, rely on motifs of family and children.
  7. Goals from research We wanted the site to be targeted mainly toward females as primary buyers. We wanted the site to be very usable, accessible and helpful. Like MilitaryOneSource.com, we wanted it to be a one-stop shop for anyone looking to buy a home. We needed to establish credibility. With only one base having home listings, we needed a way to establish trust with the customer that this was a widely-used service.
  8. Using social media SEO, Facebook, Twitter, blogs
  9. Social media and SEO How does social media fit into a search-optimized marketing plan? Builds links, traffic, and brand engagement. Social media won’t replace a core product. One day’s Digg hits won’t stick around the next day. Don’t expect social media plans to translate directly into numbers (i.e. hits)
  10. Facebook Pros: As more and more join Facebook, it’s the simplest tool to bring together scattered family members or servicemen across the globe. Built-in discussion forums and mechanisms to promote site traffic. Cons: Militaryhomes.com is not a recognized brand name and struggles gaining a fan page following. Needs more authenticity and value
  11. Twitter Learned how to use commercial tools like EasyTweet.com to make the Twitter process easier Writing tweets that are interesting, informative, and can be retweeted to spread throughout Twitter. Backlog of Tweets for future use Acting legitimately to add value to the Twitter community strengthens the brand
  12. Blogging Short, succinct posts Evergreen posts, can be posted anytime or used anytime Reach out to outside sites that might be likely to link back Problems: Need a more personal touch Need someone available to do more current posts, thus encouraging relevant conversation
  13. The numbers Looking at Google Analytics
  14. Traffic sources Over half of the traffic comes from search engines, where MilitaryHomes.com is the second ranked result for the keywords “military homes.” The site vetfriends.com was our top referrer. Plus1 would like to increase their rankings for locale searches – i.e. Jacksonville military homes. Thus our emphasis on local-driven content.
  15. Traffic summary
  16. Final products Home buying guides, blogs, Twitter postings
  17. Home buying guides Created HTML versions for bases Created InDesign template of downloadable, formatted guide file Example: Ft. Leonard Wood
  18. Blogs Created 30 backlogged evergreen blog posts Future posts can follow the same models Featured charities, essential knowledge when buying a home, tips for military families, and portraits of some of the bases on MilitaryHomes.com In the future can use “milbloggers” to promote particularly good content
  19. Twitter posts Same guidelines as blog posts: need to be evergreen yet interesting and informative Need to be supplemented with a small level of interaction with Twitter community if followers are to be maintained. Examples provided
  20. Final recommendations Use simple structure of blog posts and tweets to continue posting. Use profiles of realtors and names for blog authors to personalize the site and build trust. Profile customers for testimonials for the blog. Continue revising all site content for brevity and usefulness. Add more advanced search functions and an easier method for users to save listings, email and share, et cetera. Create sections for each base with the personalized HTML buying guides (and downloadable PDF guides based off provided template) to make moving to a specific base easier.
More Related