Campaign Report

July 21, 2015

Created by:
Iris Espino (Account Executive)
Debbie Choi
Eleanor Kreis
Elise Roberts

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Executive Summary...3
Background5
S.W.O.T. Analysis.6
S.WOT. Review.7
Communication Problem/Opportunity...8
Goals and Objectives..9
Key Audiences/Publics and Messages.....10
Strategies, Tactics and Tools....11
Budget...12
Campaign Outcomes.13
Measurement, Assessment, and Evaluation of Success....18
Suggestions/Recommendations for future campaigns..20
Client Analysis..22
References.23
Appendix...24

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
This report outlines the strategic communications plan developed by our summer 2015
Agency Team for Practical Advantage Communications (PRAD)a student-run advertising and
public relations agency located at the California State University, Fullerton-Irvine Campus.
After completing the client analysis, our primary goal was established: to promote awareness to
the CSUF communications student body. Specifically, we wanted to attract students from the
main CSUF campus to PRAD. One of the key strategies for this was to increase social media
presence through active posting on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Secondly, the team redesigned the website to make it more engaging, visually pleasing and easier to navigate. Lastly,
we contacted CSUF alumni to find out how their PRAD experience has helped them in their
current careers to promote the program through positive feedback.
The previous semester agency team hosted a successful Open House, which inspired our
team to build upon their momentum. Regrettably, our client was unable to provide us with the
necessary resources to access PRADs exiting Facebook and Twitter accounts. It is for this
reason we suggest that the agency teams for the fall and spring semesters focus on enhancing the
social media sites as a priority. Notwithstanding, our team was able to give the website a face-lift
by redesigning the home page with a fresh dynamic and chic look. A press release was written
for dissemination to the CSUF media room and other local print media. However, due to the
inactivity of the resources during the summer, the material was not published. Additionally, in
the process of interviewing and interacting with the CSUF alumni who have moved on to
successful careers we created a portrait of stories that demonstrate to the client(s) and future
CSUF students the caliber and importance of the PRAD program and how PRADs diversity and

collaboration promotes student success by bridging the gap between the classroom and practical
work experience.

BACKGROUND
Practical Advantage Communications (PRAD) is a philanthropic based organization,
which provides pro-bono services for nonprofits, small business, starter companies, and
entrepreneurial ventures. PRAD was founded in 2011 by D. Swanson, PhD in collaboration with
the Capstone Public Relations Course, COMM464 (Public Relations Management), and the
Advertising Course COMM451C (Advertising Campaigns). Dr. Swansons vision was to bridge
the gap between the classroom and practical work experience and satisfied the constant quest for
innovation in education to enhance the student experience, and to groom capable, well-rounded
constituents who will be hired upon graduation.
The CSUF Irvine campus has been around since 1989 but it was only in 2011 that it
relocated to its current location in Irvine. Because of this fact, many students think the Irvine
Campus is new and are not aware of the many opportunities beyond the academic programs this
campus offers, including PRAD. Some of the services include, but are not limited to strategic
communication planning, media relations, complete press kits, graphic design, creative projects,
social media strategies, and event planning and coordination.
During our initial consultation with the client, Dr. Evanow, indicated that PRAD needs to
continue building awareness within the CSUF student body and the small community businesses
and organizations. The client addressed concerns about PRADs social media outreach. We
concluded that our team would reach out to past alumni to find out where they are now and could
feature selective success stories on PRADs website and social media to help promote the class.

The SWOT Analysis is the structured planning method we used to evaluate PRADs strengths,
weaknesses, opportunities and threats involved in our campaign measurement. PRAD wanted to gain
students and client growth through increased awareness, maintenance and update of its website and by
reaching out to past alumni. The development of a SWOT Analysis was critical to our project. The
following table demonstrates our findings:
STRENGTHS

WEAKNESSES

PRAD is a hands-on program.

Course offered at the Irvine Campus only.

Assists both students and companies in

reaching their goals.

Not much awareness for this course.

Minimal variety in businesses/clients.

Program now available all year.

Course has high relevance in the College
of Communications.
OPPORTUNITIES
PRAD is still very young, only 4 years
old.
Lots of room for creative minds to play in
PRADs lab.
Jobs/Networking Opportunities.
A personal letter of recommendation at
the end of the course.

For summer students (8 weeks) is a very

tight deadline to make a comprehensive
campaign.
THREATS
School Budgets.
Titan PR because it is another student-run
agency
Unware students may think PRAD is a
club.
Negative reviews from students that may
have had a bad experience.

S. W. O. T. Review
Since its inception in 2011, PRactical ADvantage has conducted 76 successful campaigns for onand off-campus nonprofits and businesses. Nearly 300 students have participated in the agencys success
in the past four years. Its founders, Dr. Doug Swanson and Professor Pete Evanow have worked tirelessly
to establish Practical Advantage as one of the Department of Communications premiere high-impact
programs. Both professors have built the agencys lab and office space at the Irvine campus with the
vision to expand the Department of Communications curriculum in Irvine. The vision and leadership of
these dedicated educators are the reasons for the agencys success.
Notwithstanding, as our SWOT analysis reveals, PRAD still lacks awareness of its program.
PRAD also has not reached its target market effectively. Its media presence is not as strong as it could be
and the website lacks updates and maintenance. There has not been a coordinated effort to reach out to
past alumni, and the variety of organization/clients is limited. PRAD also has the disadvantage that no
matter how great a campaign the students developif not implemented, it is worthless.
However, as mentioned before, PRAD has a number of exciting opportunities that if carried out
effectively they could make a great contribution to the awareness and growth of the agency. PRAD is
only in its 4th year of existence, and it takes time to determine what mix media strategies and tactics
generate positive outcomes.

COMMUNICATIONS PROBLEM/OPPORTUNITY
Problem

There is a lack of consistency in PRADs current channels of communication. There are three
major problems: 1) Not enough awareness amongst target audiences, 2) Weak social media presence and
inconsistency in management and monitoring, and 3) Lack of a structured and systematic follow up of
CSUF alumni.

Opportunities
Problems 1) and 2) can be addressed through improving the weaknesses of the current website,
and through posting new, refreshing and engaging material as well as linking these to the source(s) of
information about PRAD for both students and potential clients. Problem 3) Start the process to build and
maintain a structured and systematic way to keep in touch with CSUF alumni.

GOALS AND OBJECTIVES

1. Web site update

Redesign to bring awareness and to promote the student-run ad agency.

Allow interactivity so that future students want to be part of the agency.

Objective: Promote PRAD consistently and link together on all social media platform.

2. Build stronger online media presence

Increase the number of likes on Facebook and increase number of followers on Twitter

Objective: Obtain more followers by using hashtags relevant to CSUF students and community business
and organizations. Make consistent postings throughout the summer to bridge the gap between now and
the fall semester. The idea is to keep PRAD in the students awareness all year.

3. Outreach:

Build a data base of CSUF alumni and the companies where they are employed.

Post successful CSUF alumni stories on the website, Facebook Page, and link to PRADs
information page.

Objective:
Contact CSUF alumni, interview and feature selective successful stories.

KEY AUDIENCES/PUBLICS AND MESSAGES

Targeted Publics
Our key audience(s) are:
1. CSUF students and other campus in the CSU system.
Undergraduate students (usually juniors or seniors) that are ready to obtain careers upon
graduation.
CSUF Departments and/or affiliates.
Faculty and Administrative Staff who might have their own business or are contemplating
entrepreneurial projects.

2. Non-profit, small businesses and organizations in our communities.

Rationales
1. All Communications majors must fulfill a capstone course. 464A (PRAD) satisfies this
requirement making this course a high relevance to the College of Communications.
This class brings together students from multiple concentrations. This adds to the pool of ideas
the student-run agency can bring to PRADs clients.

2. Small businesses and organizations in our communities are looking for assistance with social
media presence, development of campaigns to increase brand awareness, and many of the
services PRAD provides:

Strategic Communication Planning

Brochure Creation / Design

Research / Data Analysis

Social Media Development and
Management
Event Planning / Coordination /
Promotions
News Releases and Media Kits

Public Service Announcements

Newsletters
Feature Articles
Graphic Design

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STRATEGY, TACTICS, AND TOOLS

Strategy #1: Revamp PRAD Website
Complete revamping of the home page including structure, content as well as format.

Tactic: Prepare new content to update website

Creation of fresh content and new students and faculty photos.

Tools: Use Weebly and the tools provided by the Lab to create a more dynamic, modern and
chic website to attract future students. Deploy message(s) to get the word out to students
wherever they congregate.

Strategy #2: Increase PRAD awareness via Social Media

Tactic: Find out what sites students visit and follow them, like them, etc.

Upload new content and photos

Post pictures conveying the benefits of the PRAD program

Promote PRADs First Summer class (COMM464-A) now available all year.

Tools: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram (others) using related hashtags.

Strategy #3: Reach CSUF alumni

Tactic: Get list of CSUF alumni from appropriate source and contact as many of them as
possible.

Find out what they are doing and with whom (company)?

Ask them, what impact did PRAD have on their current job(s)?

Feature their stories on PRADs website. Alumni and business endorsements.

Tools: Excel or other database creating system. Photoshop and Illustrator.

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BUDGET
For this campaign, the Agency Team did not have a budget. We spent our time and efforts working on
creating a communications campaign utilizing the free tools provided by the Lab, free social media web
sites, and by reaching out to friends for help.

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CAMPAIGN OUTCOMES
The first strategy of our campaign was to increase PRADs awareness throughout the
summer by giving the website a face-lift with fresh new content and new client logos.
The update of the website consisted of an entire revamp of the home page including structure,
content and format. With the goal of designing a more modern, chic yet simple website, the execution was
successful in terms of the limited options that were available on Weebly. The previous website seemed a
bit cluttered, and it did not have a clear navigation of the home page. The vision of the website revamp
was to promote the agency focusing on the future students rather than focusing predominately on the
current students. This will allow prospective students to want to be a part of the agency after reading the
inspiring and positive remarks about what the PRAD program can do for them.

We removed the individual group photos from the home page and added them onto the summer
2015 students page. We also created a new subpage for the spring 2015 students as well as a summer
2015 subpage for the current class. We transferred the 2015 spring class photos to their own respective
subpage from the main students tab, and we updated the main student page with the current class
separated into each group along with the students names.
To update images from last semesters students to the current, our team conducted multiple
photo-shoots on campus of the entire class and of individual groups, and then uploaded them onto the
website.
In addition, we featured students with interesting and/or successful backgrounds who are
currently attending the course. Unfortunately, out of the four students interviewed, only two were
successful to feature on our website. The other two did not feel comfortable with an in-person recorded
interview and agreed to take the questions home and send their answers to us via e-mail. Since we did not
receive their answers back, we were not able to feature their stories. On the bright side, two featured
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students sufficed to add onto our home page, leaving more room for another new addition of the Advice
from Our Alumni column, which had a much more successful outcome than the Featured Students
column.

We created the structure of the website also for the convenience of future students. Rather than
uploading images created on another portal, the new format makes it simpler to replace previous
semesters photos to the new, change text easily and overall make updates relating to the current class
much easier.

Our second strategy was to increase social media presence and awareness across the online
communities where our target publics congregate. After the initial meeting with our client, he discussed
the need to revamp PRADs Facebook and Twitter to be able to create more awareness for the agency. By
revamping the two social media sites to a more modern and attractive look, we concluded this would
create the needed traffic flow for PRAD sites. Regrettably, we have to defer this strategy to the next
agency team since our team did not have the necessary resources to access PRADs exiting Facebook and
Twitter accounts. In addition to the fact that the summer is not an ideal time for promoting the course to
students. The CSUF campus is quiet during this time and some of our tactics and tools would have not
worked without student active participation.

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Intended Outcomes
We intended on fulfilling the campaign goals of increasing awareness through social media awareness in
the eight weeks summer session. We believed the time we had was feasible to increase the number of
likes on Facebook and the number of followers on Instagram by at least 5%. Our Account Executive, Iris
Espino, met with a Social Media Consultant who specializes in revamping social media sites and
monitoring links from where the followers and likes come. The advice received was extremely helpful
and allowed us to devise a plan in accordance with the organizations needs.

Unintended Outcomes

We did not intend to not have access the entire term to neither the Facebook nor the Twitter account.
After multiple attempts, to obtain login and passwords, we had to make a decision to redirect our focus
onto the website, which took up the majority of our time. We had to assume that our client was
preoccupied with other busy and important matters.

Finally, our third strategy was to reach out to past alumni to get testimonials to attract more
students to this class versus choosing other capstone courses, thus adding credibility to PRADs website.
The alumni outreach initiative was to foster relationships between the CSUF Alumni and past
PRAD students and get some of their stories posted on PRADs website. Once the agency team began
making contacts, we created a database with their information-- the companies for which they work and
their email addresses. Then we added CSUF alumni stories on the website.
This strategy was to increase alumni involvement, which in turn could help produce more
potential clients for PRAD. The tool we used was LinkedIn. Once we made contact with alumni and
began networking, we received references to other alumni. The agency team also thought of its own

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personal contacts that would be great to include in the interviews, thus increasing the number of alumni
reached.
This graph depicts the outreach achieved during the campaign:

The questions posed to each interviewee generally consisted of the questions listed below, and
whether or not they participated in the PRAD program:
1. How did your experience at CSUF (and PRAD) help you find your first position after graduation?
2. What would you look for if you were in the position to hire new graduates from CSUF?
3. If you could do it all over again, what would you do differently?
4. Did anything discussed in the PRAD class come true?
5. Are there other alumni you stay in contact with, whom you would not mind referring us?
6. May we stay in contact with you after this interview?
The alumni interviewed were willing to help in any way possible. They all also agreed to be a contact
in the future. The alumni consensus was thankful for the interview opportunity and for the honor to
appear in the agencys website.
After each of the interviews, we structured the quotes. Once the quotes were structured and we
obtained their headshots, we added them to the website. Once we had a screenshot of the completed

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Advice from Our Alumni column, we began sending completed quotes to the alumni for approval,
along with the waiver. Overall, the alumni were very happy with the outcome.
The individuals featured on the website are a balance of PRAD alumni, CSUF Communications
graduates, female and male, whose distinguished backgrounds and/or careers illustrate the caliber of
CSUF and PRAD students. Half of the alumni postings on the website are personal endorsements or
testimonials praising the Practical Advantage program, or the faculty members who teach the course.
Below is a screenshot of the Advise from Our Alumni:

Prior to our agency team working on this project, there was no alumni presence on the website,
nor was there a database. Once the outreach began, the networking kept expanding, leaving so much
potential for growth in the future. The next agency team to take on this campaign can use Elise Roberts,
as a contact to continue the influx of alumnis knowledge and presence in PRAD. Elises contact
information is mobile: (714) 732-0748, email: adventurexlass@gmail.com or elise.roberts@polb.com.

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MEASUREMENT, ASSESSMENT AND

EVALUATION OF SUCCESS
Quantitative hard data It is about numbers
While the number of followers and likes did not increase in the 8 weeks of our
campaign development for the reasons stated in the Campaign Outcome section, the revamping of
the two social media sites to a more modern attractive look will be easier with the suggestions our team
has provided under the Recommendations Section.
The revamping of the agencys website was a total success. Our team revamped the entire home
page including the structure, format and content. This execution was the key to promoting the agency not
only to current students but also to future students who will be excited to join PRAD. We are unveiling
the before and after during our campaign presentation. PRAD will greet the students attending the fall
semester with a brand new agency website that is not only chic and modern but also practical and
interactive. Not only that but, they will also have a brand new location with more space and equipment
that mirrors that of a real advertising agency.
The alumni outreach also was a great success. The agency team accomplished everything we set
out to do and more.
The graph below depicts the alumni outreach achieved during the campaign:

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Prior to our agency team working on this project, there was no alumni presence on the website, nor a
database created.

Qualitative soft data difficult to quantify

A press release was written to promote the PRAD course now being offered year-round.
However, The Daily Titian and other CSUF media channels are close during the summer. It is
ready for publication when the fall semester resumes.

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RECOMMENDATIONS
1. PRADs Website Upkeep
The website is the face or the front door to PRAD. Our team focused and spent a great deal of
time creating the new website with the goal that future agency teams can build upon it, that is
why we highly advise that the next individual who takes on the Agency Team website becomes
familiar with Weebly, if he or she is not, by watching the introduction tutorial.

2. Management and Monitoring Social Media

We recommend that the agency team for the fall semester immediately obtain login and password
information to any of the Social Media accounts no later than the 2nd week of the semester. The
Facebook and Twitter will be the first social media accounts in need of updating with pictures and
current information. We recommend that there are 1-2 post per week utilizing hashtags and
featuring relevant events and information linking to the new updated website.

3. CSUF/PRAD Alumni Outreach

Our team recommends that the next agency team focus on raising students awareness of
PRactical Advantage program via clubs and/or courses that communications majors are required
to fulfill, for example, COMM 233 (Mass Communications) and COMM 407 (Communications
Law). We believe these classes would be the best to target, in order to educate students about
PRAD. These two courses encompass communications students from various concentrations and
levels.
COMM 233 would be an ideal course to target because freshmen, sophomores and transfer
students generally take it. If the next agency team reaches out to these students early on, they
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could influence their decision for their capstone class before they have other options. At this same
time, they can be educated about PRAD and in turn, increase PRADs brand awareness
throughout the campus.
Another target can be COMM 407 primarily taken by juniors and seniors who are looking for a
capstone course Agency could gain improved awareness of PRAD, possibly increasing the
number of student enrolling in 464A.
An additional target audience could be communications clubs: AD Club, Entertainment
Travel Club (ETC) and Public Relations Student Society of America (PRSSA). We have an
established relationship with Alex Cabale, AD Club, Programs Director, as well as with Deanna
Rey, past Treasurer, PRSSA, who has also offered her assistance. If the next agency team reaches
out to these clubs and establishes a relationship with its members, they could increase the agency
outreach and make PRAD more viable.
Both points of contact are included in the Alumni Outreach Database (AOD.)

4. Invite Businesses for a Tour of the Agency

Businesses who rent the Irvine Campus Meeting and Conference Room facilities should
be made aware of the agency and invite them to see it while they are in the premises.

5. Increase The Category Of Business/Clients

Some brands are more exciting to work with than others are; providing variety might
awaken the student excitement to work for a brand they like.

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CLIENT ANALYSIS
Our team worked directly with Professor Evanow, who is a faculty member and one of
the founders of the premiere, high-impact PRAD program. His professionalism, flexibility and
reliability made it easier to communicate our initial campaign proposal.
After the agency team formally presented the campaign proposal, the client approved it
with minor changes and suggestions. At this point, the client gave approval to go ahead with our
campaign strategies.
The team adjusted the original proposal by obtaining either verbal or e-mail approval
from the client. The original proposal included a more ambitious social media strategy
revamping of the Facebook and Twitter sites. The adjusted proposal reflects a less ambitious
strategy for social media and instead focus the efforts of the campaign on the creation of a new
website.
Overall, our team met with great support and understanding from the client side and are
happy to have been a part of this project.

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REFERENCES

Wilcox, D., Cameron, G., & Reber, B.(2015). The Internet and Social Media. In Public relations:
Strategies and tactics (Eleventh ed., p.598). New York: PEARSON.
Meaning in Method: The Rhetoric of Quantitative and Qualitative Research. (n.d.). Retrieved
June 23, 2015.
Meaning in Method: The Rhetoric of Quantitative and Qualitative Research. (n.d.). Retrieved July 22,
2015.

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APPENDIX
Screen shots of all the pages updated on the website

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