Create Your Plan

About the Project:
The purpose of this exercise is to create a plan for an influencer marketing campaign or a brand ambassador program.
Project Instructions
Recall the program you selected in Week 1 and your research from Week 2. In this project, you are presenting (PDF or video) your program plan.

If, INFLUENCER OUTREACH PROGRAM
If you have elected to create an influence marketing plan, craft the plan by which you will conduct outreach to influencers identified in Week two. Explain your approach, including how you will personalize your communication to each individual influencer.

Define your program goals (3 goals that fit the SMART format). You’ve established SMART business goals in Week 1, now set 3 SMART goals for this campaign. Some possible goals to create may involve Influencer-generated content (blog posts, articles, video uploads, etc., Impressions / CPM, Increased social engagement (Likes / Re-tweets) or Conversions: micro (smaller things like social follows, email opt-ins and whitepaper downloads) as well as macro (purchases, sales appointments, reservations, etc.) Be sure to explain how these campaign goals relate to the broader business goals you set in Week 1: how one impacts the other. For example, if in Week 1, you stated that one of your goals was to ‘reduce your cost per lead by 10% in the next 6 months,’ and in this assignment you set a campaign goal to reach 100 pieces of influencer-generated content, you might say the following: “Influencer generated content relates to our goal of reducing cost per lead, because content created by influencers saves us money that we’d otherwise have to spend to get professional photographers and writers to create comparable content for promotional use.”
Define your audience, who are they – be specific!
Specify a timetable for your campaign. You should commit for at least 1 year, but you might elect to run the campaign for 18 months or longer, depending on the nature of your business.
Explain how you’ll build buy-in internally. Without commitment and dedication, your influencer outreach program will not succeed, so describe how you will communicate your plan to launch an influencer outreach program to the rest of your company (employees), and how you will enlist supporters to get people at the company on board.
What story do you want influencers to share? How does that story help you to meet one of your stated goals?
How will you create outreach pitches that get influencers on board?
Be specific: you don’t have to actually write the pitch, but explain what you are planning to include, and why you feel that what you plan to say in the pitch will persuade the influencer to share.
Also address whether you plan to offer influencers compensation: money, sample products, admission to events, etc.
Who at your company is going to work on the campaign? What specific actions they will take (and when), and plan to touch base frequently to ensure that your company is paying attention to the program, and not missing any influencer mentions.
Choose someone within your company to act as point person for the campaign.
Choose someone who is intimately familiar with your brand, as well as dedicated to making the outreach campaign a success.
Set a schedule for how this person may check metrics, so they can adjust as necessary if your influencer outreach isn’t taking hold the way you’d like.
What specific channels will you use to contact the influencers? Will you contact your selected influencers via email, Twitter, LinkedIn, distinctive swag packages sent via postal service, etc.
Based on your target influencers preferences, explain why the approach(es) you propose will work.
Align the platforms and channels with the analysis you’ve conducted in previous weeks, and explain how you know that you can reach these influencers on these specific sites, traditional channels, social networks, etc.
How will you compensate your influencers?

IF, BRAND AMBASSADOR PROGRAM
If you’ve chosen to focus on developing a brand ambassador program (or a smaller version of one, like a consumer panel), create a launch plan. For an example of a successful brand ambassador program, watch this video about the Fiskateers at http://vimeo.com/16211895. The video walks you through how the program is structured, including the online community for members, and how each gets a pair of scissors with their own unique number on it (providing exclusivity).

Define your program goals (3 goals that fit the SMART format). You’ve established SMART business goals in Week 1, now set 3 SMART goals for this campaign. How many brand ambassadors you will include to start? Explain how you will grow it over time, and what you hope to achieve, specifically from your brand ambassador program. Be sure to explain how your program goals relate to the broader business goals you set in Week 1: how one impacts the other. For example, if in Week 1, you stated that one of your goals was to ‘reduce time spent on customer service calls by 5% in 6 months,’ and in this assignment you set a brand ambassador program goal to empower your ambassadors to answer questions for your customers on a forum or social network, you might say the following: “Creating a forum where customers can interact with brand ambassadors relates to our goal of reducing time spent on customer service calls, because allowing brand ambassadors to address certain front-line questions saves our representatives time that they’d otherwise have to spend answering those basic questions that tend to come up repeatedly.”
Define your audience, who are they – be specific!
Specify a timetable for your campaign. You should commit for at least 1 year, but you might elect to run the campaign for 18 months or longer, depending on the nature of your business.
Explain how your program benefits ambassadors.
Most fans do not want to be paid outright: they act on behalf of your brand because they love you and feel a sense of ownership in the organization. Without using monetary rewards (salary $$$), how will you reward these ambassadors for their support? Remember to add exclusivity. Describe how you will make the brand ambassador program exclusive.
Explain how you’ll build buy-in internally. Without commitment and dedication, your brand ambassador program will not succeed, so describe how you will communicate your plan to launch a brand ambassador program to the rest of your company (employees), and how you will enlist supporters to get people at the company on board.
Create community. The best way to get the most value from your brand ambassador program is to enable your ambassadors to interact with one another, as well as with your company.
Explain how you will encourage feedback from your ambassadors, and establish a system to ensure they receive communication back from your brand.
Set a schedule for monitoring customer conversations (online and offline) so you don’t miss any of these interactions.
Offer access. Assign someone within your organization as the point-person for your brand ambassadors. Explain why this person is a good fit for the role. Explain how you will provide ambassadors access to higher-ups within the organization, as well.
To earn maximum points, make sure to reference the rubric below and double check that you’ve included the appropriate information.

Deliverable
Submit the proper file type
A Keynote presentation. If you elect to submit your plan in a Keynote presentation, be sure the slides include the important details, such as your creative concept and your plan for getting your content into the hands of influencers who can help it to catch on. The Keynote file must be converted to a pdf if there is no voice over element or a .mov file if there is a voice over element. PLEASE DO NOT SUBMIT THE RAW KEYNOTE FILE.
A podcast enhanced with slides (.mov file required). If you submit your plan as an enhanced podcast, include slides that complement the audio/narration. Full credit will not be awarded for an audio file with no visual element, or for podcasts that only use screenshots, with no Keynote slides supporting the narration. Maximum length 10 minutes.
Use and cite resources
Whatever format you select, if you consult outside sources, cite them using proper APA formatting for sources in your paper or Keynote.
If submitting an influencer program, answer all the prompts in the influencer section above.
If submitting a brand ambassador program, answer all the prompts in the brand ambassador section above.
Avoid scope creep.