Chrissy+Lyons+-+3+websites

Name: Chrissy Lyons Website 1: Starbucks []?

Starbucks first started in the 1970s in Seattle. Almost 50 years later the product has become a phenomenon. At the beginning of the 90s Starbucks started to expand to company across the country and then over the year across the world. Starbucks has more than 15,000 locations across the globe. In modern times new media and social networking has played a large role in advertising and connecting with buyers and customers. When you first approach the Starbucks website, the first thing that comes to your eye is a video add. There are 4 videos that continue to play one after another. Each of the videos addresses a different topic that has some what of a connection to Starbucks coffee. The ads get the viewers attention quickly and get people to believe that buying the bran is the only way to go. The first video is all about competing in a triathlon. The women in the videos drinks Starbucks coffee every morning and says that the coffee helps her start her day the right way. The video is trying to tell the viewer in a variety of ways that drinking our coffee will help you start you day off correctly and make you work, play and train hard and better. Starbucks is also known for their commercials on TV. The new ways of advertising are trying to get the word out to people that Starbucks is the best type of coffee and that you get the best bang for your buck with it. The advertisement also the site has pages and links connecting viewers and customers to social media sites that have stark bucks pages. Starbucks is setting up ways to communicate with their customers and buyers thru places such as facebook and twitter. Communication between the company and its buyers is very important in modern times when there are some many different companies trying to cell the same or similar brand. A few weeks ago Starbucks came out with a new product and the word spread the fasted through twitter. With in a matter of hours after word that the product was in production and going to be sold everyone knew about it and wanted to try it. With twitter Starbucks can alert its fans or buyers when something new is coming out. Twitter givers daily updates, even hourly on certain topics. It is any easy way for Starbucks to communicate one to many. With all the different competing brands, companies need to have some sort of an advantage over the competition. Advantages can be as simple notifications on what latte flavor is in season. Small things like having facebook and twitter pages are ways for the companies to get word out to their fans.

Website 2: USC [] []

What is the first thing that comes to your mind when you think of USC? Probably football, and if not football then probably some sort of athletics. USC or the University of Southern California is mostly known or their great athletics and also success in them. That’s why it isn’t to surprising that when you go to the web page for athletics at USC the page is much more elaborate and eye catching than the main website for the college. The main website is boring and has a common set up, but the sports page is unbelievable. It is colorful and covered in pictures and videos. It is not surprising that the athletics is much more impressive, seeing how the school is so well know for sports. What is really surprising is that the main web site for the school, USC.edu, does not have any sort of connection for facebook, twitter, or YouTube. Know and days almost every website has a place for you to log on, but the main website did not. If you go to the sports page the title bar or header of the page has all the social media icons and a place for you to log in and also follow SC sports. The pages for each sport on facebook all have almost more than 1000 fans. Also coaches for each team have more fans than the basic USC page. The school is so well know for football that it is not surprising that the football facebook page has the more fans and that Pete Carroll the football coach has about 1000 more fans than the basic SC Trojan page. Also the athletic page has ads all over the place of a variety of different products. The first add that pops onto the page is an iPhone application ad. There applications made for each of the individual sports that that fan can follow there teams. There are also adds for cars on the site. The main school page has no ads at all and the sports page has ads for iTunes, iphones, and also Chevy trucks. New media and social networking has helped college sports fan get closer to the action in a variety of different. Ways. It makes sense for USC to have a more impressive site for athletics if the majority of people going to the site are going to get more info on there team, but this could also cause a lot of issues with the rest of the school someday.

Website 3: Ben and Jerry’s []

Ben and Jerry’s have, buy far the coolest website for an ice cream company. Their website uses all different types of new media to grab the views attention. The website uses flash and Ajax and it is like no other. Ben and Jerry’s wouldn’t need a cool website to get more business or customers thou. They are know for the bizarre and amazing ice cream, but the website in a way is the cherry on top of the Sunday. Besides the fact that the website is eye catching and cool the company communicates with their fans through different social networking sites. Facebook and twitter have pages with thousands or fan and followers. One way that Ben and Jerry’s is using new media to help spread to word or just help their company is by using the facebook login and being able to add things about Ben and Jerry’s to your facebook page. Facebook Connect is a way of integrating sites with Facebook. In a way it's a direct reversal of Facebook Applications, where a site would effectively appear in mini form on Facebook; with Facebook Connect, Facebook functionality appears on other sites. Now and days just about every site has a Facebook connect login. In this case people, or anyone that has a Facebook can use their Facebook details to log into the flavors section of Ben and Jerry's site choose their favorite flavor, and then post it to their Facebook profile. Ben and Jerry’s is using Facebook and different new media as a way for their fans to express themselves. Ben and Jerry’s also use twitter to spread news about there products.