The Southern Baptist Convention’s missional branch, North American Mission Board, and their church planting subsidiary, Send Network, failed to provide online communication guidance to help establish (or plant) new faith communities. Only 13% of Evangelical Protestants are under the age of thirty (Pew Research Center, 2015). If the Southern Baptist Convention wants their church plants to grow in a media-focused society, they must learn how to communicate with the generations who were born with technology in their hands. The purpose of this study is to identify which content and frequency Southern Baptist Churches in Metropolitan Phoenix should use to reach their target community. The project began by conducting research on twelve Send Network church plants within fifteen miles of the center of downtown Phoenix. The results led to drafting a communications and branding guideline for one of the Send Network’s church plants, Mercy Hill Church, creating a ten-week posting schedule to collect insights on content and frequency of posts, analyzing and identifying best practices for its social media strategy and tactics. The ideal posting schedule and ratio of still image and video content for Mercy Hill Church on Instagram and Facebook was revealed. Additionally, it was identified the best day of the week to publish each type of post out of these seven: community, Scripture, worship, testimony, ministry highlight, sermon recap and church invite. Overall, the project determined that a consistent and cohesive Instagram and Facebook posting schedule increased traditional college-aged student engagement with Mercy Hill Church. It also resulted in an ideal posting schedule for Southern Baptist church plants if their target audience includes traditional college-aged students.

The 2016 election brought a pivotal shift in the external communications of businesses with their consumers. The shift was from the established practice of businesses selectively and voluntarily choosing to comment on social issues, to now businesses’ consumers and employees expecting a comment. While political and social subjects were once considered off-limit conversations, some businesses found themselves in the middle of election rhetoric and taking sides on candidates. As a result of this shift, issues such as abortion, discrimination, gun control, and current political policies, which were once closed-door, private conversations, are now being discussed openly by CEOs. I have gathered research from scholarly outlets, business publications, statements from executives and companies, as well as resulting news coverage and commentary. Throughout this thesis, I will explore how the 2016 election brought about a pivotal change in how and when corporations release statements publicly as a response to current events. To understand this change in corporate communications I will provide the history of how corporate communications were viewed and shared with their consumers since the 1930s, and what it has evolved to today.

Online editors using Saudi Arabian social media platforms are in a novel position,providing news in an environment where they themselves are not trained journalists, on publication platforms that developed independently of legacy news organizations, and in a cultural context where journalism is constrained by government and societal concerns. Yet, they provide a highly popular and growing venue for news distribution. As such, the news values they consciously consider and profess they choose when selecting and posting their news content online is of substantive interest in terms of local and global practice. The potential ramifications of their choices include the framing and documentation of past, present and future events and perspectives. Therefore, this research seeks to determine and understand the news values that online editors on Saudi Arabian social media platforms consciously consider and believe they choose when selecting and posting their news content online. It also explores whether those online editors consider audience news preferences when they select what they report or republish. This dissertation relied on qualitative in-depth interviews with nine online editors who worked for the top news accounts on social media in Saudi Arabia. Analysis of interview responses showed that impact, timeliness, proximity, novelty, positivity, and nationalism were the common news values the online editors held. The analysis, which concluded that the online editors used the different engagement tools available in social media to enhance their understanding of the audience and their news preference, suggests further interpretation regarding a market orientation. The interactivity played important roles in making profits for the news accounts, facilitating and mapping the news accounts’ work, and measuring the online editors’ personal success and progress. Finally, although the online editors said they prioritized and assured the importance of selecting news based on audience news preference, they professed an awareness of their role as journalists in the society. In the interviews, they give insight into how they select some content based on their own preferences and their understanding about what the audience should know. This suggests an evolving journalistic environment in Saudi Arabia on the fastest-growing information-sharing publication platform. KEYWORDS: Journalism, social media, engagement, interactivity, online editors, audience, news values, news selection, audience news preferences, in-depth interviews, Saudi Arabia.

The purpose of this thesis is to formulate a reliable promotion strategy that will help future independent artists effectively gain exposure and create an engaged and enthusiastic audience. To do this, we set out to create moments of discovery - the moment when a listener decides they have a particular affinity for an artist or song - by introducing Apollo Bravo to audiences that are most likely to enjoy what Apollo Bravo has to offer. The methodology underlying these campaigns was to present authentic and attention-grabbing content, in both brief and extended methods, to people who are most likely to enjoy Apollo Bravo.

From our research, we found that for as little as $5 a day, an independent artist can make effective introductions to audiences most likely to enjoy what they have to offer without compromising artistic expression, while also learning from and engaging with their growing audience.

Our goal for the project was to formulate a reliable promotion strategy that, when implemented, will help future independent artists successfully get discovered and build an engaged following of their own. To do this, we set out to create moments of discovery - the moment when a listener decides they have a particular affinity for an artist or song. In an effort to find a better and more dependable process for independent artists to be discovered, we tested our theories on Apollo Bravo, an innovative, Alternative/Electronic passion project, created by two of our group members, Max Fees, and Cole Kinerk.

We found that traditional means of exposure offer little insight into an artist's growing audience and can pose several challenges when measuring their efficacy and return on investment. Through these channels, artists can spend thousands of dollars promoting themselves to disinterested individuals while learning very little about their audience in the process. If only there was a reliable method for artists to introduce themselves to the people most likely to enjoy what they have to offer…

By harnessing the power of Facebook’s audience targeting machine learning ad platform, artists have an opportunity like never before to:
1) Find an audience without compromise
2) Study and engage with said audience
3) Find millions more listeners who, based on their Facebook data, resemble their growing fanbase.
Furthermore, the more time and money artists are willing to invest in their ad campaigns, the more opportunities they create for Facebook’s machine learning algorithms to learn and optimize, thus targeting more desirable listeners more efficiently

Though access to new listeners is at an all time high, finding this audience requires strategy. In the context of driving results and creating an audience - honing one’s skills as a marketer is just as important as it is honing their skills as an artist. Before all else, artists must identify their genre and differentiating factors. A firm understanding of positioning and value proposition is necessary to inform one’s targeting, content and copy development strategies.

By harnessing the power of targeted advertising, machine learning, and brand strategy any artist can find and develop an engaged following. Furthermore, these powerful advertising platforms let independent artists circumvent the top-down system that the music industry has operated on since its inception. No longer do artists have to find a label or sign away their next five years to be successful. Through digital advertising and a small amount of ad spend, any artist can find the
right listener, a listener waiting to fall in love with their music.

The discussion of the word “natural” in product marketing and its power to persuade consumers is not often discussed. Research on consumer behavior surrounding “natural” products is compelling due to the current lack of research on the topic and true meaning of the word. Without any legal guidelines for the marketed use of the word “natural” in the sale of personal care products and cosmetics, consumers’ perceptions of the “naturally” marketed items are subjective. Additionally, brands identify with the word “natural” in different ways, using the word as an ideograph to suggest brand enhancing associations to consumers without legally needing to support these associations.

The following thesis is a creative project that looks at all facets of the “natural” personal care product and cosmetics industry. This includes the origin, history of use, regulations, and consumers’ understanding of the word “natural” in marketing, as well as the identity of the word “natural” as an ideograph. In addition, this project illustrates in-depth analyses of the three major consumer segments of this industry. These analyses uncover each consumer type’s perceived connotations of the word “natural” in personal care product and cosmetics and their characteristics and buying behavior. Lastly, this project features a plan for a digital marketing campaign to showcase this research and incite discussion that raises awareness surrounding the word “natural” in the beauty space.