Community, Family, and Local Businesses Initiative - Literature review Example

Community Youth Family Social Media A Community, Family and Local Businesses Initiative Community Youth FamilySocial Media Community, Family and Local Businesses Initiative Introduction The recent emergence of new and extremely powerful communication platforms in the form of social media that have the innate ability of reaching an estimated well over 300 million consumers on Facebook alone, 75 million on twitter and 60 million users on LinkedIn. Social Media can be largely considered to be nothing short of a remarkable technological achievement (Stenzel, 2011, p. 315). It is critically important for the local business community to ensure that it makes the most of this newly emerging opportunity so as to be able to connect with the customer, grow and shape their brands as well as be able to develop long-term customer relationships at a fraction of the current media costs. The community youth and social media project will seek to engage the youth and local businesses in our community in an initiative that will see the youth get contracted by the local business community to help the local businesses in creating and building their online business via the use of the various social media sites. Social media can help in providing the next customer base frontier for the local business as is highlighted by the fact that although it was not until 1997 that internet usage across the United States was able to reach 50 million users (Medoff & Kaye, 2011 p. 7), Facebook, which is one of the social media sites to be used in the initiative was able to gain an estimated over 100 million users within the United States in the period ranging between January 2009 and January 2010, this was a staggering 145 percent growth within a time period of only one year. The local business owners that have not as yet implemented initiatives designed to help them develop a social media presence will be encouraged to allow the youth in the community to help them in doing this. The initiatives mission statement will be Developing and growing the social media presence of local businesses by engaging the youth in the community so as to help them enjoy healthier youth development and attain the 40 developmental goals assets so as to secure a stronger and healthier future in our community. The main objective of this initiative will be to utilize the various available community resources to promote youth engagement. Some of the resources that will be utilized in the course of this project will include the community library as it will serve to offer the youth with the necessary internet access to help in facilitating this project. Another key objective of this initiative is for the youth to act as a platform that will serve to create awareness among the youth, and gradually get them engaged in the active participation of the various community services such as hospital visits, church and youth organizations organized forums and activities that will help in guiding them towards the attainment of the 40 developmental asset goals. By engaging in this project, the local businesses will be able to provide the active youth with basic beneficial skills in addition to also providing them with work referrals. The 40 Developmental Assets that this initiative hopes to achieve were first released by the Search Institute in 1990. The assets identify a set of experiences, skills, behaviors and relationships that serve to enable young people to be able to develop into contributing and successful adults (Chartier, 2008, p. 4). This framework quickly became the most widely utilized and frequently utilized youth development framework across the work and resulted in what was termed as a sea change in adolescent development. In developing the 40 Developmental Assets framework, Search institute collect data from surveys of an estimated over 4 million youth and children across different situations and backgrounds. This data consistently demonstrated that the more Developmental assets that young people are able to acquire, the better their overall chances of being able to become healthy, happy succeed in school and emerge as actively contributing members of their societies and communities. It is as a result of the benefits that the youth in our community will stand to gain from the 40 Developmental Assets, that the framework has been adopted into this initiative (Search Institute, 2014). Some of the goals that this initiative hopes to achieve include the reduction of the school dropout rate among the children and youth in our community, promote the proper utilization of some of the underutilized community based resources in our community such as the community library and help in bringing together and connecting families. To help in achieving its objectives, the initiative will partner with the local churches, youth organizations, community organizations and families so as to create awareness about the program as well as to be able to easily source for membership. Our community’s usage of social media to promote and enhance online business is seen to be of a similar scale to that which was reported in a Harvard Business review survey conducted on 2,100 companies. The survey which reflects our community’s current usage of social media by local businesses indicated that although a relatively large number of business surveyed (79%) are currently actively engaged in using social media channels, only a measly 12% of these firms fell that they are using social media in an effective manner. By involving the local youth to take up this vital business function on their behalf, local businesses will be able to start engaging beyond the old and tired method of shout marketing. The youth will enable them to start using social media more effectively so as to monitor trends among customers, promote their brands and even conduct effective research on any new product ideas (Ennes, 2014). (Ennes, 2014) Similarly to the our local community, the survey buy the Harvard Business Review found that a significantly large percentage of organizations were still largely hesitant to get serious in their usage of social media. Two-thirds of the businesses survey had not established any formalized any social media strategy while only a paltry 7% had been able to integrate social media into their overall marketing strategies. While 69% of the businesses predicted that their general use of social media will eventually grow, 61% of these businesses admitted that they needed to first overcome a learning curve before they could be able to adopt any form of social media strategy. By engaging the youth in the development and promotion of their online presence, local businesses will benefit by saving the time they would have had to undergo in during the learning curve and be able to go straight into reaping the benefits social media will afford for them (Ennes, 2014). (Ennes, 2014) Under the initiative, it will be possible to build competencies among the youth that will enable them to be able to meet the basic developmental needs; this will ensure that the youth are able to become contributing and successful members of the community under the 40 Developmental Assets framework. The initiative will also serve to help in teaching the community, families the important principles of internet communication. It will also serve to create a forum where schools will be encouraged to allow for the integration of MySpace, Twitter, Instagram and Facebook into their lesson plans, this is an important consideration in light of the ever growing importance of social media in today’s society. The initiative will also facilitate the utilization of social media as a tool that will allow for schools to come together with the local community as a result of the enhanced interactivity that is seen to be promoted by social media. With our local community having an estimated 60% of the population being under the age of 40 years, and with a relatively young median age of 29.5 years, the larger percentage of our about 300,000 strong local community can be seen to be comprised of a young and techno-savvy generation that has access to various social media outlets. To this end, the initiative will try to positivity engage the youth and by so doing, aid them in attaining some of the 40 Developmental Assets goals such as reducing problem alcohol use among them, reducing illicit drug use, discouraging violence and bullying among the youth as well as discouraging them from engaging in irresponsible sexual activity. The initiative will also target to cultivate leadership attributes among the youth and help them in exhibiting these attributes. In addition to this, the youth participating in the initiative will also be taught to value diversity, be encouraged and aided to succeed in school as well as be carefully monitored to ensure that they are able to maintain good health. All these objectives are seen to be in-line with the framework provided for under the 40 Developmental Assets. The idea for instigating this initiative was first born when my friends and I were having a deep discussion after learning about the 40 Developmental Assets. We were concerned that the majority of the youth in our local community would not be able to develop into successful and actively contributing members of society as a result of some of the negative influences in our surrounding community such as drugs, violence and rampant drug use. I went home that day with this question in mind and was wondering if it was possible for there to be an easy local solution to this problem. After a lot of thinking the idea of initiating this initiative eventually emerged and after receiving encouragement from my mentor who was instrumental in helping me refine the idea, this community youth family and social idea was initiative was finally developed. In developing the initiative’s mission statement, I sought to try and encompass all the ideals that the initiative sought to try and achieve and especially so, the use of the 40 Developmental goals towards improving the future of my local community. The initiative will be developed to have a set of five basic action strategies that will be designed to guide and help in regulating its progress. These action strategies will be: Conducting an Initial Test Run with a small number of Local Businesses: This action strategy will allow for the viability and success of the initiative to be assessed before it can officially be publicized and launched in my local community; Training for the Youth: Training will have to be provided for the youth on how they will be able to use social media so as to develop and promote the social media presence of the local businesses involved in the initiative. This training will also involve basic social media marketing skills. Designing of Proper Initiative Structure and Guidelines: For the success of the initiative to be secured, I will first have to address this action strategy by engaging some of the youth and local business owners in creating a framework that will guide the implementation and implementation of this initiative; insight from the youth and local business owners will come in handy as I might possibly overlook some important aspects and concerns if I were to design this framework all by myself. Awareness Creation: Creating awareness of the initiative in my local community. This action strategy will primarily be designed to target local businesses and the youth community. This will be addressed by using the use of forums such as youth group organizations and churches to promote the ideals behind this initiative. Once the youth are made aware of this initiative, they will be of further help in convincing the local businesses to sign up to the idea as most of these businesses are owned by their parents, relatively and neighbors and it will be relatively easy for them to approach and point out the benefits of this initiative to the owners. Promotion of the Idea to the Local Town Council: The town council will also be approached so as for it to approve the use of the local library in this initiative. The library which is currently not being well utilized by the youth in the community will serve to provide the computers and internet access that are necessary in driving this initiative. These action strategies were chosen after intensive consultations with my mentor who happens to be a successful local business owner owning a number of business operations in the community. The input of a local youth organization leader was also taken into account so as to ensure that the initiative would thoroughly represent the interests of the youth. The use of these strategies will help in guiding the initiative by providing a framework within which its operations will be conducted. However this framework will possibly undergo a number of suitable changes as the initiative grows and develops. The initiative will be grown and sustained by ensuring that as many local businesses and youth as possible sign up to the initiative. A large-scale awareness program will be initiated and conducted across the local community to help in creating awareness. By involving the large number of youth in the community to help in convincing more business owners to join in the project, the initiative will be sure to signup even larger number of business owners. To help in sustaining the initiative, a specially appointed committee will be formed whose membership will be drawn from all the parties involved in the initiative, this will include the local business owners, youth and family representation. This committee will be tasked with running the initiative and ensuring that it is continually sustained. After the initiative is officially launched, the youth involved in the project will receive a small stipend from the businesses whose social media presence is being promoted, this will serve to further motivate them to be even more engaged in the initiative with the benefit that the initiative is further sustained. The incorporation and attainment of the 40 Developmental Assets into the initiative is of critical importance as it will serve to ensure that the benefits of these assets are enjoyed by the family, community and schools. The 40 Developmental Assets are important as surveys have shown that the youth are able to access the 40 Developmental Assets, the more likely they will be able to emerge as leaders, do well in school and be careful of maintain their health. These assts also ensure that the youth are less likely to become involved in violence, do drugs or even participate in underage drinking (Page & Page, 2003, p. 60). In addition to these benefits, the youth will gain from receiving basic business skills development from the business owners as well as the much needed mentorship to ensure that they develop into upright members of the community. The initiative will also afford the youth leadership development opportunities in addition to part-time job experience that will be of benefit to them as it will provide them with exposure to the work environment. The skills and knowledge that they gain while participating in this initiative and learning how organizations operate might probably be of future benefit in influencing their learning options. Conclusion Social media remains a relatively unexploited marketing outlet by the local community businesses. The local businesses face considerable challenges in being able to adapt to the usage of social media due to lack of adequate resources to hire dedicated social media business managers as well as the learning curve that they would have to undergo on the use of social media. By using the youth in helping the local businesses to create and develop their social media presence, the local business community will actively facilitate the attainment of the 40 Developmental Assets by the youth in what will be a mutually beneficial agreement. The careful and successful implementation of the set action plan strategies that include social media marketing training for the youth and initiative awareness creation will go a long way towards ensuring that the initiative is able to grown in a sustainable manner and achieve its set objectives of fostering interaction between the youth and local businesses and mutually benefitting both parties so as to secure a stronger hand healthier future in our community. References Chartier, A. N. (2008). A Comparative Study of Developmental Assets and Post-high School Outcome Choices. ProQuest. Ennes M. (2014). Social Media: What Most Companies Dont Know. Accessed on Feb 15, 2014, from http://hbr.org/web/slideshows/social-media-what-most-companies-dont-know/1 -slide Medoff, J. N. & Kaye, K. B. (2011). Electronic Media: Then, Now, and Later. Taylor & Francis. Page M. R. & Page S. T. (2003). Fostering emotional well-being in the classroom. Boston; Toronto ; London [etc.] : Jones and Bartlett Publishers, cop. Search Institute. (2014). Developmental Assets. Accessed on Feb 15, 2014, from http://www.search-institute.org/research/developmental-assets Stenzel, J. (2011). CIO best practices : enabling strategic value with information technology. Hoboken, N.J. : Wiley. Read More