Meet. Prey. Love. - The Campaign Louisiana State University Adviser: Dr. Erin Coyle South Hollywood PR Members: Claire Biggs Kittu Pannu Robbie Petro Mia Bullard South Hollywood PR Table of Contents Cover Page............................................................Page 1 Table of Contents..................................................Page 2 Campaign Summary..............................................Page 3 List of Itemized Expenses.....................................Page 7 List of In-Kind Donations.....................................Page 8 Timeline................................................................Page 9 Challenges and Opportunities.............................Page 10 Media List...........................................................Page 11 Why “Meet. Prey. Love.”?..................................Page 12 Final Evaluation of Campaign............................Page 13 Table of Appendices............................................Page 14 South Hollywood PR Campaign Summary Situation Analysis and Client Background: The CW Television Network is the result of a 2006 merger between UPN and The WB. The CW Television Network’s primary audience is women 18-34 years old, and it is the only network to exclusively target that audience. The CW has recently decided to reduce its programming to five nights a week. Tribune, the largest owner of The CW affiliates will fill the vacated time. The network’s number one rated show is “The Vampire Diaries,” which returned for its second season Sept. 9; it airs at 8PM EST, and it is followed by a new show, “Nikita.” The CW is ranked fifth among other networks. Other shows on The CW Television Network include “One Tree Hill,” “90210,” “Gossip Girl,” “Life Unexpected,” “America’s Next Top Model,” “Hellcats,” “Smallville” and “Supernatural.” Problem statement: We need to influence women 18-34 years old to learn more about The CW Television Network and its most successful show, “The Vampire Diaries.” Through our research, we discovered that while 75 percent of people surveyed had heard of the show, only 20 percent actually tuned in on Thursdays to watch “The Vampire Diaries.” Research: After we had selected the members of the South Hollywood PR team, we set out to compile extensive research on our client and our audience. To complete our primary research, we used two tools: surveys and polling random students. With the survey we created, we were able to figure out what challenges we had ahead of us. We found out how many students had heard of and/or watched the show, what was the best way to reach out to students who had not heard of it, and what would entice students to attend an event for “The Vampire Diaries.” We were not surprised to learn that many students were suffering from vampire fatigue. One of cable television’s most popular shows, “True Blood,” filmed part of its seasons in Louisiana, and the next installment of the “Twilight” saga will start filming in Baton Rouge in November. On that note, our team embarked on our secondary research phase and explored the history of vampires in popular culture and in Louisiana to see which themes remained popular and relevant to our target demographic. Our secondary research included a detailed report of our student demographics, through which we found that more than half of LSU’s student population was female. We also researched which events had the highest student attendance last year, which helped us create an event that would be successful. Finally, our research revealed that we would be working under a significant planning consideration: football season. Football season is the main LSU activity during the fall semester. We discovered that our campaign would have to work around the upcoming football season and, at the same time, capitalize on it to compel students to work with and support our campaign. South Hollywood PR Campaign Summary Planning: Goal 1: Increase awareness of “The Vampire Diaries” and The CW Television Network on Louisiana State University’s campus. Objective 1: To inform at least 250 students about The CW Television Network and “The Vampire Diaries” during the two week campaign period. Strategy 1: To create awareness for the “Meet. Prey. Love.” Campaign by utilizing local media and social networking. Tactics: • Create a Facebook group for our campaign to promote our events and messages and provide correct information about “The Vampire Diaries” and The CW Television Network. • Create a Twitter account to promote our Facebook group and our events to local businesses, student organizations, and other groups on Twitter. • Send press releases to KLSU Radio Station, TigerTV, “The Daily Reveille,” “Tiger Weekly,” the Baton Rouge Chapter of PRSA, and “Scene Magazine” to garner coverage of our events and campaign. Strategy 2: To partner with student organizations and local businesses to engage different groups of students to support the “Meet. Prey. Love.” campaign. Tactics: • Attend every PRSSA meeting and encourage members to support the campaign and our events by volunteering and bringing their friends. • Form a partnership with “Up ‘til Dawn,” a student organization that raises awareness for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. We will promote a service portion of our campaign that also promotes “The Vampire Diaries,” because vampires can only stay “up ‘til dawn.” • Attend meetings at every sorority house on campus to encourage students to get more involved with our campaign and to attend our events. • Offer an incentive, such as free cupcakes, to the sorority house that supported our campaign the most. Goal 2: To encourage students to get excited about the current season of “The Vampire Diaries” and our “Meet. Prey. Love.” campaign. Objective 1: To encourage 50 students to attend our “Do You Bleed Purple and Gold?” T-shirt painting event on the Parade Grounds on Wednesday, Sept. 15. Strategy 1: To create awareness of the event by building upon the hype of the upcoming football season. South Hollywood PR Campaign Summary Planning (cont’d): Tactics: • Hold the “Do You Bleed Purple and Gold?” T-shirt painting event the Wednesday before LSU’s first home game on the Parade Grounds. • Pitch our T-shirt painting event as a way to create the perfect tailgating shirt. • Encourage students to act as our awareness team the entire week to create a buzz about our campaign and event on campus. Objective 2: To encourage 75 students to attend our “Meet. Prey. Love.” event in the Holliday Forum on Wednesday, Sept. 22. Strategy 1: To increase hype about our event, “The Vampire Diaries,” and our campaign through Free Speech Alley demonstrations, partnering with local businesses, and on-campus organizations. Tactics: • Work with the Pi Kappa Phi fraternity to have shirtless, glittering vampires in Free Speech Alley the days leading up to and the day of our main event on campus. • Team up with Currie Boutique to take over the window display to promote our event. • Join with the LSU Wellness Center to host and promote a week-long blood drive on campus • Create memorable signs promoting our campaign such as “Would You Like To Starve A Vampire?” for our blood drive and “Real Vampires Don’t Sparkle – Watch ‘The Vampire Diaries’” for our glittering vampires. Execution: After weeks of planning, our campaign implementation began on Friday, Sept. 10, when we launched our Facebook group and Twitter account. First, we promoted the blood drive we brought to campus beginning on Sept. 13. Our sparkling vampires were on campus and in Free Speech Alley with signs, posters and fliers. We held the “Do You Bleed Purple and Gold?” T-shirt painting event that Wednesday, Sept. 15. Our team invited local band “Rockets for Reverie” to liven up the event and attract students to our area of the Parade Grounds. Finally, we held our main event on Wednesday, Sept. 22, in the Holliday Forum of the Journalism Building. The event began at 6 p.m. with a performance by local band “State Street Survivors.” Students were able to come in, mingle, eat and pick up giveaways at this time. To keep students engaged, stage make-up students were on hand to apply “vampire bites” to anyone who wanted them. We also invited students to update their Facebook and Twitter statuses at our social media hub, “The Pulse.” We borrowed a Civil War era dress from LSU’s Human Ecology department to bring the historical aspect of the show to the students; part of the display included pieces from our window display at Currie Boutique. Students were offered toothpaste and toothbrushes to “Keep Your Fangs Clean” and floss to remind them to “Floss Your Fangs.” South Hollywood PR Campaign Summary Evaluation: Goal 1 - Objective 1: To inform at least 250 students about The CW Television Network and “The Vampire Diaries.” Outcome: Between our Facebook group and Twitter account alone, our fan numbers and followers exceeded 300. Combined with our placements in Tiger Weekly, The Daily Reveille, Scene Magazine, the Baton Rouge Chapter of PRSA’s Web site, and mentions on KLSU, we reached more than 300 students. Goal 2 - Objective 1: To encourage 50 students to attend our “Do You Bleed Purple and Gold?” T-shirt painting event on the Parade Grounds. Outcome: Sixty students stopped by to prove they bleed purple and gold and to create the best tailgating shirt ever. With that number, we exceeded our goal by 20 percent. Goal 2 - Objective 2: To encourage 75 students to attend our “Meet. Prey. Love.” event in the Holliday Forum. Outcome: With 125 people in attendance at our event, we exceeded our 75 person goal by 66.67 percent. Our team discovered through our evaluation survey results that more than 90 percent of students felt the event exceeded their expectations, while 86 percent were more inclined to watch “The Vampire Diaries” after attending the event. Our final method of evaluation included a small fellowship portion. We revisited the sorority houses to discuss what they enjoyed about our campaign – and to hand out cupcakes. We learned they were grateful to be able to participate and to help promote our campaign; many of the sisters had started watching the show in groups after we spoke at their house.