Public Relations
Project Summary:
For my project, I managed and created content for my own social media brand – Meals Under 5. Through 4 years of college and a mission, I’ve learned how to make good meals fast and for little money. I was excited to keep this brand going as a part of my senior project and help others see how many many food options there really are even though you may be limited by time and/or money.
Before beginning this project, Meals Under 5 was already a small social media brand on Instagram and Tik Tok. I knew this brand had a lot of potential to grow so I set out to do just that! My objectives and goals were as follows:
| Objectives | Goals | Metric |
| Build a bigger “Meals Under 5” community | Double the current amount of followers – reach at least 120 followers | # of followers |
| Increase Engagement on social media platforms | Increase weekly engagement by 50% | Instagram engagement insights |
In order to achieve these goals and objectives, I knew I needed to be more consistent about posting. The first plan I set was to post consistently for 3 weeks. In order to do so, I created a content calendar. This calendar included each recipe that I would post that day, as well as the caption and hashtags I would include in the post.
To help me create this calendar, I created two personas that allowed my to better-understand my audience and create content for them.
Personas:
“Busy Becca” – Becca is a college student who loves to be involved. From sports to class to social activities, she is there! Because of this, she doesn’t prioritize cooking for herself. She needs someone to show her that she can still have time to make a quick meal and be involved in the college life.
“Frugal Fred” – Fred loves going to school, but is currently struggling with his finances. Monthly rent and tuition never seem to disappear. He is discouraged and is looking for ideas of food/meals he can make on such a tight budget.
After putting together the content calendar, I began creating content and preparing to post. Along with these posts, I created a simple blog with each meal written out in a recipe format. This blog is available at the link in my Instagram bio and there, users can find the recipe associated with the reel they watched.
By the end of the three weeks of consistent posts, I was amazed by how much I had exceeded my original goals. While still small, Meals Under 5 had grown a lot from where it first began. On Instagram Meals Under 5, currently, has 232 followers (over 250% increase) and engagement averages at about 100 per week. It was amazing to see all the hard work pay off!
Running a social media brand is no joke! It’s a 24/7 job. While it was time-consuming and difficult to keep up with at times, I really enjoyed the opportunity to apply what I’ve learned throughout my degree and, even, establish my very own brand! I’m excited to get creative and find out what’s in store for Meals Under 5 in the future!