Project Overview
For my project, I decided I would build a marketing campaign for the Onion Barn. The Onion Barn is a new venue in the Gila Valley area where I am from – or more specifically, Safford Arizona. This barn has been a part of a farm in the area for many years (before the early 70s when my client’s family purchased it), and family and friends of the client have previously used it for their events as a free service.
My client wanted to start making a profit off of the barn, and decided that it could do well as a paid event venue! After remodeling the barn to make it more sturdy, adding beautiful lights to the barn, and a new fence around the area, my client reached out to me for help branding the venue, creating a website, and building a social media presence for the Onion Barn! My passion for social media marketing and this venue has come to life as I’ve spent over fifty hours creating this project.
Branding
One of the first things I had to do before I could get into social media or building a website was creating a strong brand style. Since the barn was just recently open to the public, my client didn’t have any prior logos or colors. One of my goals with branding was to create logos, colors, and fonts that would set the Onion Barn apart from other local venues, fitting the rustic feel of the barn, but still helping the barn feel modern and classy enough for a wedding. The fonts we chose showcased this vibe perfectly, the cursive “Onion” showing of the classy look, and the capitalized “Barn” fitting the more rustic, barn side of the venue. The colors are neutral, which fit the modern look, but the browns tie in the barn theme and help it all come together!
(see more about branding on pages 19-23 of my E-book: https://issuu.com/onionbarnvenue/docs/simple_modern_elegant_wedding_photo_book_2_)
Social Media Campaign
After the logo, fonts, and colors were decided, it was time to move forward with the social media marketing part of the campaign! Creating a strong social media presence was one of the pains my client expressed – she felt she didn’t know how to use social media to grow her business, but knew it was crucial to the awareness of the new venue. I spent a large part of my project managing the Instagram and Facebook accounts for the Onion Barn. This included doing outreach to various photographers and brides who have been to the barn prior to its rebranding. Many of them were hesitant with me sharing their photos when I asked, but I was able to find a few galleries/pictures I could use for social media. I also had a gallery of professional photos of the barn and its features I pulled from often.
As I started the social media accounts, I knew I wanted to show off what the barn looks like, both in a normal setting and set up for an event. I shared a combo of both, and even made a few reels/ Surprisingly, the still photos and photos I tagged brides in did better than the reels I created. In my posts, I wanted to educate what we offered, so I made a post about services. I created story highlight bubbles, so that when we had events/will continue to have events, I can highlight them to show off to potential clients.
To gain followers on the accounts, I sorted through followers of similar businesses and vendors in the area, and followed them. Most of my followers came in that way, but more came as I consistently posted and then later hosted a giveaway. We are currently at 680 followers on Instagram, and 361 on Facebook. This is amazing progress for only posting and running the social media campaign for a little over a month!
Check out our Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/onionbarnvenue/
Facebook link: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61567158965506
(Learn more about my social media strategy in my E-Book: https://issuu.com/onionbarnvenue/docs/simple_modern_elegant_wedding_photo_book_2_)
Social Media Giveaway
As part of my social media campaign, I participated in outreach to the local community. I wanted to create a giveaway to further raise our awareness, and so I reached out to several local businesses and asked if they wanted to participate. I then made a post mentioning this, and had over twenty businesses messaging me!
Overwhelmed with the amount of responses I received, and after talking to several of the vendors, I decided to keep the social media giveaway more simple, but am planning on doing an open house in the future where these vendors can be involved.
The giveaway encouraged engagement as part of the process to enter, and as a result, we had 1,171 interactions on this single post. This included 845 comments, 191 likes, 77 saves, and 58 shares. On Facebook, our interactions included 60 reactions, 514 comments, and 58 shares. My followers increased by 64 on Facebook, and 61 on Instagram.
This giveaway has been so successful because my client is giving away products our potential customers like, such as Hydrojugs, a couples photoshoot, and a discount for the Onion Barn venue.
(Check out our giveaway post here: https://www.instagram.com/p/DCSiQDoyylT/?img_index=1)
Website
Another thing that I knew would help the Onion Barn campaign be successful was creating a website for the venue! I used Squarespace to create the website, and I adapted a template to fit the Onion Barn branding and vibe. I added the history of the barn to the website, so people could learn more about the background of the barn in a greater depth than what the website stated. There’s an about page introducing the family who owns the Onion Barn venue. There is also a contact form for potential clients to fill out, a gallery of photos of the Onion Barn, and examples of the services we offer. It is a simple yet functional website that clients can access easily! We’ve already received several contact forms that individuals have filled out from the website.
(Check out our full website here: https://www.onion-barn.com/)
Summary of Project
I am so grateful for the opportunity to partner with the Onion Barn brand for my project! Through this project, I got to practice my social media knowledge and skills. I learned that you don’t have to be posting twice a day everyday to gain followers; consistency is key, but the quality of content and brand management on social media is just as important.
I had the wonderful opportunity of branding a company that wasn’t mine, and was able to align my ideas with the client’s wishes. I was able to communicate and build trust with both my client as well as community leaders and business owners! Through working with the owner of the Onion Barn, I became familiar with Squarespace for web building, and feel confident that I can design other webpages through the company. I look forward to continuing to work with the Onion Barn company, and am thrilled to take the skills I learned in this project wherever this journey directs me!
Feel free to check out my work in detail by looking through my Case Study E-Book! https://issuu.com/onionbarnvenue/docs/simple_modern_elegant_wedding_photo_book_2_
About
I’m Paisley Layton, a senior at Brigham Young University – Idaho. I have a passion for creating beautiful things, whether that be photos, graphics, social media accounts, and more! My degree is Communications with an emphasis in Digital and Social Media, and I have loved learning these skills that have helped me me reach my career goals! I have loved working on the Onion Barn project and will continue to work for the company until life takes me elsewhere!
