BOI CIRCLE MOBILE APP - CAMPAIGN PROPOSAL

Course Code: MSJ11442

This public relations proposal, prepared by PR Heads has been created exclusively for use by Rokomari.com

1. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

As requested by Rokomari.com, the following public relations proposal has been devised in order to successfully promote and maintain a PR strategy for new innovations at Rokomari.com.

Rokomary.Com started its journey in 2012 as an online book store based on a website. At that time there were few other online bookstores available but it emerged to become the largest and most popular online bookstore of Bangladesh. Now Rokomary.com is aiming to put the largest online bookstore of Bangladesh in people's pocket by launching a new mobile app named “Boi Circle” Our PR campaign will make people aware of the “Boi-Circle” app where people can buy books at lower price than physical shop and even lower price than Rokomary.com website. Campaign will focus on creating a new market and converting the existing traffic drive (visitors) and clients (people who buy books) of Rokomary.com into Boi Circle app users. The campaign includes PR activities including one free book on first order from the app, delivery free for first 10 orders for each account, sending a short note to try out the app with each delivery from Rokomary.com’s order etc. Other than that, the various promotional advertisements will go on social media platforms like Facebook, YouTube, etc. Boi circle will have online ambassadors who will influence people to use the app. The planning of the campaign will start on April 1, 2021 and The PR campaign starts from May 1, 2021 and it will end at October

2. SITUATION ANALYSIS

Business is becoming more challenging than ever before as we are surviving a pandemic. Fortunately the ecommerce landscape experienced a positive spike due to movement restrictions measures aiming to protect public health amid Covid-19 pandemic. To analyze current situation of the market, our team has conducted a survey by multi stage sampling among the target audience and the responses are attached below.

(Disclaimer: this survey is the representation of approximated future situation, actual fruitful conversion will be depending on various other factors)

Survey responses indicate that almost half of the respondents from our target population is between 20 to 27 years old and the remaining half consists of 15 to 20 years (30 percent) and 27 to 40 years old (20 percent)

Among the respondents from our target population, 48.3 percent people sometimes read books and almost 38 percent regularly read books. It's quite interesting to see that only 13.8 percent of the population doesn't read books.

83.3 percent of the respondents are not using any app to read or buy books so it indicates that we have a good opportunity to create a new market here. Rest of the 16.7 percent indicates the existing competition within the market

In contrast with the previous pie chart which indicated that most of the people don't use apps to buy or read books, 93.3 percent of total respondents actually interested in an app in which they can order a list of their favorite book. This phenomenon is strengthening the previous indication of opportunity to create a new market

90 percent of the respondents are interested using an app which offers free delivery of the books

And almost 76 percent of our respondents suggested that they will download an app in their cellphone to order books and over 24 percent of them may be interested in doing that.

More than half of the respondents are currently buying books from the physical shop and 30 percent of them using Rokomary.com. Thin portion of them are using various other sources. It indicates that we have good sold base of Rokomary.com traffic in our favor but we have opportunity to explore and convert large portion of the target market though PR Campaign.

Because of lockdown and other restrictions, online becomes the preferable and viable option for shopping and As smartphone users are increasing among the young generation and working class, we believe that apps are the future for more convenient shopping experiences hence it is the ideal time to launch the app and run the PR campaign now.

3. GOALS

In conjunction with [CLIENT COMPANY] the following goals have been set forth with regards to public relations:

As we observe in the situational analysis section that there is a huge market opportunity for Boi Circle app as there are not enough dedicated apps present at the moment to cater Bangladeshi book market. More than half of our target population is habituated into physical shops and that's the challenge we have to undertake to influence the purchase habits of our population and convert them into Boi circle app users. Almost 30 percent of the respondents already use Rokomari.com to buy their books and we want to initially convert both of the portion into Boi-Circle app users. Our goal is to make our target population aware of the Boi Circle app, Influence them to download and use the app through a PR campaign.

4. OBJECTIVES

• Building Product and Service Awareness- Since we are re- introducing a new app (Boi Circle) for an existing service, we can use a repurpose previously used marketing elements that will generate consumer attention and awareness through media placements and special events.

• Creating Interest- Stories in the media can help entice a targeted audience to try the application. For example, during festive seasons, a special occasional offer may be promoted through promotional releases sent to the users of the Boi Circle App.

• Providing Information- Online blogging and press releases can be used to provide users with more in depth information about the app and its services. Through articles, collateral materials, newsletters and websites, we can deliver information to customers that can help them gain understanding of our app and services.

• Stimulating Demand. A positive article in a newspaper, on TV news show or mentioned on the Internet, will often result in a discernible increase in app downloads.

• Reinforcing the Brand. In many companies the public relations function is also involved with brand reinforcement by maintaining positive relationships with key audiences, and thereby aiding in building a strong image. A strong image helps Rokomari.com build its business and it can help the company in times of crises as well.

5. TARGET AUDIENCE

To conduct a successful PR campaign, a PR firm must analyze and research its target audience. The target audience is the group of people who might be interested in the specific products or services, and the organization is trying to reach that target group of audience. They are our potential buyers and customers, and our campaign should be designed in such a way so that we can grab their attention.

Through our research and analysis, we have divided our target audience into the following groups:

A. Primary Target Audience:

The primary target audience is the group of people to whom our campaign is mainly targeted towards. Although they are not the only group of customers to be persuaded, they are the most likely to buy into that product or service. Keeping all the factors in mind, we have divided our primary target audience into four different categories:

1. Students from the age 15-20 (male & female)

2. University Students from the age 20-26 (male & female)

3. Job holders, homemakers (age 26-40)

As our product/service is a mobile app, our primary target audience is the youth, and we have divided them into two categories. At first, are students from the age 15-20 all over Bangladesh. Their academic books will be available in this app, including Bangla medium, English version, and English medium academic books.

Our next group is the undergrad and grad students from the age of 20-26 years. As most of their classes are still online, their academic books will also be available here. Our next group is both male & female of the age 26-40 years because there are countless novels, fictions, non-fiction, drama, monographs, anthologies, storybooks, encyclopedia, and many other genres of books besides all the academic materials.

B) Secondary Target Audience:

The secondary target audience is the group of people who will most likely not directly buy the products/services but can influence our primary target audience. Sometimes they can be the customer themselves. Based on our analysis, we have divided our secondary audience into three categories:

1. Teachers & Faculties (school, college, university)

2. Writers & Authors

3. Publications.

Our first group in the secondary target audience are teachers & faculties. As they are taking online classes, they can encourage their students to buy their study materials online through this app.

Our second group is writers and authors who can potentially use this app to launch their upcoming books. For this same reason, our third group is publishers who can also use this platform for their forthcoming publications.

6. TARGET MEDIA

To reach our target audience, target media plays a vital role. For this campaign, we have selected five different forms of media. They are-

1. Facebook

Posting regularly about the app's new features will help people understand it more clearly. We can share static and dynamic creatives containing vital information to draw the attention of potential users. Can promote this app with a CTA button so that people can easily find a way to download it. Also, the content we are sharing on YouTube can be promoted through Facebook as well.

2. Instagram

We will post static and dynamics simultaneously on Facebook and Instagram. As the audiences of Instagram are more precise than Facebook, it will help us to rich our target audience properly.

3. YouTube

We plan to make content like - live sessions with the writers, discussion about books, reviews, the introduction of a new book, etc. Writers can share their journey or experiences, which can influence the new writers. Also, people can make videos recommending books that they love, which we can share from our YouTube channel. We can make a contest like "choose your favorite book and design its cover, make a video on that and share with us via Boi Circle App." Can promote the best designers' video content through YouTube. Also, we can offer people to share short stories via the app. App downloaders will easily be able to download those stories directly from the app. We can send gifts to the best writers based on the views or download amount. It will help us to increase App download amount and engage with people more.

4. Television

Television ads are very commonly used to influence viewer's purchase decisions. Although people think online ads are the most effective in this era, generally, people trust the ads they see on television more than what they see online. That's why our TVC will be broadcasted on different TV channels throughout this campaign so that we can reach an even more comprehensive range of audiences.

5. Newspapers

Our posters will also be posted in different newspapers to reach our diverse range of audiences. As this is primarily an offline platform, the posters will contain all the necessary directions and pieces of information about the product and services.

6. Radio

Radio shows are very popular among the youth culture in Bangladesh. People who frequently listen to radio shows are often very engaging audiences. Hence, our radio commercials could be a hit to influence the general public to download and use the app.

7. KEY MESSAGES

The message plays a vital role in a campaign. We can gain attention and also inform our target audience through this message. We created one core message and two sub-messages for this campaign.

Core message:

"Your favorite book is now just a tap away."

We wanted to keep our core message very simple & generic to make it easy for our target audience to understand. Also, this message will inform our audience about how easy and efficient this app is. We decided to convey the message in a neutral tone as we have a wide dynamic of audiences.

1st sub-message:

"Stay safe, stay home and spend your quality time reading"

We created this message to relate to the current situation of the world. As we all are going through the second nationwide lockdown and the end of this pandemic is nowhere near, we are encouraging our audiences to spend their quality time reading.

2nd sub-message:

"Be it adventure, be it drama

Grab your desired books at a discounted price on Boi Circle."

With this message, we are promoting that this app has a very diverse collection of books. Also, all of our books are sold at a much-discounted price than other places. This will encourage and attract our audience, as a result increasing the engagement of the app overall.

8. Marketing Concept:

A marketing concept is a system where businesses start from their customers' needs to build and promote the product to satisfy these needs. To market our products and services, we came up with the following concepts:

1. We will sell our books at a much-discounted price than other stores. This will be our main selling point of this app. Due to the ongoing pandemic; people are not able to step outside as often. That's why people are more into online shopping these days. And the offer of discounted priced books online will encourage our audience to buy the products through this app.

2. Discount and offer for newly registered users : If they create an account the discount will be in-between 25%-30% on their first purchase and they will also get a free book as a gift. This offer will encourage our potential customers to try out the app for the first time, as this discount will reduce the book's price a lot. Also registered Boi Circle app users will enjoy free home delivery up to your first three orders.

3. Promoting any product/service through a Facebook group can be a valuable tool to increase sales. Usually, Facebook groups consist of many people with the same interest. And there are many groups for many Bangladeshi readers on Facebook, which includes more than fifty thousand members. Promoting our services through these groups can be highly beneficial for our company.

4. Affiliations with teachers and lecturers can be beneficial in order to promote our academic books. As most educational institutions are still conducting their classes online, the teachers can encourage their students to buy all their books from this app, which will be beneficial for the teachers, students, and the company.

5. These days, affiliation with various influencers is a crucial tool to promote any products. Usually, these influencers have a very loyal following that trust and rely on their words a lot. As a result, when an influencer is talking about a specific product, there is a high chance that a good number of his/her followers will like to try out the product.

6. Driving existing customers of Rokomari.com to the app: through an action button and banner in Rokomary.com website, we will drive the existing customers into the app. With all the orders from Rokomary.com, the customer will get a short note in wish we will ask them to try out the boi circle mobile app.

9. STRATEGIES AND TACTICS

Media Outreach - Media outreach is basically putting the story in

Front of people like journalists, editors, reporters, etc. who have the platform to tell this story to the wider audience. In order to get a successful media outreach, we need to follow a proper strategy and make a plan. Media outreach is a very important part of the campaign as it is the best way to brand something. The goal of the media outreach is to earn press coverage which can help the brand to grow over time. There are different types of media outreach, for example - Social Media, Reaching out to media, or influencers on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram. It has become a very important part of it. In recent years, social media outreach has grown significantly. The social media outreach plan is a detailed plan that outlines the goal and action plan of a PR campaign. Also helps to stay focused on the objectives, better executions, and measures the success of the outreach campaign.

We need a proper media outreach plan and strategy. For that, we can follow the five important parts –

1. Define and segment the audience

2. Build a media list

3. Develop stories

4. Create schedules

5. Define what success looks like

In order to pick the right news outlets to broadcast the story, first, we need to know who we are hoping to reach and what’s the purpose of conveying the news to that particular group of people. What types of news platforms our audience will follow, is also important to know. Once we have a clear idea of what type of media outlets we want to be featured on, we need to find the right Journalists or platforms which can help us to promote and tell our story to the target audience. Need to develop out story that we are going to tell to our audience. That will help the journalists to write properly. It’s very important to have a thoughtfully planed schedule. It helps us to plan out everything in a proper way. The success depends on how experienced we are with the PR outreach. If we can go with the proper platforms, it becomes easier to reach the audience.

For the “BOI CIRCLE APP” Facebook (choose influencers, OVC, create static and dynamic creatives containing information GDN adds, etc.), Instagram (static and dynamic creatives), YouTube (Video contents), newspaper articles, magazines, TV news coverages, Press Conference, Posters as the Media Outreaches we are planning for. As our target audience range is 15-40, and mostly these people are active on these platforms, for them, these media will be helpful to gather information.

Press Releases:

Our press releases will be announcements made to the press with the goal of generating media coverage. It is essentially a request to the media to talk about our Boi Circle app and events for media coverage. Press releases are a must for virtually every campaign, especially for the launch.

Press releases distributed via newswires have had evolving roles with SEO over the years. Newswires are services that compile and distribute news for media outlets and reporters. Reporters can search newswires for information relevant to their areas of coverage and may publish press releases that are relevant to their readers. Additionally, newswire press releases are published on media outlet news feeds, and when using the most credible services, they also earn prominent spots at the top of internet searches. So, the newswire increases the chances people will find your company online through the press release. Once they find our app or the landing page of our website, they are more likely to act or engage.

An integrated campaign often has multiple touch points, such as social media, email marketing, media outreach and a website. A press release can reinforce the messaging across these touch points and, in some cases, it will drive readers to these locations, so it is imperative that the information presented is consistent. It will also allow us to use strategic messaging to position our brand and service in a positive light to journalists, who will relay that positive message to our target audience in the form of a story.

While we will never be able to fully control every aspect of media outreach, a press release gives us the opportunity to create an initial platform that reporters’ stories can build upon. In this way, we can use press releases to help increase the public’s perception and awareness of our brand and services.

Editorial:

Our editorial strategy outlines the content formats, channels, and workflows that will drive our marketing efforts and enable us to hit our PR goals. It centers on our target audience at all times, because of which, an editorial strategy will set our organizational standards and expectations of content based on what our audience wants.

We consider our editorial strategy as a central roadmap that maximizes our team’s efforts, so we can observe the highest possible return on investment (ROI) and support our overall business goals. It’s a document that removes all the guesswork from our content creation and our team can always refer to it ahead of projects and planning sessions.

One of our major aims is to get editorial coverage from all the traditional major news organizations like The Daily Star, Prothom Alo, The Business Standard, Dhaka Tribune, Noya Diganta. Young writers and youth influencers such as Nuhash Humayun, John Kabir, etc who are known active book readers can also share their honest reviews to their followers.

We are also planning to implement an Editorial Calendar for our strategies. Editorial calendars are created by publications to help editors plan out future issues. Though they’re typically created for advertising purposes, editorial calendars give a PR team a topic guide for creation of press releases, blog posts and content marketing. By laying out what content to create, when to pitch and whom to pitch, editorial calendars make PR both easier and more effective.

Editorial calendars outline the content that media outlets will focus on for the entire year. In a similar way, we keep a calendar that outlines key topics for promotion, including proactive media pitches and social media posts for the year. With a structured plan in place, our PR team can space out appropriate brand announcements on relevant days.

Timing is everything when it comes to earned media, so we naturally want to avoid releasing announcements that might be overshadowed by other news during a holiday season or the run-up to a major election. Unforeseen media opportunities will come up throughout the year and we may have to stray a bit from the calendar, but that’s the point of having a flexible media plan.

Events:

The event is anything that takes place or happens, especially something important. For the PR campaign to promote the “BOI CIRCLE APP” the upcoming events can be the best opportunity or option. Events like Dhaka Lit Festival, Book Fair, Book reading platforms sometimes organize events or workshops where we can promote our APP. Different events organized by the school, college, or university can also be a good way to promote this App. Departmental stores sometimes arrange book corners and events and that can be another place to promote the App.

Speaking Opportunities:

Speaking opportunities create a way to be more generous with the information. Increase the engagements with the audience. Different events like Dhaka Lit Fest, International Children’s’ Film Festival Bangladesh (ICFFB), Dhaka International Film Festival, Dhaka International Mobile Film Festival, Book Fair sometimes arrange workshops or speaking opportunities where we can speak about the “BOI CIRCLE APP”.

Social Media:

Social media marketing is basically the use of social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, etc. For the “BOI CIRCLE APP” here we are using Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube as we believe our target audiences are very much active on these platforms. We will create a Facebook Page through which we will promote our APP details by creating static and dynamic creatives with solid and eye-catching information and a CTA button which will directly take our audience to the App download site. The creatives will grab the attention of our potential audiences. Boosting the specific and informative creatives will help us to reach the target audience. The content we are making for YouTube can also be promoted through Facebook. The same creatives that we are using on Facebook can also be used on Instagram. Can create few seconds story ads for Instagram Story as people love this kind of content. Also can make content like - live sessions with writers, discussion about the book, reviews, the introduction of a new book, etc. Writers can share their journey of experiences which can influence the young writers. Also, people can make videos recommending books that they love which we can share from our YouTube channel. We can make contests like “choose your favorite book and designs its cover, make a video on it and share with us via “BOI CIRCLE APP”. Can promote the best designer’s video content through YouTube and Facebook. Also, we can offer people to share short stories via App. The App downloaders will easily be able to download those stories directly from the App. We can send gifts to the best writers based on the views or download amount. We believe it will help to increase the App download quantity.

Crisis Planning:

The campaign can sometimes generate increased traffic drive to the app and we have to be prepared to receive complaints or negative reviews. However, one of our aims is to stay prepared and have an active team working behind the app to deal with bugs and provide necessary updates with improved features and better usability. An optional monthly survey form will be given to the users for their feedback and based on that we can specifically focus on solving any issue that they might be facing. As soon as the problem is resolved we will let our audience know that the problem is now solved.

12. Monitoring and Measurement

In our campaign monitoring will be a continuous process which we will be initiating from the very beginning. After the app development process is done we will give the beta version to some limited users and monitor the feedbacks about it. After working on the feedbacks, we will start social media and print media promotions where we will introduce our app to the target audience and influence them to download it. At this point we will monitor how our audience are feeling about our app and if our promotions are working or not. After few more continuous monitoring, in the end we will measure our success or failure of the campaign.

Measurement is the process of computing how effective or ineffective the campaign was. It can be calculated by analyzing some indicators.

Some of the indicators we will be analyzing are-

• App downloads from Google Play Store

• App reviews and ratings

• Instagram Insights

• Facebook generic reach and engagements

• Social media impression

• Print media impression

• In app purchase

• In app advertisement revenue

These indicators will guide us if we achieved our goals and objective or not.

After analyzing the number of app downloads, reviews and ratings on Google Play Store we will know if our target audience are reached and influenced. Also we will be able to measure if our app is creating interest amongst the users.

Instagram insights, Facebook reach and engagement will lead us to understand if the information we are providing them are useful to them or not.

The social media and print media impression will indicate us if we are able to maintain a positive image of our app to the key audience. It will also be very helpful to stimulate demand of our app.

By analyzing the in app purchase and in app advertisement revenue figure we will be able to measure and predict if our budget is used sufficiently and if our campaign is successful.

Post 1:

“Today a reader, tomorrow a leader” – Margaret Fuller

Post 2:

Interested in BOOKS ? Download the BoiCircle app, create your account and enjoy the perks of being registered !

Post 3:

BoiCircle has thousands of books from a range of different genres, ready to deliver at your doorstep ! Take a look at the huge collection of books from the BoiCircle app and register to get 30% off and free delivery!

Post 4:

Want to buy books but don't want to go out ? We will get your favorite books delivered in no time while you relax at home. Order your favorite books from BoiCircle app now.

Poster 1:

Poster 2: