Week2 Part B: Business Research

1. Bird Rock Coffee Roasters    
2. https://www.birdrockcoffee.com/ 
3. Local coffee business that has 6 total locations in Southern California. Their differentiator in the coffee market is that they source locally and ethically.
4. Social media accounts are not listed on website (strangely enough there is a "follow us" section) and have to be searched for. Social media that is being used includes: 
• Instagram: 31,600 followers. Last Post- 9/7/21. Posts are nearly daily.
• Facebook: 9,418 followers. Last Post- 9/7/21. Posts are nearly daily.
• Twitter: 3,471. Last Post- 9/7/21. Posts are nearly daily.
• TikTok: 69 followers. Last Post- 6/11/21. Posts were infrequent ranging from 1-2 a month every couple of months.
5. Bird Rock Coffee sticks to re-posting the same content they have to all of their social medias which allows them to be consistent in their update schedules; this excludes TikTok which is mostly inactive and has a different for of media that needs to be produced to post on there. Instagram is the most interacted with account with most posts gaining 100-250 likes and under 10 comments; responses to other users tend to focus only on customer concerns. Facebook, Twitter, and TikTok have very low engagement with normally under 30 likes and 0-1 comment per post.

1. Better Buzz Coffee
2. https://betterbuzzcoffee.com/
3. Local coffee business with 12 locations not including their HQ office and warehouse location. All based in Southern California. Market differentiator is that they are CCOF organic certified and are committed to sourcing Fair Trade and Rainforest Alliance Coffees.
4. Social Media accounts are not listed on website but can be found through searches on Google. Social Medias that are being used include:
• Instagram: 43,200 followers. Last Post- 9/6/21. Posts about 3-4 times per week.
• Facebook: 5,103 followers. Last Post- 9/6/21. Posts 2-3 times per week.
• Twitter: 1, 194 followers. Last Post- 6/1/20. Posts 2-3 times per week.
• TikTok(inactive): 36 followers. Last Post- 4/23/20. Only 1 post.
5. Better Buzz has the most interaction and following on Instagram and focuses on their social media efforts mainly on this platform. Facebook seems to get most of the same posts as the Instagram and garners some attention through a handful of likes but no comments. Twitter has very low engagement. TikTok looks to have been an attempt to capitalize on the growing platform but may have been an unsustainable platform to create content for because most of the other accounts only post pictures and infographics with little to no video. Overall, Better Buzz does not interact with their followers very frequently except for on Instagram to respond to some questions and concerns.

1. Big Bud Press
2. https://bigbudpress.com/
3. Local/National company based in Southern California with 3 locations and 1 location in Chicago. Pride themselves on being sweatshop free, sourcing locally, and using recycled or eco-friendly fabrics with daily to weekly audits on production of their clothes.
4. Social media accounts are not listed and require a search. Social media accounts being used are:
• Instagram: 300,000 followers. Last Post- 9/6/21. Posts are made daily.
• Twitter: 3,243 followers. Last Post- 8/26/19. Posts were made months apart being updated 1-3 times in one week.
5. Big Bud understands that their social media following is on Instagram and keeps themselves relevant by posting daily. Posts range from 1k to 15k likes and have between 10-200 comments per post. They quickly interact with a good chunk of their followers by sending back loving emojis and kind encouraging comments. Twitter had good interaction with plenty of customers tweeting at them their purchases and leaving likes and comments; aside from retweeting customers they tended not to reply back.

1. Tunnel Vision
2. https://shoptunnelvision.com/
3. Local business based in Los Angeles that only operates online and caters to alternative/punk focused fashion. Selling point is that they are original designs, sweatshop free, and an ethical workplace that supports POC and LGBTQ+ individuals.
4. Social Media accounts are listed at the bottom of the website but more inactive social media accounts can be searched for. Social medias include: 
• Instagram: 396,000 followers. Last Post- 9/7/21. Posts range from being hourly to daily.
• Tiktok:105,100 followers. Last Post- 9/7/21. Posts range from 1-2 weeks with some posts going up on the same days.
• Facebook(inactive): 6,885 followers. Last Post- 3/16/19. Posted about once a month before becoming inactive.
• Twitter(inactive): 1,192 followers. Last Post-6/28/18. Posted close to daily before becoming inactive.
5. Tunnel Vision has a large following on both Instagram and TikTok and earns plenty of views, likes (6k-100k), and comments(10-400) per posts. They have a very consistent schedule in posting alongside the owner who has accounts that are also very popular and bring lots of attention to her brand. Replies on Instagram are very sporadic but TikTok interacts with many users on each of their posts in very casual manner. The inactive accounts had very low interaction with most posts going ignored which most likely was why the brand stopped updating them; these most likely still exist to preserve brand integrity and prevent fake accounts from popping up.

1. Star and Bun
2. https://starandbun.com/
3. International online art shop created by artists StarPyrate and Bunchatas. Art and prints are original art from StarPyrate and BunChatas and manufactured by BunChatas.
4. Social Media is not listed but can be found through a google search. Active and related to the store social media accounts are: 
• Instagram: 1,765 followers. Last Post-3/22/21. Prior to dropping off from posting, the account was updating once every week.
• Twitter: 1,872 followers. Last Post(retweet)-8/30/21 and last tweet- 3/24/21. Prior to dropping off the account was updating about 3-4 times every week. 
5. Star and Bun's social media accounts seem to be used to help brand the shop and are fairly inactive. The Instagram solely posts products and does get more interaction and comments and the account will respond to questions about ordering and restocks. The Twitter posts about product and shop updates and retweets other user's posts when they show the products that they've received; the Twitter account gets fairly low interaction so there is not much for the account to respond to. It seems that the artists rely on their own social media accounts (artist website with their socials are linked on shop website) to help promote their product but the shop seems more like a passive form of income to these individuals.

    From analyzing several social media accounts from these 5 businesses, I can safely say that the most successful platform for all the businesses was Instagram and the least successful platform was twitter. I think that the reason that Instagram accounts are so successful is because it is a very popular platform and more people will scroll through their feeds and through several posts from both friends, family and businesses throughout the day; these posts are also easy to digest because its a single picture where the captions aren't too important to the audience. Twitter does not seem to be the most friendly to be the most business-friendly platform and with the exception of Star and Bun most of the other businesses created their accounts during the height of popularity of Twitter between 2007-2013. 

    It seems that the most valuable platform to keep updated is Instagram but businesses are continuing to carry over those same posts to platform like Facebook; this may be to keep relevant to a different demographic that is on these platforms or to try to keep their brands popping up in as many places much like a billboard or tv ad. The exception to this is when brands try to carry into TikTok which is a purely video based platform. Bird Rock and Better Buzz struggled to garner attention on these platforms because of their inconsistent posting and this was most likely due to them not being able to create videos that followed TikTok trends like viral dances or memes. Tunnel Vision is the only business that has been able to take on and have a prominent following on Instagram and TikTok despite the inability to reuse content for each platform; this again may be to the owners popularity and knowledge of social media but could also be because of how casual and interactive the brand is to their younger audience.

    Overall, most brands should be focusing their efforts on posting on Instagram and reusing this same content for any other platforms that they have. There should also be consistent posts made on the daily with more interaction with their customers. I'm surprised that the most of the local brands that claim to be a part of the community and want to help the community interact with their people very little. TikTok, while it is the hottest social media at the moment is a large hurdle to tackle for most small and local businesses. If there was more effort in being consistent and relating to most of the TikTok user base then these businesses may be able to succeed on the platform but it seems to hard of a challenge to take on at the moment.