Introduction & Methodology

Introduction

Down Syndrome Indiana (DSI) is a local nonprofit organization that helps connect families to support and raise awareness for Down Syndrome. Our aim was to create a strategy for increasing their youth Instagram engagement with the end goal of greater community participation with the organization. We created this recommendation report based on the findings from our extensive literature review and the local survey we conducted. 

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Methodology

To create our recommendation report for DSI we used online sources, our survey, and ideas that we discussed in our weekly meetings. Our goal was to provide DSI with ideas to increase community involvement in their annual Buddy Walk while raising awareness about Down Syndrome.

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Our team and the Executive Director at Down Syndrome Indiana, Lisa Wells met on September 28th at noon to establish the scope of our research.

 

1. Client 

   • During our meeting with the executive director of Down Syndrome Indiana, Lisa Wells, we had the opportunity to gain a better understanding of our client’s expectations. We discussed specific requests as well as possible alternatives that we could focus on as we formed the recommendation report. Before the meeting, we prepared some questions for our client to ensure we gathered all the necessary information. This meeting guided our research and helped us develop our recommendations.

2. Roles 

   • After better understanding our client’s goals and the scope of the project, each team member created their own recommendation idea to research for this project. Our recommendations include: 

     • Utilize Instagram stories 

     • Take advantage of the different methods social media offers to visually appeal to their audience. 

     • Create a consistent plan for all social media platforms 

     • Partner with high schools and other organizations with similar goals 

3. Research 

   • Our team spent 150 hours conducting research through reliable databases found on the IUPUI University Library website. We utilized proQuest and EBSCO to find articles related to our recommendations based on relevant key terms. Some of those key terms included:

     • Marketing AND “social media” - ProQuest

     • “Social media engagement” - ProQuest

     • “Non-profit organizations” AND marketing - ProQuest

     • “Increasing non-profit awareness” - ProQuest, EBSCO

     • Credibility AND engagement - ProQuest

     • Marketing AND outreach - ProQuest

     • “Visual marketing” AND “nonprofit visuals” - ProQuest

     • “Increasing volunteer engagement” - EBSCO 

     • “Collaboration” NOT “social media” - ProQuest 

     • Non-profit organization partnerships - ProQuest 

     • NPOs AND partnership - ProQuest 

     • Marketing NOT Social media - ProQuest 

4. Citations 

   • We created a google document for our sources, and each team member added at least four references to the google document. This google document included all of our sources cited in APA format and listed in alphabetical order. After correcting citations and formatting, we included our references in Appendix B.

5. Team Memo

   • The team memo included detailed information about our project. We started the writing process by assigning each team member a section. One of the most beneficial sections of our memo was the Dominance, influence, Steadiness, and Conscientiousness (DiSC) results which highlighted our personal strengths. This section helped us determine how we work best—both individually and collaboratively. We used these results to assign our roles for the recommendation report and the rest of the project.

6. Meetings 

   • We met virtually every Tuesday from 12:00-1:15 PM to collaborate on google docs. Before sending out our local survey, we held a zoom meeting to finalize the survey format and distribution responsibilities. Meeting weekly to share our ideas and progress kept us accountable for our individual roles and also allowed us to work efficiently by avoiding overlap and repetition.

7. Survey 

   • Our local survey targeted IUPUI students who were at least 16 years old. We developed our questions based on recommendations that we felt required supplementary support or evidence. This helped us get a better idea of how we can increase youth involvement in the Buddy Walk as well as Down Syndrome Indiana.