Adventures in Adulting: Senioritis

As this semester draws to a close, the senioritis is slowly starting to hit me.

I thought this was something that only high school students experienced from their desperation to move out of their parent's house and get out on their own. But as my days grow shorter here at UGA, I find myself a little conflicted: I'm really ready to get out and tackle the real world... but I'm also not sure I'm ready to give up my college world just yet.

I know there aren't many days left where I won't be full on adulting. This leads everything into being viewed as "my last _______."

These things are the remaining events that stand in the way between me and full-on adulting: my last home football game as a student, my last GA/FL, my last spring break... the list goes on. I'm even starting a senior bucket list because I want to feel like I got the most out of my last year in Athens.

I think that it would be an interesting idea if certain bars were to capitalize on seniors' countdown to adulting and maybe the overall nostalgia of Athens as well. Some examples of times this could work well are after the last home football game or really the whole months of December and May.

They could create Facebook events that promote special deals for seniors or maybe certain bars can bring back a certain drink or event that they used to do when we were freshmen. Does anyone else miss Power Hour? Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram posts would be the best way to promote. Specifically, the bar could tweet/insta out different bucket list things to do in Athens, and occasionally incorporate their bar specials/events into them. Lastly, they could have an Instagram contest for the best picture of someone completing the bucket list of the day. The winner could win a t-shirt or other goodie from the bar.

                                                

The bar could engage seniors by asking them to tweet something on their bucket list using #beforeIgraduate. The bar could add some of their favorite tweets to their bucket list and could even incorporate them inside the bar by writing them on a chalk wall.

I'd love if my college experience came full circle by celebrating the things that made it so memorable. Cheers to finishing off the four best years of my life.

Adventures in Adulting: First House

"Hello MTV and welcome to my crib..."

This is what I feel like saying to everyone that comes over for the first time. This summer I furthered my adventure into adulthood and moved into my first house with three lovely roommates. And for the first time in my life I actually decorated with furniture other than a futon and cubby shelf. Furniture fit for an adult. After months of decorating, I'm so proud of how our little house turned out. Here's a quick tour:

                     

As fun as buying adult things and decorating has been, one thing truly hasn't been fun about adulting: managing the house (mainly utilities). I honestly don't know the first thing of managing a household or how to keep my utility bills as low as possible. 

What temperature am I supposed to keep the house at? Why was our water bill so high this month? 

These are some questions I'm searching for the answer to. Side note: I even got tricked into getting a phone line for a cheaper rate, which I didn't know would result in companies sending me a ton of annoying junk mail. Ugh. 

I'm certainly learning how to adult, but I wish I had some helpful advice that made it easier. Here's some examples of some things I'd be interested in reading:

This struggle led me to an idea of how local Athens companies could connect with fellow new house owners/renters venturing into adulthood (like myself).  Companies such as Rent Athens and Charter (or other rental and utility companies) should better educate new home owners/renters through social media.

These companies should target their new customers by creating an informative online atmosphere. I would love to follow someone who tweeted out articles on saving money on utilities, life hacks for your house, and other helpful advice for managing your first house. By simply tweeting out such helpful information, these companies would find themselves gaining an engaging audience.

Also, they can connect with their audience by encouraging customers to ask for advice using #AskCharter or #AskRentAthens. Engaging their followers with helpful answers is a quick and easy way to build brand loyalty.

Targeting these new customers this way is such a great idea because if you can make a positive impression on these young adults during their journey into adulthood- they'll likely secure a customer for life.

Adventures in Adulting: Motivation

Being told "I know you can do this" weirdly makes me not want to try… "You CAN'T do this" has same effect. Ok, yeah, I might just be lazy.

— Anna Kendrick (@AnnaKendrick47) October 9, 2014

I'm not sure if it's the midterm season or early senioritis setting in, but lately it's been borderline impossible for me to get out of bed and get anything done. I've never been a lazy person, or someone who excessively sleeps, but I swear all my motivation has gone out the window.

As I sit here for the fourth consecutive hour in the library, I'm thinking about all the things I would rather be doing than studying. Sleeping, eating... the list goes on. And then I thought, how cool would it be if I saw on Twitter (okay so maybe I'm on Twitter instead of studying) a tweet about the possibility of free food delivered to me during my time of misery?

If you haven't read my intro blog, I've recently set out to identify ways that local Athens businesses can market to students using the idea of "adulting," and I feel like this would be such an easy way for Papa Johns to interact with students. The tweet could say something like:

"Adulting is hard, but it's nothing pizza can't fix. Tweet us your current adulting struggle using #AdultingforPJ for a chance to have a free pizza delivered to you"

When the pizza is delivered, share a picture of the student(s) enjoying the free pizza. I think that this would be a great social media push to have once a week, especially during midterms and finals. 

And on that note, I feel that about sums up this post. Like I said, all motivation went out the window this week...

Adventures in Adulting: Work-Life Balance

Sometimes the best part of my day is imagining what I'm gonna eat when I get off work.

— Anna Kendrick (@AnnaKendrick47) April 21, 2014

Have you ever been stuck at work and found yourself thinking about dinnertime? I have. A lot.

I don't think I obsess over dinner because I'm hungry (well most of the time), but because it's the only part of my day that I get to actually relax before tackling endless chores, schoolwork, and other to-dos.

I'd like to think that my inability to reach my ideal work-life balance is simply a college-phase, but the adult world hasn't proved too promising for me either. I say this because I had the opportunity to intern for a large company this summer, where I was thrown out into the field and expected to adult. But this was adulting to the extreme. The stereotypical 9-5 job wasn't a reality in this world; when and how long you would need to work was always unpredictable. This inconsistency left me too tired and without much time for my personal life. Side note: if you're an adult reading this, you're probably getting a good laugh in. Yes, I know it only gets harder. Don't remind me.

Such a demanding job really had me questioning if a work-life balance was even achievable in the adult world. 

So here I am, overwhelmed as I stare into the face of approaching adulthood: graduation and the start of my career. Suddenly, the thought of taking a fifth-year victory lap sounds incredibly enticing. But instead, I know I have to take adulthood head-on and continue filling out applications for full-time jobs.

Let me tell you, the job search has proved far more complicated than I had anticipated. How do I get a true sense of the work-life balance that awaits me at one job over another? Flashes of my summer audlting-experience haunt my mind; I hope to never again be expected to adult without a proper work-life balance.

Why aren't these potential employers trying to woo students capitalizing on our fear of entering adulthood to better market themselves to us? Specifically by addressing work-life balance? I have a little advice for companies trying to win students over:

Utilize social media to create work-life balance

I believe that these companies can create work-life balance  for their employees by using social media. For instance, Facebook can be used to promote and host events that promote work-life balance for employees. Examples include organizing a work softball team or posting about available concert tickets to employees. Facebook groups are also a great way to inform employees about anything deemed incredibly important, without them having to check their work email or phone on the weekends. Having the ability to turn these off for the weekend can better separate work from their personal lives.

Using social media to promote a work-from-home policy would do wonders in helping to create the work-life balance. A company can also use platforms such as Meerkat and Periscope to train employees online, and YouTube as a way to store these videos for future use. Similarly, these social media platforms can be used to hold virtual meetings so employees don't have to be on site to attend.

If your company can successfully create an environment that promotes work-life balance to this extent, it's time to share that resume.

Utilize social media to send students your resume 

I think it's pretty common for companies to forget to market themselves to students as hard as students are marketing themselves to them. Students put in all the work needed to build and format their resume throughout the years; but a company should note that students don't stop there. Students are always searching for recruiters on LinkedIn: trying to connect, send messages, and hopefully get them to take a second look at their resume.

Similarly, companies need to be proactively searching for students on LinkedIn, marketing to our needs as we enter adulthood, and trying to get us to take a second look at them. For example, I was really impressed by one company that I had never heard of that reached out by messaging me on LinkedIn. The woman wrote why she felt I would be a great match for their company, some benefits to working there, and to come check them out at the Career Fair. With a simple message, and in a sense a simplified company resume, this company went from being unknown to the top of my list.

Companies should mention their specific steps to promoting work-life balance for their employees. I think highlighting the possibility of work-life balance, in-depth training, and a smooth transition from college to career would be the best way to target those students preparing for adulthood.

Adventures in Adulting: Fostering Pets

Whenever I see an adorable service dog and I know I can't pet it, the greatest internal struggle of my life begins anew

— Anna Kendrick (@AnnaKendrick47) January 2, 2013

There comes a point in every young adults life where you get that feeling (you know...the one when you see that service dog on campus) and you know you desperately want a pet of your own. One that adores you more than anything else on the planet.

College is the perfect time to either foster animals or train service dogs.  You get all the love from that animal without the financial obligation or lifelong commitment. Last September, I knew that I wanted to be responsible for a life other than my own and to take another step towards adulting. This was my plan as I filled out an application to foster from Oconee County Animal Control.

I was told by the workers that black cats are less likely to be adopted because of superstition. So I decided to pick out an all-black kitten. Here's a picture of me holding him for the first time:

I named him Oliver (Ollie for short) and this month marks exactly a year since I began this new chapter of adulting in my life: parenthood. It's ironic that this black cat has been such good luck for me, although being a pet owner hasn't been easy. I've had my fair share of difficulties including a massive flea infestation in my apartment, but it's all been worth it. I fell in love with Ollie and adopted him.

 

It's been such an amazing adulting-experience to raise an animal all on my own. I think Oconee County Animal Control should target other college students like myself through social media to spread awareness of their foster program. College students (well... responsible ones that are ready to adult) are perfect to foster because of the lack of long-term and financial commitment required.

I looked up Oconee County Animal Control and was surprised to find that they had an existing Instagram account. However, I was extremely disappointed in their use of it. Their last post was 42 weeks ago (ouch). I saw lots of pictures of random animals (probably from Google images) with few postings of their own animals.

First of all, I think Oconee County Animal Control should be Instagramming cute pictures and videos of their animals throughout the week. The caption should include information on the animal, a blurb saying "adopt me," and a call to their followers to tweet out and share the Instagram in hopes that someone will adopt the animal. Perhaps OCAC could partner with other businesses in Athens that would donate gift cards or other rewards that could be given to students that are very involved in sharing OCAC's animals on their personal social media.

These Instagrams should also be posted to their Facebook account, which was actually more lifeless than their Instagram. Their Facebook only has one picture posted. Not a single status, comment, or anything other than this one picture. They definitely could step their game up on Facebook as well.

Clearly, Oconee County Animal Control is missing out on a huge opportunity to get their animals in front of college students faces and into their homes.

Adventures in Adulting: Dressing Business Professional/Casual

Why is fancy clothing always way too long? Do women get taller as they get richer? Cause if so, mama's gotta make that paper. #ShortyMcgee

— Anna Kendrick (@AnnaKendrick47) July 3, 2013

The more adult I become the more I see the daunting words... dress business professional/casual.

Men have it so easy. There isn't much difference for them between business professional and casual, and they can get away with only owning five shirts and two suits and still look hella professional . But as a woman it just isn't that easy.

There's a lot of gray area for me between dressing business professional and business casual. On top of that, it's pretty hard to dress professional while being fashion-forward. For some reason fashion and business don't commonly mix, and I just end up feeling boring in my pants suit. I can't possibly be the only woman out there struggling on what to wear to look professional and cute. I'm all for adulting, but I don't believe in giving up dressing stylish for it.

I've recently started shopping at the Banana Republic Factory Store off the Oconee Connector in Athens. I think their target audience is definitely young professionals/college students because their factory prices are much more affordable. I believe the best way to target their audience would be through their struggle to learn to adult. Specifically, their struggle with what to wear in the adult world. I picked up a few things for my interview next week:

I would love it if BR would tweet out cute business professional/casual outfits using their current clothes in store. They could also tweet outfit ideas for interviews, how to know if a suit fits you properly, dressing business professional/casual during different seasons, best business professional/casual styles for certain body types, the difference between business professional and business casual, dos and don'ts, etc. This would make for a great way to incorporate their clothes and in-store sales in a way that would interest those new to the world of adulting. Here's some examples of what it could look like:

Also, I think the company should have #AskBR where people can tweet out their interview outfits to ask BR if it is appropriate. BR can respond to these with advice and can suggest their merchandise if (and only if) the person were to need it.

Then, BR should compile all of these tips on a Pinterest board and have the pins link back to the BR Factory website. For pins that include outfits created with BR Factory clothes, they should include links to the specific clothing pieces in the description. (side note: one frustrating thing about Pinterest is when there's no link to buy something you really like) Each Pinterest board could be a different category, and they can create a Lookbook with this different boards.

Adventures in Adulting: Working Out

Can Claire Underwood from House of Cards please do an exercise tape where she's like cold and dispassionate but she gives you a perfect ass?

— Anna Kendrick (@AnnaKendrick47) March 30, 2015

In order to find the perfect balance of adulting you need to incorporate working out into your busy lifestyle. But making myself workout isn't easy.

My biggest reservation about going to the gym is that when I get there I have absolutely no clue what to do. So naturally I just avoid the gym all together. Lately, I've been finding workouts on Pinterest that I can do at home like this one I started this month:

The downside is that I don't have weights or other equipment at home, so I'm pretty limited in the workouts I can do. I feel like I can only accomplish real-adulting-workouts at the gym. For this reason I have been thinking about joining the Omni Club in Athens for some time now. I checked out @OmniClubAthens on Twitter to see if they offered anything that would ease my fear of walking into a gym completely clueless.

Omni is really active on Twitter, especially with engaging their followers, but I didn't find anything to solve my problem. I wish that Omni would tweet out a Workout of the Day or #WOTD that I could follow in order to utilize their equipment. Perhaps inside their gym they could have a sign that says "Ask us about the Workout of the Day" and also include their Twitter handle to promote their social media. I'd like to think if they incorporated something like this, that I'd work up the courage to actually see the inside of their gym.

I think this would be a great way for someone like myself to grow more comfortable working out so that I can start adulting like I should be. It would be an effective way to engage and grow followers, and ultimately increase brand loyalty.

Adventures in Adulting: Wine

That bottle of wine that you have in case of a "special occasion" and how 7pm starts to feel real "special" when you got no other booze

— Anna Kendrick (@AnnaKendrick47) August 29, 2015

November 19, 2014 was the day I truly felt I was adulting. It was the day I turned 21 and bought beer at the grocery store like a badass adult. Nothing compares to the feeling of ultimate adulting, but it also opened up a world far past hunch punch and $1 well drinks. As an adult I felt like I needed to enjoy the finer, yet still college-student-affordable, drinks in life.

This lead me to my new found love for wine. It makes me feel like a classy adult. But nothing is as intimidating as navigating the isles of wine because honestly I don't know the first thing about wine.
 How do I choose one? What would pair well with dinner? What does sauvignon even mean? Ugh?!

This week I set out at Kroger to try something outside of the bulk two-buck chuck that I get at Trader Joes. Since I don't know the first thing about wine, I hit up my Bible for adulting (Pinterest) to see if I could become an instant wine expert. Check out this wine guide I found:

Seriously this wine guide is amazing, it even shows you how to decode a wine label! It helped me understand wine enough to feel like I was an informed buyer. I ended up trying a sauvignon blanc which was a nice switch up from the fruity white zinfandel I usually buy.

The key takeaways from my experience were that I wanted to be an informed buyer but Kroger's wine section was pretty overwhelming. Not to harp on Athens Kroger for the second blog post in a row (sorry not sorry), but it would be awesome if Kroger capitalized on this opportunity to connect with me this way as well.

Last week I suggested Kroger make a Pinterest account dedicated to pinning recipes that used sale items and then tweeted about the recipes/sales. I think that Kroger should create another board on Pinterest that serves as a guide for wine and beer. Similarly, they should tweet and post on Facebook about this guide to alcohol and can use this as an opportunity to post about great deals they are having on beer and wine. Connect these deals on alcohol with dinner recipes they would pair well with.

I think this would do well for them if they marketed it to the local college students by using humor with the #adulting. It would help college students become more informed buyers and increase brand loyalty to Kroger. Lastly, Kroger should place a summarized wine/beer guide throughout the intimidating aisles, and include something that says, "Follow us on Pinterest, Twitter and Facebook to learn more."

In the end, I'd know more about wine and deals going on at Kroger, and Kroger would gain a loyal customer. Sounds like a win-win if you ask me.

(Check out my cute kitty! :) )

Adventures in Adulting: Cooking

Cooking Healthy and Affordable

"I'm the best person in the world" - me after I cook anything at all

— Anna Kendrick (@AnnaKendrick47) August 21, 2015

Nothing says adulting more than resisting the urge to swing through Chick-fil-A and cooking a healthy meal all by yourself. Cooking is a struggle in itself, but adding factors like healthy and affordable seems like an impossible task for a busy college student like myself.

Faced with the determination to take yet another step in adulting, I set out to cook something other than grilled cheese or ramen.

My Experience: 

First, I took to Pinterest to find out what a healthy plate looked like. 

Next, I began looking for the perfect recipe that would truly test my adulthood. (Shout out to my high school self for already having pinned hundreds of recipes).

Finally, I headed to Kroger to shop like the legit adult I am. I must say navigating a grocery store is a close second in difficult adulting to cooking. But I persevered and ventured back home to my kitchen with some salmon, asparagus, and other essentials for my adult meal.

And ta-da! A dinner I was actually proud of!

                           

Reflection: 

As I mentioned in my first blog, I plan to reflect on my adulting experiences and connect them to ways local Athens businesses can better relate to college students in the area. After reflecting on my experience, I couldn't help but think about how difficult it was to plan this meal with my limited knowledge on healthy cooking. I felt pretty overwhelmed walking through Kroger. And then I wondered what my local Kroger was up to on their social media. 

I was able to find what looks to be an existing twitter account (@AlpsKroger), but not a single tweet and so much missed opportunity to connect with local college students. Why isn't this Kroger tweeting healthy, easy, and affordable recipes? I'd be all over that 'ish. Maybe post a recipe that would use a certain food that is on sale. Super Cheap? Now I'm really on board.

Before heading to Kroger I relied heavily on Pinterest. Why not have a Pinterest board that has all of the tweeted recipes in one place? This is a great opportunity for Kroger to get involved in the cooking process before I even get to their store.

Now once I'm in the store, I wouldn't mind a booth that showed some of these recipes coming to life. This booth could be a great way to promote their social media to students. Something as simple as "follow @AlpsKroger for more recipes and weekly ads."

Lastly, I think Kroger should host gift card giveaways to boost retweets. Every college student will grab at the opportunity for free groceries.

Adventures in Adulting: Introduction

Introduction

I like to think of myself less like "an adult" and more like a "former fetus."

— Anna Kendrick (@AnnaKendrick47) April 24, 2014

"Ugh I've been adulting all day today," I hear the words slip right out of my mouth. As a fourth year (and soon to graduate) college student at the University of Georgia, I'm starting to use this word pretty regularly.

When I think about it, the noun 'adult' doesn't seem adequate enough to describe the struggle I feel as I make the transition into adulthood. Doing grown-up things and being responsible is proving to be a challenging process. This is why I feel a verb form in necessary. Adulting is hard.

For me, adulting is all about looking like you know what you're doing. I thought this was solely a struggle of mine, but searching social media for #adulting proves me wrong. Suddenly I went from being intimidated by people who looked like they had it all together, to being pretty convinced that no one actually knows what they're doing.

If all these strangers can seem so relatable through our struggle to become adults, certainly companies can use the same tactics to relate to others learning to adult. For this very reason, I'm setting out to document some of my adventures in adulting, and tying my experiences into how local Athens businesses can better relate to college students by utilizing "adulting" in their social media marketing.