Post by Riley Crosgrove
On November 15th, 2013, all of San Francisco awaited the Make-a-Wish foundation’s grant of Miles Scott’s wish to become a superhero. While thousands of people gathered in San Francisco to watch Batkid in action, hundreds of thousands more followed social media, Twitter specifically, throughout the day to get updates. Hashtags such as #BatKidSF and #BatKid generated over 1.7 billion impressions. Tweeters included pictures with these Hashtags to allow users all over the world to see what was happening. Over 6,000 of these Hashtags were sent to San Francisco influences to ensure that it started trending early. Leading up to November 15th, news had rapidly spread throughout the nation of the plan to transform San Francisco into “Gotham City”. While most were interested initially, the repetition used by Twitter and other social media networks were enough to ensure that this would an event that everybody would want to keep up with. On November 15th, Batkid was the most popular topic on Twitter, generating over 50,000 tweets per hour.
Twitter also used celebrities and highly credible spokespeople to increase involvement and interest with this event. Encouraging tweets were sent throughout the nation to Batkid from journalists, politicians, and pundits in Washington D.C. Batkid even received an official thank you from the U.S. Justice Department. Many celebrities got involved through Twitter, including Britney Spears, Enrique Iglesias, the San Francisco 49ers, The Golden Gate Warriors, and an astronaut at the International Space Station. Ben Afflect claimed that he could never live up to such a performance, and the President of the United States tweeted his first vine wishing Miles luck. Twitter also created a @SFWish account, as well as @PenguinSF, an account that the villain used to mock tweet at Miles. With the use of Twitter, people throughout the nation were able to get involved, stay updated, and follow the successes of the day.
While it was easy for San Francisco residents to get involved and stay updated with the Make-a-Wish foundation’s event, Twitter allowed people all over the globe to stay up to date. While Miles embarked on his journey to save Gotham City, San Francisco paused. Thousands of volunteers dedicated their day to help the Make-a-Wish Foundation, people left their offices to watch the action, and the city temporarily unified behind the cause of making Miles’ dream come true. Those attending the event used Twitter and other forms of social media constantly, allowing the rest of the nation to stop, pause, and unify as well. Twitter newsfeeds were filled with the repetition of BatKid, offering constant updates from viewers and encouragement from all. Across the Internet, BatKid was hard to miss. Through the help of the thousands of Twitter users cheering on Miles, our nation as a whole became part of the #SFBatkid community.
The Elaboration and Likelihood theory is structured around the idea that people can process and evaluate a message through a “peripheral route”. Most ideas are processed by people through a “central route”, which allows them to be aware and actively think about a message. It is valuable for people to take a “peripheral” route when they are not interested in the message, don’t have the ability to evaluate a message with an understanding and open mind, or when they simply do not have the time to actively process a message through a “central route”. A “peripheral” route depicts how people are influenced by repetition of a message, highly credible spokespeople, and tangible rewards. If somebody is not interested in a certain idea or message, through a “peripheral route”, the message will be displayed to him or her in a way in which they become interested. Through the example of repetition, Twitter illustrates the Elaboration and Likelihood theory. Twitter is a “peripheral route” to getting people to pay attention to the Make-a-wish foundation’s granting of Mile Scott’s wish of becoming a superhero.
The Make-a-Wish Foundation needed to use public relations in order to spread the world across the nation of Miles Scott’s dream to become a super hero. Twitter is an example of public relations in practice related to #Batkid. Through the communication process of PR, a beneficial relationship was formed between the Make-a-Wish Foundation and Twitter. Through this, Twitter was able to effectively communicate and provide excellent PR for the campaign. Twitter helped to manage the way that communication about this event was spread from the Make-a-Wish foundation to the San Francisco community and the United States as a whole. Twitter communicated the details of this event throughout the nation, especially with the repetition of Hashtags such as #BatKid and #BatKidSF. With the help of thousands, in person and online, the Make-a-Wish foundation was able to make Miles Scott’s dream of becoming a super hero come true as he took the streets of San Francisco and successfully saved Gotham City.
- Delreal, Jose. “Pols, Pundits cheer BatKid on Twitter .”Politico . (11-15-2013): n. page. Print. <http://www.politico.com/story/2013/11/batkid-san-francisco-twitter-99935.html
- Larson, Selena . “3 Things San Francisco’s #BatKid Teaches us About Twitter.” ReadWrite. n. page. Print. <http://readwrite.com/2013/11/15/three-things-san-francisco-batkid-teaches-us-about-twitter
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- <http://digiday.com/agencies/social-media-batkid/>