Why Engineers?
From Robert’ s extensive experience in the energy and industrial sectors, he realized that there was a notable deficiency in engineering stories that actually zero in on the engineers themselves.“ Engineers are the real heroes of this world, so I wonder why they have not been given( by the media) the attention that they deserve,” said Robert. He admitted that there was an abundance of engineering-related stories, but most of them focused on products and processes.“ It think it’ s time that the world hears the‘ real’ stories of the engineers behind the engineering marvels: their lives, struggles, failures, learnings and successes.” Robert believed that by telling the stories of engineers, especially the young ones, GineersNow could inspire other engineers to strive amidst difficulties and celebrate their triumphs, and move young students to specialize in engineering-related fields and make a difference.
GineersNow has been successful in its pursuit to communicate to young engineers, as most of its followers are 18-35 years old.
The Internet, Native Advertising and Hybrid
Social Enterprise
GineersNow differentiates itself from other online news platform not only through its targeted audience, but also through its marketing and business models.
The continuous decline in the consumption of printed media prompted the team behind GineersNow to anchor it on the Internet.“ I remember a case study that we took up when I was still in Harvard: It was about the competition between online and traditional media, the Hubspot and New York Times paywall,” said Robert, explaining that the study had revealed print media would gradually fade as a medium of education and information dissemination.“ The revenue of print magazine and newspapers will dwindle because of the Internet. In 10-20 years, we’ ll be seeing less newspapers in the stands.”
GineersNow veers away from anything conventional, even in advertising. Traditional advertising is characterized by pushing the ads in front of the readers, even though they did not ask for it. Called“ interruption marketing”, this kind of invasive advertising is now in decline. Harvard case studies attributed this drop to the rise of mobile technology, increase of ad blockers, and decrease in TV spending habits and of consumers’ affinity to print media.“ You go to Starbucks and you will no longer see people reading newspapers; they hold a coffee cup and read their social media updates,” said Robert.
Instead of“ interruption marketing”, GineersNow swears by“ native advertising” as a means of making profit. Dubbed as a non-intrusive and inbound marketing approach, Robert explained that the native advertising model would allow the customers to organically find GineersNow’ s contents and the contents of its advertisers.“ We are able to organically attract attention, without interrupting our reader’ s flow of activity. When the content is funny, inspiring or really compelling, it will be shared on social media and eventually go viral.”
As a hybrid social enterprise, GineersNow consequently channels its profits towards socially beneficial causes.“ Amassing revenue is not our main objective,” said Robert, adding that GineersNow aimed to help build engineering schools in Asia and Africa.“ We don’ t aim to profit only to make ourselves richer. We want to pour GineersNow’ s earnings into helping communities by building schools, and sharing information on the advantages and benefits of engineering. We hope that by doing this, we can inspire young students to choose engineering as a field of specialization. We believe that it will not only give them better opportunities for self-improvement, it will open roads for them to make a real difference in their families, communities and in the world.”
In the next few months, the GineersNow team aims to convert its audience into a socially driven engineering community.“ I think the best way to describe it is that we are creating a community of young engineers with a social purpose, empowered by a social innovation movement that is making a difference in the engineering world.” After building engineering schools, the GineersNow team deems to invite engineers to volunteer and teach engineering subjects to poor communities, invent ways to electrify remote villages, create portable desalination systems to promote access to drinking water, and possibly re-purpose wastewater for agricultural use.“ If you have a community of socially driven engineers, we can make this world a better place. And possibly, inspire others to do the same.”
8
Building a Community of Engineers with a
Social Purpose
Robert ascribed the early success of GineersNow to social media platforms, particularly Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram and Google +, which he described as allies to amplifying the presence of the website.
He also credited the creative team behind GineersNow’ s social media sites for producing unique, engaging posts, which includes GN Bot and Engineering Debates. GN Bot is the young robot engineer that“ answers” questions from the readers. His“ knowledge” spans from affairs of the heart to the latest engineering technologies. Engineering Debates, on the other hand, allows GineersNow’ s followers to offer their insights on the latest issues concerning the engineering and allied industries.
“ Aside from GN Bot and our weekly debates, we have introduced a lot of unique content in the past 30 days,” said Robert. Trawling GineersNow’ s social media pages, one can see contents like“ Fashioneering”, which talks about the fusion of fashion and wearable technologies. There is also“ Kitcheneering”, which features how industrial engineers and IT professionals are pioneering IoT kitchen products. Then, there’ s“ Life of an Engineer”, which revolves around engineers-turned-chefs or other career shifts.“ All of these stories are inspirational, funny and really compelling to read,” said Robert.
Owing to a sweet mix of aggressive, consistent marketing and quality content, GineersNow’ s social media pages have attracted an exponentially growing number of followers, majority of which come from the Eastern hemisphere. GineersNow’ s social media success drives notable traffic to its website.