Marketing students on the campaign trail for #30DaysofKindness

Students in Allison Burnett’s third year marketing course on new tools and approaches (BUSI 3204) recently joined Marc Smith of Vancouver-based Amuse Consulting in his social media movement to make the world a happier place. The class claimed “Day 20” of Smith’s #30DaysofKindness campaign, which coincided with the last class of the course on December 3.

One of the assignments in the course was to obtain certification using the social media management tool Hootsuite. It was through Hootsuite that Burnett learned of Smith’s campaign.

“As a class we had been discussing online social initiatives,” says Burnett. “When I saw that Marc was looking for companies, organizations or even individuals to join in his campaign to spread kindness in the community, I thought it would be a fun way to explore how an idea spread through social channels can be brought to life.”

The assignment provided the students with an opportunity to apply some of the skills they have learned related to Hootsuite and Twitter. Some students carried the campaign through to their blogs. The students also had the chance to share and discuss their experiences with Smith himself via Skype.

The experience was a hit with the students who Burnett says were excited and highly engaged. “Two exchange students from Scotland went to New York over the weekend and tweeted about different random acts of kindness they either saw or participated in under the #30DaysofKindness hashtag,” adds Burnett. “The blog posts were great. I think being able to take concepts from class and apply them through case examples and then their own personal experience helped create a nice storyline.”

Check out Smith’s blog post for more on the random acts of kindness experienced by the students as well as photos from their participation in the campaign.