Biko Canada

Summary

For my third year co-op placement at Sheridan, I had the pleasure of working with Biko Canada, a unique mobile application company that made their start in Columbia and has since expanded all across North America, with Canada being the most recent branch of this expansion.

The idea of the application is simple. Open the app, ride or walk to your destination and reap your rewards for distance travelled from partnered companies, as an incentive for exercise and sustainable transport. I was hired to tackle social media, application development and partner outreach for all of Canada.

Social Media & Content Creation

After starting as the social media manager, I went on to do everything from motion graphic video to directing and shooting my own short advertisements for their social media platform, implementing them and rolling out notifications on updates to the phone application on a scheduled basis. I would then have to prepare reports based on website and application analytics and numbers of views based on content. Due to the nature of social media, I learned very quickly that the timelines and windows for certain events were small and so I had to work quickly to create content for cycling events and promotions. I worked to edit videos and create motionography for Biko promos and even helped to design and organize booths at events like Markham City Ride and the Toronto Bicycle Show.

In my start as social media manager, I was able to grow their Instagram from 500 followers to 8500 within 2 months and we saw a large influx of users for the application in that time as well. 

What I Used

Partner Outreach & App Dev

Eventually as I continued to work at Biko I took on the job of approaching potential reward partners and sponsors for cycling events as well, communicating with them on their potential rewards through the application. I was the point of contact that businesses would speak to in order to have their company featured in the app, and I advised what rewards they should offer and for which periods to maximize their returns. After this I would code the rewards into the app and would finish the circle by cross promoting these companies through the application and its social media pages. 

At the end of my co-op term I was asked to stay on longer and I agreed as I was learning a lot and enjoying the opportunity.

Social Media Videos

With new businesses being added constantly, I had to travel around Toronto and film, edit and post videos within hours of their announcement to ensure that they were well received. Though these videos are far from perfect, they taught me a lot about short term projects and have helped me in subsequent projects.

What I Learned

I learned through Biko that there are many moving parts to a business, and working in an international, multilingual business is a challenge. I would have to account for events and promotions within Vancouver and Toronto and often translate between English and Spanish to communicate updates and bugs to the other branches of Biko. I also learned a small degree of sales and how to close a deal. I learned how to use Hootsuite and set schedules for updates and SM extremely far in the future. 

Overall, Biko was a great place to work and a rewarding idea to work towards.