Virtual First Day of School Photos

In Fall 2020, the University of Illinois’ Welcome Week was reimagined into a virtual format. My task as part of the Welcome Week Committee was to create an innovative way to continue to host our annual Welcome Week events. I decided to host a Virtual First Day of School Photo event by contracting with a vendor that specialized in virtual backgrounds. Along with our graphic designers, we created backgrounds specific to their graduation years. Students could then pose in front of these virtual backgrounds with a sign of their choice, all from the comfort of their own home or residence hall. We marketed this initiative on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Snapchat and encouraged users to tag @IlliniUnion to be featured on our socials. The initiative proved to be quite popular in terms of UGC and resulted in a 35% (400 to 543) increase in attendance from the year before, even with the transition from an in-person to virtual program. You can check out the virtual photos website here.