Page 16 - South Mississippi Living - August, 2020

COAST NOTE
MATTER OF FACT
TOP 10 FACTS
story by Christina Mohrman photos courtesy of Gulf of Mexico Alliance
H ave you spent any time on social media today? Maybe
you’ve posted a great photo to Instagram or just spent time scrolling through your Facebook newsfeed. If so, you’re like most people online. According to the social media management site Hootsuite, over 80 percent of people
with internet access use social media, spending about two and a half hours a day on social media and communication apps. Since most people engage with social media several hours per day, it’s
a powerful way for organizations and businesses to expand their reach and share information.
In January, the Gulf of Mexico Alliance launched the Embrace the
Gulf campaign, a year-long awareness e ort for 2020 highlighting the vitality, sustainability, beauty, and productivity of
the Gulf of Mexico. Knowing the best way to reach a broad audience across the ve Gulf states would be to use the power of social media, the Alliance has focused on sharing daily messages across Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Embrace the Gulf highlights ve
focus areas that make the Gulf of Mexico a special place: resilient coastal communities, prosperous industries, superior educational opportunities, thriving tourism, and healthy ecosystems. The campaign shares positive messages and encourages simple changes that everyone can act on to make a di erence, including skipping single use plastics and choosing to eat sustainable local seafood.
Halfway though the year, the most popular daily facts have focused on the natural wonders of the Gulf of Mexico and ways the environment bene ts
people. Did you know:
• At its deepest point, the Gulf of
Mexico is over 2.7 miles under water? • Over two million birds cross the Gulf
during spring migration?
• One oyster can clean two gallons of
water an hour?
• Just like kidneys, wetlands naturally
lter sediment and excess nutrients? The Alliance has seen dramatic growth in the number of social media followers,
with over 5,000 new followers on Facebook alone.
Daily facts will continue through the rest of 2020. Learn more about the Embrace the Gulf campaign at www. gulfofmexicoalliance.org and follow the Gulf of Mexico Alliance on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. You might just nd a fact or two that makes you want to “embrace the Gulf!”
16 | August 2020
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