Tech Tutorial: Social Media
Harry Respass & Erica Woods
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Connecting Technical Volunteers with Nonprofits!
YOUR TARGET AUDIENCE
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WHY WE’RE HERE

Understand what Social Media is

Benefits of Social Media / Statistics

How to Map Out Your Social Media Strategy

Major Social Media Platforms
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Best Practices For Using Social Media

The Good! What Really Works
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Next Steps for Success & Activity
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Resources
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Questions
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WHAT IS SOCIAL MEDIA?
Forms of electronic communication
(as Web sites for social networking
and microblogging) through which
users create online communities to
share information, ideas, personal
messages, and other content (as
videos)
Reaching the Public Through Media
(First Known Use - 2004)
Friendster, a social networking website, was opened to the public in the
U.S. and grew to 3 million users in three months.
AOL had 34 million members.
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BENEFITS OF SOCIAL MEDIA

Increasing communication

Inbound Marketing

Intentional Branding

Increasing your Community Footprint

Recruiting, Engaging, Educating and
Appreciating Volunteers, Sponsors, and
other members of target audience

Capturing Ideas, Success Stories, etc.
(crowdsourcing)

Communicating Events, Information &
News
Social media enables all your
stakeholders to become
“brand ambassadors!”
SOCIAL MEDIA STATISTICS
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HOW TO MAP OUT YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA STRATEGY

Understand the different platforms
Which should you use?
 How will they connect to your audience?


Define how/why social media can boost the
company
What goals are you trying to obtain?
 Sales, signups, cost reduction, etc.


Its ok to peek.
See what your competitor is doing?
 Could be a good start or a bad one.

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HOW TO MAP OUT YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA STRATEGY

Dedicate a resource to do the work
The more you have speaking about your product on
your end, the better. (assistant, marketing company)
 Four eyes are better than one


Image
Tone of voice, update frequency, events, etc.
 Always post with images.


Time

Average reader spends less than 90 seconds on your
site or post. Make it sweet and to the point.
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PLATFORMS – CHANNELS
Blogging / Forums / RSS Feeds (WordPress,
Blogger, Feedreader, etc.)
 MicroBlogs (Twitter, Wooxie)
 Video and Image Sharing (YouTube, Flickr,
Pinterest)
 Social Networking (FaceBook, Google +,
LinkedIn)
 Music and Entertainment Sites (Spotify, etc.)
 Location Based Services (Foursquare)

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PLATFORM #1: FACEBOOK

Most visited website

Groups vs. Pages

Posting Strategy

Connect With Friends and
Family by sharing status
updates, photos, etc.

More than 160 million users
Facebook replaced Google as the #1 most
visited website on the internet (as of 2013)
in the US alone.

FaceBook Page makes it easy
to connect with your target
audience.

“Like Button” says they are
interested in your product.
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PLATFORM #2: TWITTER

Search Engine + Communication Platform

170 million active users; 400 million tweets a day

Largest age group = 35-49

Handles vs. Hashtags

Character Restriction: 140

Best Practices

Follow to be Followed!

Use link shorteners

Make the most of your profile (add website, use hashtags,
communicate your mission and why people should Follow)

Create lists to keep contacts organized and keep track of VIPs
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PLATFORM #2: TWITTER – HANDLES VS.
HASHTAGS

A username is how you're
identified on Twitter, and is
always preceded immediately
by the @ symbol. For instance,
Katy Perry is @katyperry.

A Hashtag is any word or
phrase immediately preceded
by the # symbol. When you
click on a hashtag, you'll see
other Tweets containing the
same keyword or topic.
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PLATFORM #3: INSTAGRAM




Instagram is
a fast, beautiful and fun way
to share your life with friends
and family.
Take a picture or video, choose
a filter to transform its look
and feel, then post to
Instagram — it's that easy. You
can even share to Facebook,
Twitter, Tumblr and more. It's
a new way to see the world.
Has the use of hashtags for
easier searching.
Have an event? Upload some
photos and give it a name (i.e,
#RavensParty). Have others do
the same. It will fill up fast.
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PLATFORM #4: LINKEDIN
175 million users
 #1 Networking site for
Businesses and
Professionals
 Company Page vs.
Group
 Appropriate depending
on age and professions
of target audience

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PLATFORM #5: YOUTUBE





Easy way to communicate through video and audio
demonstrations.
2nd largest search engine in the world; 800 million unique
users visit each month; lots of auto-sharing (sharing
amongst other social networks)
Compatible with all forms of social media.
Easy to embed (to your website) and upload videos.
YouTube Subscriptions



Have users subscribe to your page and become fans.
Allow users to interact by using “like comment on videos and
make suggestions
YouTube Channel

Channels appear on YouTube more often and in more varied
placements than ever before. Optimize your channel for
placement in search, related channels, browse channels and
the feed so you’ll engage current and potential subscribers
across YouTube.
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YOUTUBE CHANNEL
• Your Own Personal Space
• Post Your Videos Get
Subscribers
• Great Way to keep in touch
with the public
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YOUTUBE SUBSCRIPTIONS
Video
Subscribe
Number Of Hits
Share with Others
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ADDITIONAL PLATFORMS

Pinterest

Google+: 100 million users
**Recommendation: Start with 1-2
platforms, get really good and
have a “content sharing” strategy
that’s realistic and maintainable!
Don’t take on too much.**
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BEST PRACTICE #1 – QUALITY PROFILES

Quality Pictures

Communicates Purpose

Who’s your target
audience?

Why should they
follow/like you?

Includes Website URL

Use hashtags for
Twitter profile
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BEST PRACTICE #2 – DEVELOP A CONTENT
STRATEGY
Use a platform where it’s easy to
interact
 Focus on Quality over Quantity
 Re-post quality content from time
to time
 Think through how you can use
content to benefit, engage and
appreciate users
 Schedule Posts & Tweets; Utilize
tools for scheduling posts, other
automation tasks, etc….

Use a news aggregator like
Feedly to compile news feeds
from a variety of online
sources that you can
customize and share with
your audience
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CONTENT STRATEGY (CONT)
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BEST PRACTICE #3 – SHARE CONCISE, RELEVANT,
INTERESTING AND/OR VALUABLE INFORMATION
Events, recognitions, news,
new programs, impact or
progress made (how funds
are being used), volunteer
or company spotlights,
relevant quotes
 Speak in terms of your
organization (“We” or “Us”)
 Post things your viewers
might actually like and
share organically

Check out:
goodreads.com/quotes
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BEST PRACTICE #3 (CONT)
Evaluate “reader
friendliness”
 Avoid long blocks of
text
 People will ‘Share’
short, concise and
interesting posts
without being
requested to do so
 Capture attention in
a couple seconds

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BEST PRACTICE #4 – ENGAGE & RESPOND

Engage & involve audience



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Propose topics, ask questions, fillin-the-blanks, etc…
Reply to your audience - respond
to questions and comments;
Facebook replies now allow you
to reply to a specific comment,
creating a sub-thread for the
discussion of that particular post
Send short welcome Direct
Messages to new followers
Thank people for their
comments, re-tweets, etc….
“Too many brands treat social
media as a one way, broadcast
channel, rather than a two-way
dialogue through which emotional
storytelling can be transferred.”
– Simon Mainwaring
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BEST PRACTICE #5: USE IMAGES & HASHTAGS
Integrate images into your
social media strategies
 People are attracted
towards images more than
wall of texts
 A 60-40 ratio for images vs
texts is a great start.
 Upload flyers as images

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BEST PRACTICE #5 (CONT)


Hashtags 101
 Increase relevancy
 Searchable
Use relevant hashtags in order to
increase your visibility and
enhance your online presence
 Twitter and Google+ support
hashtags
 Facebook recently
implemented a searchable
hashtag service
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BEST PRACTICE #6: POST
DURING PRIME TIMES
Facebook – between 10 am
and 4pm Monday thru
Thursday
 Twitter – between 1pm and
3pm Monday thru Thursday
 LinkedIn – focus on posting
before and after business
hours, 7 am to 9 am and 5pm to
6pm Tuesday thru Thursday
 Google+ – 9am to 11am on
workdays

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BEST PRACTICE #7 & #8:
‘THANK YOU’ & IMPACT
Demonstrate the impact
 Update on progress
 Give appreciation

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BEST PRACTICE #9: USE A DASHBOARD
https://hootsuite.com/
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BEST PRACTICE #10 – ANALYZE & REVISIT STRATEGY



Analyze strategies
 What’s working?
 What type of content do
people seem most
interested in?
Evaluate reports provided by
platforms and/or social media
dashboard
Use additional tools to
measure success
Twitter Weekly Recap
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GOOD
EXAMPLES
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NEXT STEPS FOR SUCCESS
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
Choose 1-2 platforms and learn more
Develop Social Media strategy, including content and
sharing strategy
Create social media presence
Get feedback & then improve presence based on
channels
Use a dashboard that will help you track everything
(HootSuite.com)
Get in habit of posting 2-3+ times a week
Share Blogs, Articles, News, etc… via Social Media
channels
Evaluate every 3 months
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LINK SHORTENERS & ANALYTICS

Link Shorteners
https://goo.gl/
 http://ow.ly/
 https://bitly.com/


Analytics – measures effectiveness of social media
activity (i.e. posts, tweets, etc)
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https://www.gosquared.com/
Google.com/analytics
Twinfluence.com
Klout.com
Twitalyzer
http://www.socialbro.com/try/twitter-analytics
***Dashboards, like Hoot Suite, provide analytics!***
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ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
http://oursocialtimes.com/resources/
 https://business.twitter.com/
 Best Times to Post:
http://www.socialmediatoday.com/content/best-timespost-social-media-infographic
 LinkedIn Guide:
http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/23454/TheUltimate-Cheat-Sheet-for-Mastering-LinkedIn.aspx
 Best Twitter Posts around Giving Tuesday:
http://ht.ly/Fgjzx

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