Balance.
The two most common social media blunders are like most things in life, at opposite ends of a best practices continuum. If you blog, FB, Tweet or G+ to get your vital message out, consider a self-audit exercise. It won’t take but a few minutes.
Quickly review your past month of posts. Note the media type, frequency and maybe rank your content as fluff / personal / on-target / vital.
Now consider your communication goals via social media. You have goals, yes? Think about this for a while. Jot some first thoughts down and save this for future pondering-planning.
The most common social media blunders are To Much Information (TMI) and an Untended Social Presence. Based on your industry, your target audience and key messages, you pretty much know where you want to be in the space between these extremes of blunder.
What is the solution? Preplan and be intentional. Just because you can and have a thought doesn’t mean you should share with everyone impulsively. Consider pre-writing in draft your week’s (or day’s) content in social media that represents your key messaging to your target audience in the best media. This may differ from FB to Twitter to LinkedIn. Come back to it later, review what you’ve written and schedule the release rate. Sure there’s room for timely response to what you read, commenting etc. Just be sure you are making room for that in the strategy and not simply firing off posts willy-nilly without a plan.
Balance requires discipline, time and a budget. Your company, non-profit and you deserve that deliberate investment.
Photo: Carla Swope from InnerVisionYoga.ca. Justin Brown Photography
Recently the Vancouver Sun’s Education writer, Janet Steffenhagen, presented a list of BC School Superintendents who blog. I followed the links and with considerable interest noted the variety of blog presentations.
I say with considerable interest because these bloggers represent the top of the administrative and leadership heap for the school districts they lead. Their readership consists of a more diverse mix than most bloggers have to consider. They are writing to their bosses, the Board. Also their staff, their principals, teachers, students and the toughest crowd of all, their students’ parents. So, how do the leaders of the fundamental educational pillar in our communities present? What do they present?
I toyed with the idea of a superintendent blogging report card but decided against this. Here however are the basic items I consider when reviewing or developing and invite you to add your own.
- Who is the blogger? Much can be learned from how the ‘about’ page. Personal identity, goals of the blog, corporate identity…
- Who is the intended, identified audience? Does the writer identify who she/he is writing to?
- Read the comments? Are readers engaging with the writer? Is dialogue encouraged or is the blog intended as a newsletter? (there are better platforms for this) Are easy sharing tools provided for the reader?
- Dedication. How frequently does the blogger post?
- Photos. How are photos managed? When you click on the an image, what happens? Huge, unwieldy download or nice, quick, expanded view?
- Blog design. Is the blog inviting? Does it make you want to get to know the blogger better and share the link with others? Is it part of the School District website or a stand-alone? Which do you prefer?
- Access. How does one find it? Search in Google by author name and blog title. Does it show up?
- Social Media Policy. Generally not readily apparent but I would be curious if the blog is guided by a policy of the Board. After all, the blog content must be defendable, like everything else an educational institution does.
While blogging has been around for a while, for many institutions it is a new venture. Like everything else the institution does, blogging involves an investment of resources. Time to write, time to research, time to edit, gather and edit photos, develop guidelines, write policy and evaluate.
While some of the blogs on this list are clearly in early days, others were engaging, well considered and warrant return visits. Interesting reading. Thank you.
Oh my, I feel a rant coming on!
I’m ready for a productive day of work with a client meeting late afternoon. S’all good. Quick morning scan through some things and we’re off, yes!
Apparently not. What is happening to this morning?
- I received a targeted email from an organization thrilled that they have new content on their ABOUT webpage. (really?)
- Flipped through a recent issue of Canadian Fire Chief magazine and skimmed an article by an Ontario Fire Chief about social media. Apparently kids increasingly prefer communicating with online friends through social media, and “any fire department” can make a simple video, post it to YouTube and if it generates “word of mouth buzz” and “goes viral” it will be viewed by millions. (relevance alarms going off everywhere)
- Vereburn, a large medical supply company sent a 1 page, 2 sided flyer across the country announcing boldly “NOW SHOP ONLINE!” with nary a reference to their web address on the entire flyer.
- In my email Inbox this morning there is a new Twitter follow from Tick Ripper. Apparently a gadget you should have in your wallet and use to remove ticks. The Twitter page for Tick Ripper doesn’t display images and the linked website defaults to a godaddy domain park page.
Please, before you publish, send, text, launch or even phone, consider who your target audience is and be clear about your message.
If the goal is engagement, please endeavor to inspire confidence. Maybe this can be accomplished by outsourcing the communication task, choosing a message worthy of the reader’s time and attention, simply closing your loops and sometimes, just not communicating until you know you’re ready. And hey, how about a proofer? Now there’s an idea!
I get asked; “Should I invest in our FB presence or will it (Facebook) fade away soon?”
My thinking is that if FB was leaving anytime soon, innovative integration and partnerships FB related would slow down. Innovation and FB related development definitely aren’t slowing down.
F A C E B O O K S T O R E F R O N T S
What is now coined as f-commerce is evolving continually and quickly. Online stores can be set up with providers such as Payvment.com. Here are two examples.
- https://www.facebook.com/DoLifeNow?sk=app_135607783795
- https://www.facebook.com/bikerchicjewelry
F A C E B O O K R E A C H
FB is now extendable to your website via Open Graph. For a while now we’ve been integrating FB live feeds into your website pages, now we can go the other way as well. We’re jumping on this and would encourage you to consider this as well. It is new, innovative and seems to be where online interaction between the target audience and your organization is headed.
C U S T O M F A C E B O O K P A G E S
Make a great first impression with a welcome page! Here is Target Baby’s FB page. Other custom FB pages can detail your service. Here are two examples.
So, why not just have a FB page instead of a website? Good question. All the features are certainly there. Truth is, some people don’t spend time on FB. I know, hard to imagine, yes? A website anchor presence is still a very good idea.
And why is all this new functionality so brilliant and suddenly so necessary? Well, think about how and why FB works. Fundamentally it is still about a ‘friend’ or ‘like’ connection responding to something on your FB site or FB enhanced website, and their 438 friends noticing.
The Student Intervention Manager is a tool for School Counselors to use for Student Interventions. We’re pretty excited about it and are working hard to get the word out.
Imagine, every time you as the School Counselor make a good action decision to benefit the student you are working with, your wisdom will immediately help someone else who is also using siM. Likewise, as you make your best prescribed action decisions, you are instantly provided with perspective from everyone else who has ever used siM!
You’ll also find good information about siM at our Simcolab.com website and you can spread the news around by ‘liking’ the Simcolab Facebook page.
This is one of the most exciting projects I have been part of, right up there with HirGrnd.ca. Why? Well, they’re both meaningful and actually designed to help people!
