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Are All Young People Social Media Experts?

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graduate on cell phoneCongratulations, class of 2021. You survived. You graduated. You even landed a job.

Now, watch out.

Your employer thinks you’re a social media expert.

Just because you’re a “digital native” who played with an iPhone before you could ride a bike, your new employer thinks you can be the company’s social media manager.

Without training.

In addition to all your regular duties.

 

What are you supposed to do with that?

It all depends.  Do you want to be a social media expert?  Then, here are three things you need to do right away.

One: Explain to your boss what you have to learn.

  1. How to create a strategy for your organization, so that you reach the people you want to reach, where they hang out, with a purpose in mind.
  2. Who in your organization has great stories to tell.
  3. Who in your organization can take great photos.
  4. Who in your organization can produce great graphics.
  5. How to motivate the people in 2, 3, and 4 to send that content to you to use.
  6. What a publication calendar is, and how to stay on schedule.
  7. How to write killer subject lines for email, headlines for blogs, and text for tweets.
  8. How to write content that will make people look past the headline.
  9. The best ways to make sure your Facebook posts get seen.
  10. The best times of day and days of the week to post on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, LinkedIn….
  11. How to integrate your print communications, website, blog, email, and social media.
  12. What will make your followers like, share, and comment on your posts.
  13. How you can find and curate content your followers will be glad to read.
  14. How to tell whether any of it is making a difference.

Two: Tell your boss you’ll need a budget for training.

(Call it “professional development”: it sounds classier.)

  • There are great online courses.  The Social Media Managers School founded by Andrea Vahl and Phyllis Khare is one of them.
  • You can also take webinars on the subject of your choice.
  • In-person classes and conferences will bring your skills up to date and keep you there.

Three,  politely explain that being a social media manager could be a full-time job.

Heather Mansfield, author of Social Media for Social Good, estimates that doing a good job with just Facebook could take you seven hours a week.  Get a very clear set of instructions about your boss’s priorities: in writing, if possible!

eating snakes

Is this how you think of social media?

But perhaps you’d rather eat live snakes than manage your organization’s social media.  Then, show your boss this blog entry to make the case that it’s just too big a responsibility to do on the fly.

Suggest that he or she hire a communications consultant to do it right. (I might just be available.)

You just helped make your organization better.  Congratulations, graduate!

Don’t Worry about Facebook (More Than Before)

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facebook hoaxOkay, now I’m mad. Some scammer is trying to take advantage of…our fear of being scammed!

If you’re on Facebook, you should always think twice before accepting a friend request. Specifically, if the thought crosses your mind, “I thought I was friends with her already?, you probably were. And it’s probably not her.

This was true last week, and last month, and last year. All of us should always be checking to see if a friend request comes from someone we’ve friended previously. That’s nothing new.

The Latest Facebook Hoax

This past weekend, tons of us got messages from people we knew saying their Facebook accounts had been cloned. This is a bad joke perpetrated on the public. Here’s how that hoax happened, according to Time Magazine.

The message says that the sender has received a duplicate friend request from the recipient. Then, it tells the receiver to forward the same message to their friends. Many have apparently taken that to mean that they should forward the same message to all of their friends, prompting dozens or even hundreds of others to believe that there may be a problem with their accounts as well.

BUT THESE MESSAGES ARE A HOAX.

There is no epidemic of cloned accounts. There is an epidemic of people wasting each other’s time and confusing one another by sending out these bogus messages!

So what should you do if you receive one of these hoax messages? Nothing. Delete the message and move on.

Why You Got Fooled

If you took these hoax messages seriously, there’s a reason for that. As Snopes rightly remarks:

This message played on warnings about the phenomenon of Facebook “pirates” engaging in the “cloning” of Facebook accounts, a real (but much over-hyped) process by which scammers target existing Facebook users accounts by setting up new accounts with identical profile pictures and names, then sending out friend requests which appear to originate from those “cloned” users. Once those friend requests are accepted, the scammers can then spread messages which appear to originate from the targeted account, luring that person’s friends into propagating malware, falling for phishing schemes, or disclosing personal information that can be used for identity theft.

You care about your friends. You don’t want to get them into trouble. So, you end up doing something that protects nobody, wastes their time, and annoys them. It also creates a paranoia about using Facebook…and distracts us from the real problems, and the real solutions.

What You Should Do Instead

  1. Always check new friend requests to see whether the person apparently sending them is already your Facebook friend.
  2. If they are, then the new request is a fraud. Report the fraud attempt to Facebook.
  3. Always check frightening rumors with a reputable fact-checker like Snopes. Do not pass on unsubstantiated information.
  4. Take 15 minutes to review your Facebook settings to protect our own privacy and that of your friends. (That is a much better way to show you care than passing along hoax messages!)

 

Learn Social Media from these Nonprofit Pros

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Nonprofit social media

 

 

 

A guest post by Terri Williams

When your supporters look at your social media, what do they see?

According to Pew Research Center data, at least 69% of the public uses some sort of social media. While young adults use social media platforms at higher levels, usage among older adults has increased significantly.

For your nonprofit organization, it’s important to tap into the potential that social media can provide. Here are two ways nonprofits have achieved success using social media platforms.

How Your Nonprofit Succeeds on Twitter

There’s a model you can adopt if you want to reach your supporters on Twitter.

A report by Chao Guo, associate professor of nonprofit management at the University of Pennsylvania, and Gregory D. Saxton, associate professor of communication (with an emphasis on nonprofit communications) at the University of Buffalo, analyzed the social media efforts of 188 Civil Rights and Advocacy nonprofits. These organizations achieved success building social media outreach using a three-step process that includes:

  1. Reaching out to people,
  2. Keeping the flame alive, and
  3. Stepping up to action.

In the first step, reaching out to people, the organization makes its social media community aware of its causes. The second step is to keep engaging those constituents and build passion among them. The final step is to rally the supporters to action for any given event.

Although you should continue to email and call your existing contacts, you can reach out to people in a number of ways outside the contacts that already live in your customer relationship management (CRM) software.

Try these ideas to increase your Twitter reach:

  • All of the employees of a nonprofit organization should follow it on Twitter (that’s a given)
  • Other stakeholders should be encouraged to become followers, as people are more likely to follow an organization if their friends and family members do so.
  • Employees should also like and retweet the nonprofit’s posts so the messages show up in the timeline of their friends.

 

Organizations can post various types of information, such as upcoming events, mentions in the media, annual reports, etc. Sharing volunteer events and photos can pique interest in others who are looking for a way to donate their time. In addition, cross-promoting or sharing information about similar organizations can help you build solidarity. If they return the favor, you benefit from having your posts shared with their followers. Twitter is also a favorite platform among reporters, so the information you share could also lead to interviews and feature stories.

However, it’s also important to have other types of content besides announcements, such as blog posts or newsletters that are informative and well-written. In addition, the nonprofit organization should engage in conversations with followers – and always respond quickly to questions or concerns.

FACEBOOK: Learn from People for Development

Facebook is the most popular social media network in the world. While Twitter allows nonprofit organizations to share information, aside from the equivalent of 2 or 3 sentences, the medium limits users to photos, infographics, and links (which can be to articles or the company’s website). This is fine for sharing new information. However, as a nonprofit, you also want to be able to include static information about your organization, and Facebook lets you do this.

Facebook allows nonprofit organizations to include various tabs on the home page. One study of a Portuguese nonprofit organization reveals that this type of descriptive information can lead to people speaking positively about the information and sharing the existence or the nonprofit with others.

The profiled NGO, “Leigos para o Desenvolvimento” (People for Development), created a robust presence on Facebook. Below are some of the components and tabs included on the NGO’s Facebook page:

  • Description of the organization’s programs and services
  • Organizational history
  • Mission statement
  • News links
  • Campaign disclosure
  • Event calendar
  • Information on how to make donations
  • Information about organization projects

The organization also engaged in other types of activities similar to what you would find on Twitter, such as posting videos, photos, and audio files, engaging in discussions, testimonials from volunteers, and sharing initiatives of other social organizations.

According to the report’s authors, the combination of these factors can assist your nonprofit organization to establish a reputation for being open and trustworthy. And, when people are happy with the presentation, professionalism, and level of engagement, they speak well about the organization – and also share your content.

Other social media platforms, such as Instagram and YouTube can also increase awareness and engagement. As a whole, social media is an invaluable tool for interacting with supports, and expanding your base. The key is to be purposeful, professional, and engaging.

Terri Williams is a writer for TechnologyAdvice.com. She has covered business and tech topics for a variety of clients, including The Economist Careers Network, Intuit Small Business Blog, Investopedia, The Houston Chronicle, Daily News Energy, and Homeland Preparedness News. Follow her on Twitter: @Territoryone.

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