This post was contributed by Jennifer Trefelner, APR, CPRC.
1. Conduct Research
Do you want to drive traffic to your website, grow your followers, attract donors, or increase attendance at an event? Once you have completed research as to what your goals are, you can plan how to implement strategies to fulfill measurable objectives for each of these goals.
2. Develop a Social Media Plan
Once your research is completed, think of who your audience will be on each social media site. Decide who will be administering the content, how often you will post, and the marketing messages you are trying to convey.
3. Study your analytics
Use the analytics tools built in to social media sites to understand your audience. Take the time to review the “insights” that are provided through social media to learn when your audience is the most engaged, what content is the most viral, and which posts get the most traction. Build on this success and modify the posts that are less engaging.
4. Schedule posts
Take the time to schedule posts to run during the times where there is the most activity on your social media sites. Posting information that is not time sensitive, but relevant to your marketing pillars is an ideal way to share content.
5. Follow those you respect
Watch what others are posting and follow those you admire. Following other professionals that have the same vision as you, may spark ideas for collaboration or ways to share content.
6. Tag entities in your posts
To increase the virality of your posts, tag the entities you are mentioning or that may have a vested interest in your story. If you are posting photos of others (with their permission), tag them in your post so they can share the information, “like” the post, or comment.
7. Cross promote your sites
Promote your Twitter account by mentioning your handle on Facebook, or promote your Facebook page by telling followers on Instgram to find more information about a story on Facebook.
8. Use hashtags
To ensure the hashtags you promote are unique to your cause research the hashtag prior to promoting it. Query information or share information based on the hashtags that you promote for your organization.
9. Review what is trending
Is it #TBT and time to post a photo from the past? Is it #CSW and you have photos to showcase of your students? Find what is trending online and become part of the action.
10. Use graphics, photos, videos
A picture speaks volumes and uses no words. As people read less, they are paying more attention to videos, photos, and infographics which catch their attention.
