Content Counts in Social Media

What you say on social media says a lot about you. Think about it. From a personal standpoint, the posts you write, the friends you have, the pages you fan all paint a picture of the person you are.

Similarly, as a school or company what you post – text, video, photos, etc. – says worlds about what your organization believes in and values.  Take a minute to review what you’ve posted in the last few months. You may be surprised to find out you’re favoring one area, interest, age group, even gender over another.

Years ago, I was an English teacher at a high school and we were trained to solicit answers from everyone in the class. It seemed that subconsciously we as teachers would always go for the smiling and attentive student or off-task student and ignore the invisible ones. Our filter was skewed; without being intentional we didn’t have a complete picture of our class’s understanding.

Without really listening to the whole school, not just the smiling, perfectly dressed students in the front row, we are not able to paint the whole picture. Now, there’s a balance between authenticity and still marketing your school’s best side, but there’s room for the fun and chaos and mess of daily school life if we simply are ready to listen.

A school in particular is a balance of competing interests. We’re artistic and academic and athletic and other activity-ic. We’re young and old. We’re studious and social, serious and smiling. We’re mission-driven and spontaneous and boisterous.

Who are you and does your Facebook page and Twitter account really reflect it? Or, are you just posting athletic scores and wondering why no prospective arts parents are coming to your admission office? Content is king. Let the king represent his country.

Lorrie Jackson

Tweet Your Tagline

Can You Tweet Your Tagline?

Quick. What’s your mission? What’s your philosophy? Most importantly, what’s your current advertising tagline? And, can you tweet it?

In a recent blog post, Beth Kanter talks about Twitter for back channel , the conversation that’s happening while you present. You know, the folks that are tweeting your main points, comments/reflections on your points and counterpoints to your points WHILE you’re still talking in a presentation.  One of her suggestions? Start presenting in tweet-able bites.

Translate this to school or corporate marketing. We’re used to sound bites for media. Now it’s time to look at tweet-able bites that help spread our tagline and message quickly. That’s true whether you’re preparing a presentation or just creating tweets to send out on a typical day.

For some schools, this is a shift. Many of us are great at tweeting campus events, news, awards, etc. That’s the trees. Time for the forest. Share the 20,000 ft. view of your school every now and then. What do you stand for? What sets you apart? If you only have 140 characters to describe your school’s uniqueness, what are you going to say? Perhaps this even becomes a great marketing exercise for internal use, clarifying your identity and vision.

So, I ask again, can you tweet your tagline?

Lorrie J

Silence is No Stance with Social Media

Think you can afford not to have a social media presence? Worried that the negativity, noise and nonsense aren’t worth your time and efforts? Think again.

The reality is that for customers, clients, prospective families and students, sites like Facebook and YouTube are becoming the first stop in their quest to learn more about us.

I wonder what product/school x is like?

What are people saying about them?

Our audience is out there, searching for our message. If we are absent, silent, then all they hear is our competitors, or, perhaps worse, our message distorted by unofficial, even disgruntled groups.

“If folks want to learn about us, they’ll call us or visit our real Web site.”

Maybe not. If the message they’ve seen in the places they regularly visit online is not a positive, coherent, engaging one about your school or business, they’ve moved on. You won’t hear from them.

Even if you’re afraid of the risks, it’s time to do something. Follow the footsteps of many public school districts who have established Facebook pages but have restricted uploading content to admins only. In essence, without fan participation, these become glorified press rooms but hey, you’re where the audience is. That’s something.

Silence is no stance. Are you prepared to take that risk?

-Lorrie Jackson

Online Video and School Marketing

If a picture’s worth a thousand words, what’s video worth? Increasingly, schools and other organizations are using online video to share a slice of campus life, promote events and engage their constituents. With Flip cameras and their competitors priced at a few hundred dollars, you no longer need to be an expert to shoot decent quality and easy-to-upload video for your school. The questions now become where and how.

The Where

YouTube

Every minute, 20 hours of video is uploaded to YouTube. It’s by far the largest repository for online video. There’s the great and there’s the gunk on YouTube but as the number one video site, it’s where the traffic is. If you choose to use YouTube – as the American School of Bombay, Branson School or Lausanne Collegiate School have done – be sure to brand your page using YouTube’s channel capability to add your school colors, etc.

Vimeo

Vimeo offers high definition video uploads without all the craziness of YouTube. It’s not as well-known which means you won’t have prospective families just stumbling into your videos. You’ll have to direct folks here. Take a look at Phillips Academy’s Vimeo channel.

School Web site

Don’t overlook the option of uploading videos to your own school’s site. The advantage is that it puts engaging material right next to your admission application or donation form, the action items on your list. The challenge? Depending on your website provider, space and technical capabilities can be an issue.

Facebook

Surprise! Facebook’s a great place to upload short videos and talk about traffic: folks spend 55 minutes a day on Facebook. If you’ve got something really short to share such as an invite to an Open House, this is the place for it.

Now the How…

Consider the suggestions from these links as you plan, shoot and upload your next online video…

• Average online video – 4 minutes
• Or, best video length from a journalists’ point of view
• Great example from higher ed – Glee-inspired video from college admissions
• Consider live streaming
• YouTube’s own tips on online video
• Suggestions for online video and marketing
• 5 types of videos to consider for your school
• How TV habits are shifting to online and beyond
• More on the prominence of online video in our lives today

Online video is easy, cheap/free and effective. How are you marketing with online video?

–Lorrie Jackson

Downtime is Facebook Time: Market Wisely

Did you hear? The most popular Web site in the U.S. on Christmas and New Year’s Day was Facebook, beating Google. That’s important for marketers and here’s why…

You’ve got advertising resources and time to spend. You want to be where you audience is. So, when they’re bored with time on their hands, are they looking at billboards, listening to radio ads or flipping through print ads? Increasingly, they’re on Facebook. On a typical day, that’s 55 minutes for the average user and apparently on holidays now, even more than that.

Isn’t it time you market where you audience is? Create a Facebook page today, add some exciting content to your existing page or consider advertising on Facebook? Make it easy for your customers to find you, engage with you and share your message. It’s cheap (or free) but more importantly, it’s vital to survival in this economy. Downtime is Facebook time today. How are you marketing wisely?

–Lorrie Jackson

Staffing Your Social Media Team

I’ve heard the horror story a few too many times. One staff member managed a school’s Facebook page then he/she left that school. No one else was designated a page administrator and guess what? No one at the school could, without the help of the former employee, access that school’s page. Yikes.

That’s worse case scenario, but the reality is: supporting a school’s social media campaign is a team effort. There may be just one person that’s posting most of the content to Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc., but you need the expertise and input from lots of folks for a truly successful and campuswide approach.

Looking to staff your own social media team? Here are some of the major players:

Communications/marketing staff
These are the folks who know the long-term and short-term marketing goals for the school. What’s the pressing issue facing the school and how can the school attack that issue using social media? Plus, much of the content that the communications person is uploading to newsletters, Web sites and publications can be repeated in social media. This person is the information nexus and needs to be heavily involved on the team.

Admissions
Retention and recruitment are two of the biggest goals for schools using social media. Admissions needs to be at the table to help target these as well as use social media platforms to highlight open houses and other upcoming events.

Alumni Relations
LinkedIN and Facebook are prime opportunities to meet and engage with alumni. Make sure someone from this office is included.

Athletics
Play-by-plays on Twitter from the basketball, hockey or other game are very popular at many schools. Also consider athletics input on your Facebook page: photos, events, questions to fans. Sports draw the attention of parents, students and alumni like few other activities so capitalize on this fact!

Arts
Social media users love multimedia experiences so reward them with photos, audio, video and text from your fine and performing arts. A word of caution: care should be taken that work is student-created, not copyright-protected. When in doubt, check out copyright usage laws before posting on YouTube or Facebook.

IT
Don’t forget the techies! Whether it’s general support or ideas to push the envelope on how you’re using social media, your own technology department might have the answers you’re looking for.

Administration
Not only do you need their buy-in but you need to keep them in the loop to prevent any miscommunications or misunderstandings.

Sounds like a big team, huh? In truth, probably just a handful of folks with administrative privileges (3-4 administrators typically) is all you need, bringing in others as the situation warrants. Good luck and go team!

Lorrie Jackson

Public vs. Private Responses to Social Media Complaints

We in independent schools don’t like to admit problems publicly. Everything is A-okay. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain. But sometimes, when there’s a problem, even where’s there’s just a perception of a problem, and it’s expressed on Facebook or another social media platform, then we need to man up and say something publicly, even if it’s just, “We hear you. We cannot comment, but we understand your concern and we hear you.”

Imagine this scenario. Parent A is upset about carpool. So are parents B, C and D as each has commented about it on your school’s Facebook page. You could choose to remove all these comments as any comments are removable by you the administrator but by the number of comments and by the amount of time between comments, clearly carpool is a problem and not just one parent’s personal gripe.

So, perhaps the best course is to post a comment from the school saying the following, “Thank you for your honest comments concerning carpool. We understand that this year’s redesign has caused some delays and frustrations and are currently working on improvements. We welcome your input. Please contact Bob Smith, Director of Facilities, at ______ to send us your suggestions.”

Then, leave your response and the comments up for a few days. In addition, contact each parent via e-mail or phone directly. Who knows when they will next check your school’s page and you want them to know you are listening and taking their feedback seriously. This contact will usually help appease concerns and impress upon them the school’s desire to listen and respond positively.

So, respond generally to concerns then contact people directly when you can. Let your constituents know you are there for them.

–Lorrie Jackson

Holiday Shopping, Social Media and Independent Schools

ComScore recently released some interesting statistics on the influence of social media on buying decisions this holiday season. 28% of those polled said social media had influenced their decision to some degree. Specifically, buyers were influenced by:

• a consumer-generated review (13%)
• an expert’s review (11%)
• a Facebook fan page by the product’s manufacturer (7%)
• a friend’s status update on Facebook (6%)
• online video (5%)
• corporate-created tweet (5%)
• consumer-created tweet (3%)
• other (2%)

So, what does this mean for independent schools? First, we are finally seeing some interesting statistics on the real influence specific social media tools can have. The percentages may be small, but I’ll think they’ll grow in the months to come. Who would have thought last year that Twitter and Facebook would have had that much of an influence in buying decisions in such a short time?

Second, if consumers rely on corporate and other-consumer based social media presences to inform buying on say a toaster or video game system, it stands to reason they will on larger ticket items like independent school tuition. A purchase is a purchase and perhaps, just perhaps, our constituents may value input from others more greatly given what’s at stake, not entertainment or great toast but the education of their children.

Wouldn’t a similar study in the independent school industry be of immense value to you as a marketer for your school? After all, it’s cheap, often even free, and, as Gian Fulgoni, ComScore Chairman writes, it “shows an effort to get closer to one’s customers. I think we are getting our first real glimpse at the impact social media will play on commerce as we enter the next decade.”

How do you think your constituents are using your school’s social media presence to inform their decisions to enroll or stay at your school?

–Lorrie

All I Want From Social Media This Holiday Season

It’s far from perfect, this thing we call social media. It’s beta and buggy and slow and chaotic. It may in fact permanently change how we use the Internet and soon our children may not even be able to perceive of being online without its interactivity, but it doesn’t mean we can wish for better. As we move into the holiday season, here’s my wish list for a brighter future with social media:

• Shared Relationships Across Platforms

Your social media graphs are your groups of friends, workplace acquaintances, family, etc. and vary in size and intimacy. Your may be very close to your sister but barely acquainted with a former classmate from elementary school.  The problem is that your groups, your graph is not portable most of the time. Think of the time and effort you spend trying to reconnect with folks each time you join a new site. Same thing with schools. Start a LinkedIN group for alumni? Too bad you can’t simply import your Facebook page/group fans or members. Yes, there are a few workarounds like Facebook Connect but nothing is pervasive across platforms or truly seamless.

• Shared Identities Across Platforms

For one of the very best live PowerPoint presentations I’ve ever seen, click here for Dick Hardt’s Identity 2.0 presentation. Basically, just like your friends/fans/followers who you are, your identity, needs to be portable. Why am I typing my demographic and resume information over and over again? Why isn’t there a central identification portal that sites can retrieve my authenticated identity from? It’s time to save ourselves some time!

• More Data To Track Return on Investment

Social media is fun but it’s time we get more numbers and trends to back up what we do. We need information to guide our efforts and we particularly need Facebook and other social networking sites to allow schools to track mentions on wall posts on personal profiles, not just in the public spaces like fan pages. There are some great tools out there – StepRep, SocialMention and SM2 to name a few free ones – but even these are hampered by the lack of data provided by the social media sites themselves.

• A different way to look at ads

What if our ads didn’t distract us from but enhanced our overall social media experience? What if, by clicking a school ad, you could get a widget or tool that helped you do something better, faster, easier on Facebook or Twitter or LinkedIN? This is the gist of the article The Future of Social Media Advertising and it’s a great thought. Don’t just advertise where people are, advertise something they really want. (Be sure to scroll to the bottom of the article for the My Space Mobsters example…what could we do in schools to emulate this success?)

What’s on your social media list?

–Lorrie

Build a Facebook Page for Your School

Creating your school’s first Facebook page can seem daunting, but it’s actually pretty simple. Here are ten easy steps:

1. Sign up for Facebook as a person yourself – You should have a Facebook account yourself first and foremost. If you’ve never used Facebook, sign up then spend a few days/weeks getting used to it before moving to step two if possible. It always helps to know the lingo and the technology up close and personal but not absolutely necessary.

2. Log in to Facebook and click Advertising at bottom of page:

3. Click Pages at the top of the page:

4. Click Create an Page:

5. Complete the fields on the Create New Facebook Page screen. Choose education as your category (local) and choose the name of your page very carefully. Facebook’s search feature is not intuitive so keep the page’s name as close to the colloquial way of referring to your school. If you’re the Alcott Baker Clark Academy but all your constituents call you “ABC Academy” then the latter should be your page name.

6. You now see a draft of your page! On the top right, click Edit this Information and enter both Basic Info and Detailed Info (your school’s Web site!).

7. On the left side, under the question mark, click Edit Page and click Edit under Wall Settings to determine whom you want to be able to post discussions, wall posts, videos, photos to your page (just you? fans like students/alumni?). Just above this, under simply Settings, you can limit student usage of your site, if you prefer, by setting the site’s age restrictions.

8. Add your school’s logo by click Change Picture on the top corner of the question mark:

9. Put a little content on your page before publishing. Click the Wall tab in the middle of the page and type a general welcome. You can also add photos or other announcements on the Wall as well. Give folks something to see when they visit your page for the first time!

10. Publish this Page by clicking this link at the top of the page:

That’s it! You’re live! Want to know how to tell folks about your page? Check back again this week my next post entitled, “Promoting Your School’s Facebook Page.”

–Lorrie J