How to Reach Students in theAge of Digital FOMO

Dominique “Dom” BenjaminDigital & Social Media Specialist, Office of News &

Communications@dom_forshort

"Social media is a really easy way to

feel excluded. Facebook, Instagram and

Snapchat make me hyper-aware of the

activities I wasn’t invited to partake in.”

*A Freshman at Franklin & Marshall College, quoted in Huffington Post’s “Social Media Is Changing How College Students Deal With Mental Health, For Better Or Worse”

There’s something happening right now... Here’s how you can be apart of it

“There’s something going on right now.”

“Here’s how you can be apart of it.”

MAKE IT

REAL-TIME

Periscope

ACCESS INTIMACY IMMEDIACY

The ability to watch something they don’t normally have access

to.

The ability to feel connected to the subject.

The ability to connect with something happening in real-

time.

IMMEDIACY

Give the people what they want!• Most of your audience will be

people who also follow you on Twitter.

• How can you cover as much of that target audience as possible?

“ ”

IMMEDIACY

Give viewers a reason to interact!• Given the opportunity,

viewers will ask questions or comment.

• How does your video create a two-way street between your viewer and the subject that matters to them?

“ ”

IMMEDIACY

Keep the camera rolling!

• Most of your audience will be live viewers watching only a few minutes at a time.

• Why not open the window of opportunity for them to tune in live?

“ ”

Snapchat

• Celebrity takeover of the university account• Post to your university’s Campus Story

How to Share Content On Campus

Celebrity takeover of your campus account

Post to your campus story

• The selection process is subjective so:– Take the time to plan content that’s authentic and

engaging– Make it snappy, witty– Try submitting from various accounts

MAKE IT

SHAREABLE

• 40,000 page views• 10,000 unique visitors• 3,000 total downloaded files

The Results

MAKE IT

AUTHENTIC

“We do our best to enlist social media ambassadors

through our student advisor group, but we don’t do

as well as we could with directing their efforts. We

ask them to support and share our social media, but

that tends to fall flat.”

A VISION OWNERSHIP STRUCTURE

Have a strategy and let them figure out the tactics.

Give them ownership of projects that cater to their strengths.

Set goals/benchmarks and schedule regular check-ins.

Major 🔑🔑🔑

“There’s something going on right now... Here’s how you can be apart of it.”• Make it real-time– How will you make students feel like they’re there?

• Make it shareable– How can you allow students to participate in

conversations that are already going on?• Make it authentic– How can you give interns/student ambassadors the

tools they need to succeed?

How to Reach Me

• Email: dominique.benjamin@duke.edu• Twitter: @dom_forshort• Website: socialmedia.duke.edu