Transcript of SPECIAL OLYMPICS Social Media Training: Take us to the Next Level March 28, 2012.
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SPECIAL OLYMPICS Social Media Training: Take us to the Next
Level March 28, 2012
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Framework of Storytelling Where we are : Where we want to be
The new toys Its about engagement, not aggregate Read and
experiment Q&A Todays Categories 2 |
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The Power is in the Story 3 | Throughout todays session you
will see a very consistent theme throughout STORYTELLING. Special
Olympics has a very powerful story to tell. People want to hear our
story. They want to engage with our stories. They want to be driven
to action by our stories. We need to tell our story. Social media
is the easiest way to tell our story to the most number of people
at the least amount of cost. No matter the tool, platform, or any
other extraneous factor discussed today, there should be the
following questions constantly running through your mind moving
forward from this moment: Will this content be interesting to our
followers? Does it tell our story? Does it inspire? So, lets
begin
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Assumptions of What We Know 4 | Most, if not all, U.S. Programs
are using Social Media at a basic level that includes knowing how
to create an account and post content regularly. Our Fall 2011
survey of US Programs had 34 Program respondents. Of the 34
repsondents: All were using Facebook 29 using Twitter 29 using You
Tube 9 using Linkedin Of 34 respondents, only two said they had a
full-time staff member dedicated to social media. Of the 34
respondents, 33 expressed a desire to learn intermediate skills
described as, I can handle posting and replying and sharing, but
how do I really make an impact through social media?
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Lets Set the Framework 5 | We know were here to make a
difference. By definition, making a difference requires change,
which doesnt just happen naturally. It takes work to create change
education, awareness building, organizing, and fund raising. The
dilemma? Most Programs have limited resources and budget. We also
know that social media isnt just a channel for broadcasting
information but non-stop conversations that bring people together,
spark excitement, and inspire action. Social media can level the
playing field for us because it is where community building and
creativity become more important than running expensive promotional
campaigns. Here 7 powerful tips learned from successful non-profits
on how to mobilize action with limited resources. Tell the Story
Every day, we are bombarded by a ton of noise and information. To
capture peoples attention, there is nothing more powerful than
storytelling. Stories promote active listening and interaction,
meaning that your message is much more likely to be digested and
repeated to others. As Mother Theresa once said, If I look at the
mass I will never act. If I look at the one, I will. We have the
greatest one imaginable our athletes. We should be focused on
finding, developing and telling our athletes stories one-by-one, no
matter the specific platform.
http://www.ning.com/about/resource-center/best-practices/social-media-nonprofit-best-practices-grassroots-strategy/
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Lets Set the Framework 6 | Design Matters Lets face it people
often judge by appearance and first impressions matter. Whether its
the Facebook Timeline, your Twitter page, You Tube channel, blog or
other platform, an unprofessional, disorganized site wont inspire
confidence, let alone get people involved or inspired to donate.
Seek out free tools, engage local volunteers with professional
skills to help when needed. (Theyll probably share their work on
Facebook too!) Make social media work for you, not the other way
round Social media is mainstream and having presence on the social
web Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and more isnt just important, its a
pre- requisite. That said, its critical that you asses your
capabilities to properly manage a robust presence on each site you
use and to have goals as to what you want to accomplish on that
site. If you can only create a lackluster presence, it is better
not to be there at all. Dont be afraid to ask Awareness doesnt
always lead to action. Figure out what your goal is, and ask your
fans to help you reach it. The R-word campaign is a good example.
On March 27, a Red Sox pitcher used the R-word. After sharing it
via FB and Twitter, we asked people to call Red Sox and volunteer
to educate the pitcher. In an hour we had reports of more than 50
calls. Within three hours, the pitcher apologized through an
official team statement. People connect emotionally with you when
they do something tangible for you.
http://www.ning.com/about/resource-center/best-practices/social-media-nonprofit-best-practices-grassroots-strategy/
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Lets Set the Framework 7 | Get 20 influencers to get the word
out According to the recent Ning Point of View Report, you may have
1000 fans who never visit, but it only takes 20 people to evolve
from one-way broadcasting from the community leader to meaningful
many-to-many interactions. Identify the small group of quality
influencers and cultivate them to help get your messages out.Point
of View Report Encourage Content Creation Quality content is timely
and usually expensive to create. Use your fans to help tell your
story! Most people love an opportunity to tell their story. Does
your website allow embeddable HTML? Ask people for their story
based on a theme and reward them for sharing by embedding it on
your website and then promote and share it on social media. Reward
Participation Whether its the occasional Trivia Friday or a call
for videos or another specific call to action, figure out ways to
reward your fans. Special Olympics Oregon does a great job engaging
local business partners by creating activations in which a fan, or
sometimes several fans, win a product by doing something they ask.
Fans love free stuff, businesses love the exposure and connection
to Special Olympics and Special Olympics gets more exposure.
Win-Win-Win.
http://www.ning.com/about/resource-center/best-practices/social-media-nonprofit-best-practices-grassroots-strategy/
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Where We Want to Be 8 | The social media landscape is changing
constantly. Just in the last few months youve probably asked
yourself: Do we need to be in these places? Likes are great, but
how we make more of an impact? How do we decide what is valuable
and then measure it all?
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9 9 | Lets Explore Together Google Plus Google+ For those who
have not yet taken the plunge into Google+ here is a good guide for
the how to create a page.
http://nonprofitorgs.wordpress.com/2011/11/07/how-to-create-a-google-page-for-your-nonprofit/
http://nonprofitorgs.wordpress.com/2012/02/26/google-best-practices-for-nonprofits/
Your page is set up, now what? LOOK & FEEL: Create a Google+
banner that makes a strong, positive first impression. Be creative
with photo editing to run five photos together to help tell a
story. Or use www.GPlusBanner.com to make a customized
banner.www.GPlusBanner.com CONTENT: Quality should lead the day.
Story tell, story tell, story tell. In general, the most successful
posts in any social media platform are: Success stories Photos and
slideshows Videos Powerful stats Inspirational quotes Calls to
action: sign petition, call Congress, event announcement, volunteer
ask, urgent donate appeal CURATE INFORMATION: Follow NPO and other
industry leaders and create a circle called Nonprofit Resources so
with one click you can stream through what others are doing to
garner tips and tricks that you can apply. Do the same for
volunteers, athletes, parents, coaches, and any other constituent
group you may want to cultivate and engage.
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10 10 | Lets Explore Together Google Plus Google+
http://nonprofitorgs.wordpress.com/2012/02/26/google-best-practices-for-nonprofits/
ENGAGE & SHARE: +1 other non-profits content, comment on it.
The more you engage, the more exposure you get (and potentially
more followers) and you foster goodwill so other orgs will +1 your
content. Also, when you share content that is relevant to your
fans, but not created by you, it positions you as a hub of
information or content matter expert that people will begin to turn
to because you provide value and dont just market yourself all the
time. INTEGRATE: See those little icons at the top of this slide?
Get them on your website, blogs, enewsletters and anywhere else
that you control and post content! Also be sure to download the
mobile app so you can use Google+ out at events and
competitions.
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11 11 | Stop Me If Youve Heard This Before Google Plus Google+
So by now you are thinking that sounds pretty familiar. Isnt that
what we do on Facebook and other sites? The answer is yes, there is
a lot of overlap in how you create an engagement strategy and
execute. Thats why we just went through the exercise of reviewing
what should be the framework of ANY social platform you use to
engage. So, lets continue with Google Plus. Our innate desire to be
in Google+ (and other new places) has a name Shiny Object Syndrome.
It is important to remember that if you cannot dedicate the proper
resources to create a robust presence on a platform in which you
can do the Special Olympics story justice and engage fans on a deep
level, dont. Wait until you can. But waiting does not mean
ignoring. Beth Kanter breaks your choices down to three approaches:
Early Mover: Willing to combine risk taking with an understanding
that risky investments dont always pay off. Moderate Approach:
Understand the argument for an early investment but will also
insist on a sound cost/benefit analysis when new ways of doing
things are not yet fully proven. Wait for maturation? If there are
too many unanswered questions about the impact of the technology
platform, better to wait until others have been able to deliver
tangible value.
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12 12 | How Do We Move Forward? Google Plus Google+ From our
office, weve been taking the moderate approach. Here are some
things wed suggest you do on Google+ now, if you have not already.
Get in there, claim your page with your Program name so itll be
there when you are ready to dive in the deep end. Be transparent in
the info on the page and say, Were building this out, please be
patient with us! Need something right away? You can always find us
at www.fb.com/SpecialOlympics!www.fb.com/SpecialOlympics Use the
search function and put in Special Olympics and create some circles
staff, volunteers, donors, athletes. Watch, listen, review. Behind
the scenes, think about why you want to use Google+, who you want
to reach that you are not already reaching, and what can be
accomplished on Google+ that cannot be done in other places. This
of course begs the question, what sets Google+ apart from other
platforms?
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13 13 | The Google+ Differences Google Plus Google+ Search
Because Google is the search engine that rules them all, Google+
allows you to search and find content and people in a way that you
cannot on Facebook and other sites. Not just that, but as of the
beginning of this year Google has begun pushing search results of
Google+ pages that are optimized so they come up first and more
often. Read more about that here. One small disadvantage, you
cannot follow an individual person when using Google+ as your Page,
but you can follow other organizations. You can only follow (and
put into circles) individuals who follow your Page.Read more about
that here Hangouts The video chat feature on Google+ is easily its
best advantage. As you build out your circles, you can organize a
hangout with any of them at any time. For example, lets say you
have a circle with all of your local program staff and you (at the
state level) want to figure out what the best way to hold a
fundraising event may be in their area. Eliminate 30 emails by
holding a hangout chat and talking to everyone as if you were all
in a conference room face-to-face. Circles Because you can organize
everyone into categories, you can selectively target, engage,
market, solicit specific people instead of broadcasting a message
they way you might on Facebook. Circles is a very direct, very
personal way to communicate with people, and one that done properly
can foster deep emotional connections.
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Lets Explore Together 14 | By now you may have heard of
Pinterest. Turns out that new data released for January 2012 showed
that Pinterest now drives more referral traffic than Google+,
YouTube, and LinkedIn combined. Pinterest now drives more referral
traffic than Google+, YouTube, and LinkedIn combined So in looking
for a new way to drive traffic and engage, maybe youll want to
start pinning or at the very least to sign up and reserve your
first choice of usernames (hint, hint!).
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Lets Explore Together 15 | When you do decide to get into
Pinterest, remember, youre still here to tell a story. So approach
it by figuring out what that story is and what you want people to
do. Maybe you want to create boards that share inspirational
images, help people get to know our athletes, raise awareness about
a local plunge, the list goes on. Here are some quick tips that
other NPOs have found helpful. Pin your own website and blog
content, but only if it pulls up a good photo! As mentioned above,
Pinterest is quickly becoming a boon for referral traffic. Tap into
that power by pinning your own website and blog content, but only
if it pulls up a good, visually appealing photo. Powerful visuals
are what is driving the Pinterest community and referral traffic.
Add website links to your Pins descriptions. You can add a website
link while pinning or you can Edit your description after pinning
to add a link. Its worth noting that you do not need to put http://
in front of the website URL. Keep the URL simple and short, but
dont miss an extra opportunity to increase your referral traffic
from Pinterest. Finally, please use proper punctuation and grammar
in your descriptions! Most descriptions are a complete mess. Make
sure your descriptions give a good first impression.
http://nonprofitorgs.wordpress.com/2012/02/20/five-pinterest-best-practices-for-nonprofits/
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Lets Explore Together 16 | Brand Your Photos If you can, brand
your photos with a logo. It requires a little photo editing, but
you can see to the right how it helps build the brand as pins get
shared. Embed Inspirational Quotes Pinners LOVE inspirational
quotes like the environmental quote to the right. Pictures of our
athletes could soar around Pinterest with some great quotes or
messages about unity and dignity. Add a Price Banner If you dip
into the fundraising waters in Pinterest, you can add a price
banner by including a price (donation point) in the description.
Imagine a Plunger raising money with a picture of themsevles
plunging and a dollar amount linked to a donation page.
http://nonprofitorgs.wordpress.com/2012/02/20/five-pinterest-best-practices-for-nonprofits/
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Lets Explore Together 17 | Many of you use You Tube to some
capacity now. But You Tube has taken HUGE strides in helping
non-profits use video to tell their story. Did you know that as of
this month, ALL non-profit channels on You Tube have the ability to
LIVE STREAM video?
http://mashable.com/2012/03/13/youtube-non-profits-live-streaming/
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Lets Explore Together 18 |
http://mashable.com/2012/03/13/youtube-non-profits-live-streaming/
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Social Media ROI 19 | Measuring Success If you come to me with
a request for budget and resources for social media, to make it a
priority for our business, you will lose every timeIf you tie
social media to our business priorities and objectives and
demonstrate how engagement will enable progress, you will win every
time. Social media must be an enabler to our business, just show me
how. - CEO
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20 | Engagement, NOT Aggregate The days of bragging about
aggregate number of fans and followers are over. Those large
numbers still look nice and have their place, but as a social media
strategist, they should not be what you are focusing on. You must
determine meaningful and measureable metrics for engagement, track
them, report them and adjust your strategy accordingly.
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21 | Engagement, NOT Aggregate What we are developing and using
in our office right now is a Q Score model, or Quality score. So
what we do is look at Facebook Insights over a certain period of
time a week, a month and look at the number of engaged users versus
the reach (aka number of impressions). Our goal is to raise that
percentage of engaged users to reached users. Reach will just about
always go up as your fan base builds but engagement can grown and
be maximized by studying which content engages more users (hint:
photos) and optimizing your content calendar appropriately. Your
ROI, and ability to spend a lot of time tracking ROI may vary based
on a variety of factors, so lets take a quick look through some
traditional thoughts and approaches.
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What do you hope to achieve with your social media efforts?
What do show to CEOs and senior leaders to convince them to invest
in social media? Of course, you want to Align your social media
goals with the overall communications and marketing objects for
your state Program. Be specific. Pick a goal and measure it. Report
success. Fans in the stands (benchmark past events, report on
growth success) Volunteer recruitment (incorporate how did you hear
about us? to track social web referral) Donations (Google Analytics
e-commerce tracking) Keep track of goals and set benchmarks to
track progress Which tool best suits my audience? My goals? My
message? 22 | Set Goals and Select Channels Words to live by: Plan
for the marriage, not the wedding
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23 | Social Media Analytics Facebook EngagementTwitter
Engagement New page likesNew followers Posted link clicks Site
VisitsSite visits CommentsMentions Content likesRetweets
Photo/video viewsDirect messages Track metrics/benchmarks that
determine if youre reaching your goals
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24 | Social Media Analytics and thousands more free and fee
services. The Tools
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Engagement Tips for Facebook 25 | Pictures Rule! WHY? 22% more
engagement than video posts 54% more engagement than text posts
(BizReport)BizReport ***Statistics are helpful, but dont forget the
audience youre targeting!
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Engagement Tips for Facebook 26 | Pictures Rule!
http://techcrunch.com/2012/02/29/how-to-use-timeline-for-pages/
Timeline Select a great cover photo, change it seasonally Make sure
your Apps have a good thumbnail Go through your timeline history
and scrub content Highlight milestones or great posts
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Engagement Tips for Twitter 27 | Longer tweets produce more
clicks, but dont surpass 130 characters. The reason: people only
click on what they feel is valuable. You need to give them enough
information so they know the click is worthwhile, but if you go
over 130 characters, you make it harder for your followers to
retweet your message. (HubSpot Blog)HubSpot Blog
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28 | Back to Whats Really Important Create good content and
people will care!
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Read and Experiment 29 | It is difficult to express how
important it is to constantly read and experiment in the world of
social media. It seems daunting to keep up with everything. You
dont have time. You can use your time being more productive. I
know. Challenge: Block out 30 minutes ONCE A WEEK on your calendar
to read about emerging trends in social media. Do it as a coffee
break. Time prevents us from going through a lot of what we could
today. So to consolidate, Im going to include a sample of some good
articles that, if read, will help you in understanding and
implementation. Challenge: Pick TWO resources for social media news
and add them to your Google Reader, bookmark them, or do whatever
you do to keep up with your favorite sites and use those 30 minutes
a week to look through these sites. Ill even suggest two for you!
www.mashable.com (particularly their social media section and their
social good RSS feed)social media sectionsocial good RSS feed
www.bethkanter.org Beths Blog: How Networked Non-Profits are Using
Social Media to Power Change
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Read and Experiment 30 | More Resources and Article Links
Worthwhile websites and communities: www.nten.orgwww.nten.org
http://nonprofitorgs.wordpress.com/
www.ning.comhttp://nonprofitorgs.wordpress.com/www.ning.com URLs
Presentations:
http://www.slideshare.net/AdamVincenzini/google-pages-activation-framework
http://www.slideshare.net/PewInternet/022612-nfais-newnormalpdf
http://www.slideshare.net/PewInternet/speaking-the-language-of-the-next-generation
http://www.slideshare.net/PewInternet/mobile-is-the-needle-social-is-the-thread-how-information-today-is-woven-into-our-lives
Tips and Tools
www.youtube.com/en/us/advertise/content/playbook-for-good.pdf
http://nonprofitorgs.wordpress.com/2012/02/20/five-pinterest-best-practices-for-nonprofits/
http://nonprofitorgs.wordpress.com/2012/02/26/google-best-practices-for-nonprofits/
http://www.ning.com/about/resource-center/best-practices/social-media-nonprofit-best-practices-grassroots-strategy/
http://mashable.com/2012/03/21/youtube-edit-videos-one-click
http://mashable.com/2012/03/19/facebook-marketing-photos-brands/
http://www.goodtube.org/GoodtubeGrants.aspx
http://mashable.com/2012/03/19/hi-res-content-for-ipad/
http://mashable.com/2012/03/18/pinterest-brand-attention/
http://mashable.com/2012/03/10/employee-social-media/
http://mashable.com/2012/03/17/social-media-ethics/
http://mashable.com/2012/03/19/facebook-marketing-photos-brands/
http://mashable.com/2012/03/13/facebook-sponsored-stories-advertising/
http://mashable.com/2012/03/12/facebook-brand-building-tips/
http://mashable.com/2012/03/13/one-social-network-rule-all/
http://mashable.com/2012/03/16/pinterest-changes/#view_as_one_page-gallery_box4733
http://mashable.com/2012/03/13/youtube-non-profits-live-streaming/
http://mashable.com/2012/03/19/tumblr-america-underwater/
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Think about what you can offer supporters, and how you can
facilitate, not how you can push out messages. Speak as humans, not
as a company. There are natural storytellers. Find them, and the
best stories your program can tell. Find someone really passionate
about talking with supporters. Create ways for your supporters to
actively participate in content creation. Always be listening. The
more responsive you can be, the better. Building relationships is a
long- term commitment, not just a campaign. Learn by doing. Its
really the only way. Experiment and dont be afraid of failure. If
something doesnt work, adjust and keep trying or try something
else. Read, read, and read to stay on top of emerging trends. Final
Words of Advice 31 |
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Ryan Eades Senior Manager, Social Media Special Olympics
[email protected] @ryan2499 QUESTIONS OR COMMENTS?