QUESTIONS TO ASK BEFORE YOU BEGIN …

1. Who is your target audience/demographic? This is not very interesting.
2. How do you want to engage your demographics? i.e. short bursts of content, sharing photos for community building, creating a community in which people can equally sign off on the content you share, etc.
3. Are you willing and capable of maintaining fresh content for your demographic?

Any active campaign should be covered in as many, coordinated social media outlets as possible. First step is to identify target audience, and which tools best hit that target. Include in the equation all means of pushing out a message and hearing back, such as: twitter, facebook status, facebook update, facebook page, flickr group, linkedin group, etc.

All official Principia social media decisions should be reviewed by the Marketing Department before going live.
 

FACEBOOK

There are three different ways to communicate with your target audience via Facebook.

Note: With all three of these communication methods you can upload video, leave comments, create conversations, invite people to events, share links and images.

FACEBOOK: GUIDELINES & STRATEGY

Pages: The purpose of facebook pages is to build community. The more interaction, via posts, on your page, the more active your whole page will be.

Inactivity for a period of three months will result in disconnecting from Principia College of Principia School pages.

If administrative and design help from marketing is desired, then someone from marketing should be made an administrator of the page.

Profiles: Personal profiles should not be used for work.

Profiles: creating a profile for a group or organization is not recommended. But Admissions Counselors currently are creating a separate profile just for work (at college) to keep personal friends separate from prospects and parents. Name the account with “principia[name]” in it, so that it can be distinguished from a personal account, and maybe listed in an email signature as facebook.com/principia.counselor

Principia Pages to “Like:” Connect to Principia College or Principia School page and other related Principia and/or Christian Science pages and/or groups.

Events: Keep events current, always have at least a few upcoming events, link to event site especially registration (don’t confuse with facebook’s “attending”). Events on page will appear for all fans, especially pushed out an invitation [maybe never use].
Status should be set according to calendar if exists, a balance of public relations updates, items of interest for alumni, parents, prospects. Frequency - two or three times weekly, depending on the depth of posts, but never more than daily.

Updates - only for urgent, big events or notifications (arrives in fan inbox not on wall). Use sparingly because it will show up for all fans in update area not news feed.
Three months of active use will show that a page or group is going to be supported in the future. But at any time a period of a week of inactivity shows that the page or group is in need of attention and likely should be disconnected from Principia’s other pages or groups. Keep events current on Facebook page - always have at least a few upcoming events, linked to real site
 

Abroad Website Updates - fresh content, live.

Video: Videos should be embedded from a Principia YouTube channel. This will give us the opportunity to follow the metrics for each video (Facebook has no metrics for video in place).
 

FLICKR

Flickr is an online photo management tool in which users can share and comment on uploaded photos. To see an example, check out Principia School’s Flickr feed here. Principia College’s Flickr feed is here.

FLICKR: TERMS

Sets: A set is a folder of images. The account administrator has the ability to organize what images can go in a set.

Collections: A collection is a folder housing more than one set. For example, the Principia Flickr account has a “Middle School” collection in which several Middle School related sets reside.

Groups: A group is an area where other Flickr users can submit their photos. Groups are great for building community sharing through photo contests, alumni event photos, or other events in which multiple people took pictures that they would like to share.

Groups can be restricted on an invite basis only, or open for anyone to join.

Slideshows: A sideshow of a particular set can be created for embedding onto web pages outside of Flickr.

FLICKR: GUIDELINES & STRATEGY
It is wise to promote community building by allowing comments and submissions as much as possible. Crude or personal comments and submissions are not allowed. Only photos of the highest quality should be accepted.
 

PRINCIPIA’S SOCIAL MEDIA CHANNELSAND THEIR MANAGERS

Facebook

• Principia College (Page) - Managed by the College Marketing Coordinator
• Principia School (Page) - Managed by the School Marketing Coordinator
• Principia School Athletics (Page) - Managed by the School Sports Information Coordinator
• Principia College Athletics (Page) - Managed by College Sports Information Director
• Principia Leadership Institute (Page) - Managed by Leadership Institute Director
• Principia College Student Social Events (Page) - Managed by College Student Activities Director
• Principia College Women’s Tennis Alumni (Page) - Managed by College Women’s Tennis Coach
• Various Principia College Admissions Accounts (Profiles) - Managed by the College Admissions Counselors

School Flickr - Managed by the Marketing Department
College Flickr - Managed by the Marketing Department
 

Twitter

• princollege - Managed by Marketing
• principiaschool - Managed by Marketing
• principiaalumni - Managed by Alumni and Field Relations
• principiasports - Managed by School Sports Information

YouTube

• principiacollege - Managed by the Marketing
• principiaschool - Managed by the Marketing
• principia - Managed by the Marketing

LinkedIn - Managed by College Academic and Career Advising, and Alumni and Field Relations, and Marketing, and Human Resources
 

Twitter and Facebook: balance of public relations updates, items of interest for alumni, parents, prospects

LinkedIn for career networking, a hub of job information, career support discussions, and more

Twitter uses: follow our other accounts, and organizations we support, also regional - and alumni?

Frequency of updates:

Twitter - daily or every other day

LinkedIn - topics for group and pure networking are the draw here. Otherwise, people just want to join and do nothing. Be sure pending requests and comments are handled daily.

YouTube - viral video is a flash in the pan and doesn't last; professionally done and directed is where the effort should go; allow comments and respond.

* once in a long while something truly offensive is posted, which should be removed. Also remove personal information mistakenly posted in public places, such as Facebook wall for a page. Negative comments should get a response, not deleted if at all possible.

Best practices:

Point to others, not pointing to yourself, through quotes, links, suggestions.

Link to others' work.

Follow others with whom you like to be associated. This also helps those entities to know about you, to follow you.

Enter events into Facebook - they translate well into twitter, with links back to them.

Twitter feed should be featured on appropriate pages.