presentation by Stuart Hall

Good practice & strategy: online community & social media

Introduction: the simpler the better

A good strategy = simple strategy: one that can be implemented, measured & adapted to promote growth (offline & online)

Implementation and metrics go hand in hand so it’s clear what’s working & why

Results can be feedback to advance new & existing objectives, to drive performance

Strategy

The importance of guidelines & governance

Need consistent use of the community guidelines – and for them to be owned by the community: culture is key

Needs also to be guidelines for staff & offline groups on how to use social media: with training workshops > online support

Plus agreement on how to respond to difficult community questions & system to log issues

Objectives > metrics > results

Any such strategy needs to founded on meeting organisational aims

Objectives need to be measured, monitored and targets agreed, with allocated actions linked to team objectives & appraisal

Periodic healthcheck to guide to success Challenge is to measure readers offline

Engaging your audiences

Core purpose of social strategy is to promote engagement, not just member numbers?

Engagement success is based on an understanding of what your audiences want

Strategy for engagement needs to start from inside out – first with existing presence

Use listening tools to reach right people in right places: finding ‘influencers’

The feedback ‘figure of eight’

‘Use or lose it’ - strategy needs to connect offline & online groups & events, networks & consultation

Tactics need to fit both member and org goals > connecting site & community in a feedback figure of eight

Key contributions will be those that publicly impact on content, processes or products

Practice

First step: create a workable strategy

Start with understanding of digital strategy Then lead the development of an online

community & social media strategy Based on audit of current state of online

community, and social media assets Internally to include team approach, through

to success in meeting overall objectives

Second step: match up strategy & objectives

As a result create a practical strategy as the roadmap for development

It in turn would be supported by agreed objectives, metrics & targets

Which would be matched vs. individual team objectives, with system of overall & individual performance monitoring put in place

Third step: guidelines & governance

Moving to improving engagement would first focus on the community and look to improve role of advocates/champions

Plus implement clearer, shared community guidelines & system for recording issues

And set up an internal shared learning resource for examples of good practice and issue resolution for the team

Fourth step: promoting the community

Next need to look better promote the value of the community for the audiences - making sure its promoted at offline events & conferences

Plus use existing social media tools to also drive awareness and engagement of the community, such as Facebook group

Create feedback loop between the two

Fifth step: interaction and integration

Finally look to enhance use of social media tools in line with objectives through interaction and integration

Integration in sense of meeting objectives for overall strategy, and to allow community to share posts via Twitter for example

But need to allow individual voices, rather than an organisational one, to get full value

Finally..

Aim is to create a strategy that is clear in its objectives – ask what will success look like?

To support its implementation with metrics & monitoring, with clear team responsibilities

To ensure feedback from audiences, metrics, and results is all acted upon

Any questions?