You’ve Got A Social Media Site… Now What?

1. You’ve Got A Social Media Site…Now What? Jayme Jarrett, Ohio Northern University Liz Gross, Great Lakes Educational Loan Services

2. What We’ll Cover Today • Content • Types • How to find it • How to write it • Finding Fans & Followers • Account Management Tips • Social Media Assessment • Group Discussion

3. Content

4. What doI post?

5. Finding and Writing Effective Content • Remember, you don’t have to write everything from scratch! • Repurpose what you can from other sources • Think about how the audience receives your social media content • Short • Conversational voice

6. Finding Content • Potential third party sources • Federal Student Aid (FSA) • Scholarship announcements • News outlets • Other aid offices and servicers on social media • Check out this Twitter list:Twitter.com/MyGreatLakesFAP/lists/financial-aid-offices

7. Finding Content • Curation is key! • Google Alerts • RSS Readers • Feedly • Digg • Microsoft Outlook

8. Content Forms Blog

9. Content Forms Facebook Posts - Status

10. Content Forms Facebook Posts – Introduce a Link

11. Content Forms Facebook Posts – Photo Captions

12. Content Forms Videos

13. Content Forms Tweets

14. Research What is your audience looking for? When do they want to know about it?

15. Headlines Make them want to click on it!

16. Effective Introductions Be exciting! (Yes, even when the topic is financial aid.)

17. Tone

18. Be A Resource

19. Effective Content – Short and to the Point • Make your point quickly • Use lists, bullets, numbers, and visuals • Remove URLs or unrelated link descriptions • Break up content over multiple posts

20. Avoid Jargon These words should probably not appear in social media: But that doesn’t mean you can’t talk about them…

21. Writing For Social Media Let’s practice!

22. Writing For Social Media • You want to say: The Office of Student Financial Services is required by federal statute to recalculate federal financial aid eligibility for students who withdraw, drop out, are dismissed, or take a leave of absence prior to completing 60 percent of the term. Recalculation is based on the percentage of earned aid using the Federal Return of Title IV funds formula.

23. Writing For Social Media • You could say:

24. Writing For Social Media • You could say:

25. Writing For Social Media • You could say:

26. Writing For Social Media • You want to say: Federal regulations require that all students who receive federal financial aid make Financial Aid Satisfactory Academic Progress (referred to as SAP) toward achieving a degree. For financial aid purposes, progress is measured by the student’s cumulative grade point average, percentage of credit hours earned in relation to those attempted, and the length of the academic program. If a student does not meet SAP standards, all federal and state aid could be lost.

27. Writing For Social Media • You want to say: Federal regulations require that when a student is enrolled in a program that is one academic year or more in length, but is in a remaining period of study that is shorter than a full academic year, the loan amount must be prorated.

28. Finding Fans and Followers

29. Find More Fans • Build the momentum • Create word-of-mouth • Use student employees to spread the word on Facebook • Link to your page whenever you can • Use the Facebook short link on printed material FB.com/YourPageName • Connect all your online properties

30. Account Management Tips

31. Managing Multiple Accounts

32. Managing Multiple Accounts

33. Managing Multiple Accounts

34. Create an Editorial Calendar • Valuable if you need to submit content for approval • Keep track of hot topics & seasonal items • Schedule Facebook & Twitter content in advance

35. Scheduling Posts - Facebook • Click the clock in the bottom left to access scheduling options.

36. Scheduling Posts - Facebook • Viewing scheduled (and prior) posts

37. Scheduling Posts - Facebook • Tip: Treat scheduling like proof reading

38. Scheduling Posts - Facebook • Editing scheduled status updates or links

39. Scheduling Posts - Facebook • Editing scheduled images

40. Scheduling Posts - Twitter • Must use a tool like Hootsuite or Tweetdeck

41. Scheduling Posts - Twitter • Editing scheduled tweets

42. Social Media Measurement

43. Why Social Media Assessment? Assessment allows you to: • Tie your social media efforts to your goals • Improve your social media tactics • Evaluate your social media strategy • Tell a story about your office’s efforts and students’ response By measuring what matters! How?

44. Start With Your Goals • Examples of social media-specific goals • Reach 50% of the undergraduate class with financial aid information • Engage students in conversation about financial literacy • Increase attendance at exit counseling programs • Increase readership of articles on the financial aid website

45. Poll What are your social media-specific goals?

46. Measure What Matters • Reach • The number of people who see your posts • Why? • If you’re posting and no one is seeing it, why bother? • How to measure • Facebook Insights

47. Measurement Techniques • Reach – Facebook Insights (page level) • Page level

48. Measurement Techniques • Reach – Facebook Insights (post level)

49. Measurement Techniques • Reach – Facebook Insights (best post types)

50. Measurement Techniques • Reach – Facebook Insights (best post time)