E xtension 2011 study of fsa cop social media use-05-11-final

Social Media Use to Promote Community of Practice Goals:

Online Survey Results and Implications

Barbara O’Neill, Andrew Zumwalt, Carolyn Bird, Fahzy Abdul-Rahman

eXtension Financial Security for All (FSA)Community of Practice

Program Description

• Conducted study of FSA CoP to determine SM capacity and activity of its members

• Used results to inform two activities:

– Webinar on social media use and impact evaluation

– National grant-funded social media outreach project to promote savings

Definition of Social Media

Digital networks (blogs, Facebook, Farmville, Twitter, wikis, YouTube) that enable people to:

– Organize

– Socialize

– Learn

– Play

– Participate in e-Commerce transactions

IF FACEBOOK WERE A COUNTRY, IT WOULD BE THE THIRD LARGEST. THERE ARE

MORE FACEBOOK USERS THAN PEOPLE IN THE UNITED STATES.

THE WORLD’S SECOND MOST POPULAR SEARCH ENGINE IS

YOUTUBE.

MORE THAN 75 MILLION PEOPLE WERE ON TWITTER in 2009 (and

over 200 million in December 2010) AND IT IS GROWING

FASTER THAN ANY OTHER SOCIAL NETWORKING SITE,

ESPECIALLY AMONG 50-SOMETHINGS

Social Media Literacy is a 21st Century Technical Skill

• How specific social media tools operate

• How to engage users in 2-way information flows

• How to measure the impact of social media outreach

Survey Topics

• Social media tools used

• Frequency of use

• Description of content posted

• Number of friends/followers

• Social media impact evaluation methods

Methodology and Sample

• 14-question Instant Survey questionnaire

• Sent to ≈ 350 FSA CoP members and names collected at an Extension conference in 12/10

• N =45 respondents (≈ 13%)

• Primarily female and age 50, older, middle income

Use of Social MediaFrequency of Social Media Use by Extension

Family Economics Educators (N =45)Social Media Site Almost Daily Frequently Sometimes Rarely Never

Facebook 42% 20% 22% 9% 7%

Twitter 7% 14% 2% 39% 39%

YouTube 5% 25% 48% 16% 7%

Blog (any) 5% 5% 35% 7% 49%

Linked In 2% 11% 20% 27% 39%

Flickr 0% 0% 7% 19% 74%

Plaxo 0% 0% 7% 0% 93%

My Space 0% 0% 0% 9% 91%

Digg 0% 0% 0% 5% 95%

Methods of SM Access

• Respondents could check as many methods as applied for various SM programs

• Facebook: 91% used a computer and 36% used a smart phone

SM Access FrequenciesMethods Used by Extension Family Economics Educators to Access Social Media Sites (N =45)

SM Site Computer Smart Phone Web-Enabled TV Other N/A

Facebook 91% 36% 0% 4% 7%

Twitter 56% 13% 0% 4% 40%

YouTube 91% 18% 2% 4% 9%

Blog (any) 50% 0% 0% 2% 50%

Linked In 62% 12% 0% 2% 38%

Flickr 20% 0% 0% 0% 80%

Plaxo 8% 0% 0% 0% 92%

My Space 10% 0% 0% 0% 90%

Digg 2% 0% 0% 0% 98%

SM Content Posted By FSA CoP Members

• News releases• Financial columns• Fact sheets• Articles• Video links• Research findings• Original “how to”

videos• Organization minutes

• Newsletters

• Program announcements

• Pictures from events

• Summaries of legislative changes

• Links to eXtension

• Quick tips

Personal

Professional

Personal or Professional Social Media Use ?

Key decision to make early on: how much of your personal life (if any) to reveal

53% had content about both

47% focused on one or the other

Potential Outreach

• < 50 to several hundred friends/followers per individual respondent (N =45)

• Collectively, 5,965 message recipients

• Average of ≈ 132 message recipients per respondent

Administrative Matters I

• < ¼ (22%) of respondents report SM outreach to their Extension administrators

– Annual reports

– Online planning/reporting systems

– Impact evaluation reports

– CVs

• 27% would like to

Administrative Matters II

• 29% said institution has a SM policy or guidelines

• 33% said institution did not

• 38% did not know

Common Institutional Social Media Use Policies

• “Be careful not to do anything personal on work time”

• Do not mention trade names

• Content must be research-based

• Inappropriate material could be cause for disciplinary Action

Tracking Impact

• About ¼ (27%) of sample tracked use of SM content

– Scribd

– Google alerts

– Bit.ly (to track clicks on links)

– Facebook reports

– Number of Twitter followers

• 36% said they did not know how to track use but would like to

Great Collegiality Reported

• Over ¾ (78%) were willing to have their SM content reused by other FSA CoP members

• 93% were willing to use FSA CoP-created content on their own SM sites

– Cut and paste or re-tweet messages

General Comments

• Interested in receiving “ready to use” SM messages

• Not allowed to use SM at work; must do SM outreach at home on personal time

• Want training on SM use and evaluation tools

• Need simple to follow “cheat sheets”

• “We all need to be on board” [using social media]

Subsequent FSA CoP Social Media Webinar

How to Use and Evaluate Social Media in Financial Education

Duration: 01:28:44

URL for Viewing: https://connect.extension.iastate.edu/p52944724/

Implications I

• Provide step-by-step social media training

– FSA CoP developed a successful “Twitter Homework Assignment”

• Work Smarter, Not Harder

– Have a few people write SM messages for many and track their aggregate impact

• Establish/publicize institutional SM guidelines

Implications II

• Aggregate impacts could be impressive

– 45 people had potential to reach almost 6,000

– Those 6,000 could potentially reach many more

• Extension educators need to learn social media evaluation metrics

• Begin SM programming with Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter

Implications III

• Address the issue of low smart phone access

– Would increase ability to post messages “on the go”

– Lack of technical know-how?

– Lack of budget for a data plan?

• Determine the opportunity cost of SM use

– What do Extension educators give up at work and/or at home?

Comments? Questions?

What is the social media capacity of your CoP?

What can your CoP leaders do to expand it?

Best wishes!