Peer led Social Media Strategies Community Action CalNeva Conference

+

Peer-Led Social Media Strategies for Promotion of Wellness Among Youth & Young Adults

Shana Friedman, M.A., PPSC Community Action Partnership of Sonoma County

+Social media campaigns at Community Action Partnership

+In this presentation you will… n  Gain an understanding of what

social media is and why it is valuable for addressing youth health and at-risk behaviors

n  Learn strategies for implementing a social media campaign for their own youth programs

n  Understand the benefits of a peer-led campaign

n  Learn about the Sonoma County Peer Outreach Coalition

n  Have an opportunity discuss the social media campaigns already in place at other agencies

+What is social media?

Facebook

Communicating

The Internet

Twitter

Blogging

Privacy

Social Networking

Wikipedia definition of social media

"a term used to describe the type of media that is based on conversation and interaction between people online. Where media means digital words, sounds & pictures which are typically shared via the internet and the value can be cultural, societal or even financial."

"a term used to describe the type of media that is based on conversation and interaction between people online. Where media means digital words, sounds & pictures which are typically shared via the internet and the value can be cultural, societal or even financial."

In less than one week the Banff Squirrel was viewed by millions of Internet users. Why?

+How did so many people see this photo?

•  Content is KING •  Sharing tools included on the National Geographic •  Everyone can share content

+What’s the Value? n  Cultural?

n  Societal?

n  Financial?

It is a common misconception that social media is purely for entertainment or procrastination. A University of Melbourne study determined that employees that periodically check social media sites throughout the workday are 9% more productive than employees who do not visit the sites.

In addition, social media is a powerful tool that can be used to reach large groups of people.

+Why create a social media campaign for your agency’s youth program?

If you are trying to reach teens and young adults, social media is an amazing tool

n  73% of all American teens ages 12 to 17 use an online social networking site

n  The average teenager (13-17) uses social media every single day for 1 hour and 50 minutes

If you are trying to reach teens who come from low-income families, social media becomes an even better strategy

n  Over 80% of teens whose families earn less that $30,000 annually use online social networks

Source: Pew Research

+Why create a social media campaign for your agency’s youth program?

If you are trying to provide information about health or at-risks behaviors, social media is once again a great method to use in youth outreach

n  31% of all teens (12-17) search for general health, dieting, or physical fitness information

n  17% Search for "sensitive" health information (sexual health, substance abuse, mental health)

n  85% of “millennials” (age 18-33) search for health information online

Facebook is probably one of the best tools you can use to develop your campaign

n  29% of Facebook users are 18-25 years old

n  11% of Facebook users are 13-17 years old

Source: Pew Research

+Other benefits of social media

n  (Usually) Inexpensive

n  Responsibilities can be easily shared by a team

n  Easy to track statistics and measure success via built in tools or 3rd party applications

+ Sonoma County Peer Outreach Coalition

n  MHSA PEI - Grant funded program

n  Peer-led campaign aimed at transitional-aged youth

n  Social media AND community outreach are used to reach youth

n  Our goal is to promote awareness of mental health issue and to reduce the stigma of mental illness

+Why a peer-led campaign?

+Step 1: Planning your Campaign

n Our deliverables include creating a campaign that will promote mental health awareness and reduce stigma surrounding mental illness.

n We decided our approach would be to develop a campaign with an integrated health approach and focus on all topics that impact teen mental health.

For your program: Think about your program’s purpose or mission. What are you trying to accomplish? This is the time to develop the goals of your campaign.

What is a Campaign? a campaign is a marketing effort

to sell, promote, raise awareness

A social media campaign is

marketing "X" USING social media.

What is a Social Media Campaign?

+What is your social media campaign marketing?

l A social media campaign is marketing “X” using social media

l The purpose of your page (your cause) = “X”

l For the Peer Outreach Coalition, our “X” is mental health awareness and reducing stigma

+Step 2: Setting goals

Once we defined our “X”, we set out to develop a strategy to reach the goals set by our scope of work. We have three goals and a final outcome:

n A MySpace site with 200 “friends” by 6/30/11

n A Twitter account with 100 followers and 300 “tweets” by 6/30/11

n 3 Public-Service Announcement style videos about teen mental health issues to post on YouTube

n Final outcome: 60% of teens completing an online quiz will have an increased knowledge of teen mental health issues.

For your program: Once you know what your “X” is, then you determine a strategy to reach your “X.”

To determine a strategy, it is best to develop small, measurable goals.

+Goals

n  Our goals needed some adjustment

n  To reach our goals, we needed to recruit youth to manage the campaign

+Step 3: Recruitment

n  Recruited 12 youth initially

n  Recruitment performed at high schools, the local junior college and university, as well as fair and festivals for youth

n  Networked heavily with school counselors since they often work with youth who need community service or volunteer hours

n  Outreached to local health clinic with youth volunteers and local LGBTQQI teen center

+Step 3: Recruitment (cont.)

n  Diverse group (socioeconomic status, sexual orientation, race, gender)

n  Interest in mental health, teen health and wellness

n  Above average knowledge about social media, the Internet, and technology

For your program: Try to get youth volunteers from a wide variety of schools and agencies. Think about your program’s goals, mission, purpose and try to get youth who have skills and interests that align with your program. Be careful about recruiting “overcommitted” youth!

+Step 4: Training

n  Hired a social media consultant to enrich our knowledge of social media. The consultant conducted a 3 hour training for the recruited youth and staff

n  Youth also participated in several training sessions about mental health, wellness, and other issues impacting teen health

n  Each month, youth (called “Peer Leaders”) attend a monthly mandatory meeting designed to enrich their knowledge of teen health and wellness. Guest speakers have come from hospitals, group homes, LGBTQQI teen center. Trainings have included suicide prevention skills and team building activities

+Step 4: Training (cont.)

For your program: Monthly meetings are a great way to bring the team together face-to-face instead of online. n  Discuss what is/isn’t working

n  New “best practices” in social media

n  Enrich youth knowledge of your campaign topic

For example: Your “X” is a campaign to reduce underage drinking. Guest speakers could include:

n  Law enforcement

n  Local businesses that are committing to not sell alcohol to minors

n  Drug and alcohol abuse recovery center

+Step 5: Set up and manage your social media sites n  Peer Outreach Coalition sites were set up prior to the first

training

n  Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, a blog, and a website

n  Once sites were set up, we discussed best practices in managing the sites and set up an appropriate posting schedule

For your program: You have many decisions to make. You will need to consider n  Your target audience demographics n  The current social media best practices n  Your “X” n  Your available resources

+The Two Most Important Components of Your Peer-Led Social Media Strategy

People Time

+People One person can run a campaign,

but it is more effective if the responsibility is shared. It’s also a lot more fun for the youth involved!

n Security: if one person loses access others can come to the rescue

n Variety: multiple individuals bring fresh ideas and enthusiasm to the campaign

n Stability: If one person leaves the group (or moves on to a new job) others know how to run the campaign.

n Reliability: If someone is ill or on vacation, there is always someone to serve as back up

+Time

It takes time to make a campaign a success!

n Different social media sites may gather a fan base at different rates

n Certain sites require more maintenance, and more of a personal time commitment, than others

Consider your resources! If time and volunteers for your campaign are limited, your campaign may be need to initially be very limited.

+Now what?

+Why Facebook?

l  Facebook.com was the most visited website during 2010, passing Google’s search page for the first time

l  Facebook is used more than any other social media site by teens and young adults

l  A Facebook page is easily administrated by multiple individuals

l  Built in statistics make measuring success easy

+Profiles vs. Pages vs. Groups

Represents a cause or idea

No customization

Limited messaging

Some private, some public

Wall

Connect with friends

Share photos/videos

Join Groups

Send messages

Fan Pages

Profile Group

+Profiles vs. Pages vs. Groups (cont.)

The “Official Page”

Represents an organization

Customized user experience

Target Updates

Wall and FanBox

All public and searchable

The“Unofficial Page”

Represents a “topic or experience”

Owned collectively by the community

Content from Wikipedia

Community Pages Facebook Pages

+

+ What makes media social? What make social media successful?

l Content is KING

l Media becomes social when it involves a conversation

l Conversation is one of the ways to tell if you are actually reaching your audience

l Your followers will communicate and let you know if they like what you are posting…or if they don’t like it at all!

+Measuring Success

l  # of likes, comments

l  Amount of participation on your page

l  Built in tools on your Facebook page: Facebook Insights

l  Surveys measuring interest (Survey Monkey)

+Discussion time

n  Tell your group about your campaign

n  How many people run the campaign? How much time is spent on the campaign each week?

n  What is working well?

n  What have been some challenges?

n  What sort of campaign would you like to create?

n  What is your target audience?

n  Define your “X”

n  What will be some of the challenges at your agency in creating this campaign?

n  What questions do you have?

If you currently have a social media campaign…

If you want to start a social media campaign….

+How are most nonprofits using Facebook?

According to the 2011 Nonprofit Technology Network Survey, the most nonprofits are just getting started using social media.

For every 1,000 e-mail subscribers, the average nonprofit has:

§  110 Facebook fans (“Likes”)

§  19 Twitter followers

The good news is that there is still room to grow!

+Privacy Considerations

It is imperative you learn how to control the privacy settings on your personal Facebook profile

l If you are a page administrator and your Facebook account is accessed by someone else, you could lose control of your page

l Once you begin using Facebook professionally, you may start getting contacted via Facebook by colleagues

How do I Change My Settings?

+Next Steps…

Once you have kicked off your social media campaign, you can start to branch into other social media

l  Twitter

l  Blogging

l  Website

All of these will require maintenance with requires time and people

+Final words…

§  Planning and training are critical to the success of your campaign

§  Social media takes time and people

§  Quality is always more important than quantity

§  If time and resources are limited, stick to Facebook and create a page (not a profile or group)

§  Learn how to set your privacy settings

§  Stay up-to-date with the latest social media research

Any questions?

+ Shana Friedman, M.A., PPSC

Program Analyst Community Action Partnership of Sonoma County

Contact me: 707-544-6911 ex. 1052 [email protected] www.facebook.com/scpoc www.facebook.com/shanafriedman