1. Social Media Roundup
Telling a story with
Social Media
Planning, posting, measuring
2. Social Media Roundup
Agenda
In this week’s Social Media Roundup, we’ll take a look at
what it takes to produce an effective social media strategy.
• Introduction
• Planning
• Pre-execution
• Execution
• Responding
• Measuring
3. Social Media Roundup
News and information in a social media world
Today, people get their news
from social media. Not all
their news of course, but a
great deal of it.
In this social media culture,
people no longer look for the
news, the news finds them
through news feeds, RSS
feeds, twitter feeds, etc.
In order to reach the largest
audience possible, news
outlets, government
organizations and thought
leaders are turning to social
media platforms to spread
their message.
4. Social Media Roundup
The Army uses social media to provide supporting coverage of an event. By
synchronizing multiple platforms, a story can be told through video, photos and links.
5. Social Media Roundup
Creating a successful social media campaign
There are several social media platforms
available to help tell a story and cover an
event, but they are just tools. The trick is
learning how to use these tools effectively.
A successful social media campaign goes
beyond just posting links and photos, it’s a
process, and it requires planning.
To create a successful social media
campaign, it’s important to plan, execute,
respond and measure.
In this Social Media Roundup, we will use
the recent Medal of Honor ceremony for
SSG Salvatore A. Giunta as an example
illustrating how to organize a social media
campaign.
7. Social Media Roundup
Developing a social media strategy Developing a strategy
requires research and preparation.
To create a successful campaign, it is
important to prepare.
Identify goals of the strategy
Identify target audiences
Identify the social media platforms that will
be used in strategy
Draft posts ahead of time
Identify links ahead of time
Determine how each post will be measured
for effectiveness
One way to plan all of this in advance
is to create a social media strategy
document. A template of social media
strategy document can be viewed on
the right or downloaded from the
Army’s Slideshare site:
http://slidesha.re/dQgiVa
8. Social Media Roundup
Careful planning is crucial
Developing a strategy
when preparing for a social
media campaign. It is
important to check all the
links and draft all the posts in
Planning Strategy
advance.
Drafting the posts in advance
and including them in the
strategy document gives
everyone visibility of the
plan. Once the document is
created and approved,
anyone can pick up the
strategy document and
execute the plan.
Execution
10. Social Media Roundup
There are several courses of action Pre-execution steps
a social media team should take
leading up to an event to make sure
the public and the media is
interested and aware of a news
event.
Build awareness beforehand by linking to
official external sites, or posting trivia
information to your social media
platforms.
If Twitter is part of the social media
strategy, make sure a hashtag is in place,
then advertise the hashtag so people are
using it before the event. By putting it out
there in advance, it will make it easier to
track the reach of tweets later on.
Email potential bloggers and media early
with educational and promotional
products.
Reach out to other social media teams
and provide information and graphics so
they can post to their sites as well.
12. Social Media Roundup
On the day of the event, social
media managers can simply cut Executing a strategy
and paste their way through the
day.
In some cases a social media team
may only have one person. If that’s
the case, sites like HootSuite can
schedule posts and tweets to go
out at certain times so users don’t
have to post manually. However, if
events change, pre-scheduling can
potentially cause problems.
It’s important to be prepared to
change the strategy if necessary.
Occasionally, a ceremony time
may change, or a link may go
down, so social media managers
need to be prepared to deviate
from the plan.
13. Social Media Roundup
Executing a strategy
On the day of the event, it’s
important to continue posting and
continue updating. Occasionally,
a live stream link will become
available, or new photographs will
surface. It’s also good to link to
To link to another Facebook site, first “like” their
other Facebook sites because it
page. Then, when writing the post type an “@” in shows how other sites are adding
front of the name of the unit and Facebook will take to the conversation.
care of the rest.
Keep in mind that while links,
photos and information are great,
it is possible to over saturate the
platforms with event information.
Make sure to pick the right links
and avoid over posting.
This is an example of using a link in a post. Facebook will recognize
this and include the link and sometimes a graphic with the post.
15. Social Media Roundup
Responding to potential problems
From time to time, a social media-related
problem may arise during an event, like a fake
twitter account, or a series of negative wall
posts. Make sure there is a plan in place
specific to the unit or organization to respond to
potential problems.
For example, during SSG Giunta’s Medal of
Honor ceremony, a fake Twitter account
surfaced. The Online and Social Media Division
took a series of steps to identify the page as an
impersonation of SSG Giunta, including a Tweet
from the U.S. Army’s verified page and a direct
message to the user updating the page. The
owner of the site eventually changed his info
box to indicate it was a “fan” twitter account.
Every situation is different; that’s why it’s
important to have an organization-specific crisis
plan in place.
16. Social Media Roundup
Measuring
Determining the reach and success of your message
17. Social Media Roundup
Posting is one thing, but Measuring success
measuring the success of a post
is something entirely different.
It’s important to track metrics
across all platforms. On
Facebook, social media
managers can track “comments”,
“likes” and “impressions”. On
Twitter, it’s good to track
“retweets” and “mentions”.
“Retweets” and “mentions” can
both be tracked by clicking on the
message or by using
TweetReach, an application that
shows how far your tweets go.
On YouTube and Flickr, the most
important numbers are measured
through “views”.
18. Social Media Roundup
Once the numbers are
Measuring success
recorded, those numbers
can be included after
each post on the social
media strategy document. Planning Strategy Measurement in Planning Strategy
This allows senior leaders
to see the before and
after effects of a social
media strategy.
It’s also advised to create
a slide including numbers
and screenshots to
visually demonstrate the
success of a social media
campaign.
19. Social Media Roundup
Summary
• Developing a successful social media campaign requires more than just posting
links. To be effective, a social media strategy requires research, planning, pre-
execution, execution and measuring.
• Creating a social media strategy not only helps with planning, it also makes it
possible for those not associated with the planning to execute the strategy.
• It’s important to plan for the worst. Make sure there is a plan in place to deal with
social media-related issues, like imposter Twitter sites, negative wall posts or
social media site malfunctions.
• Measure the success of a campaign. It’s easy to post information and forget it, but
a social media team can’t truly evaluate their success if they fail to measure how
their messages resonate on the platforms they use.
20. Social Media Roundup
Contact information
Have questions? Please feel free to
reach out to us at the Online and
Social Media Division
Email:
Ocpa.osmd@us.army.mil
12/1/2010
OFFICE OF THE CHIEF OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS
PENTAGON
20