1. http://go.illinois.edu/tweets
Classmemberswillattempttoidentifycorrelationsbecauserespondents’eval-
uationsoftweetsandresearcher-assignedscoresinthe10qualitativecatego-
riesinanattempttodrawconclusionsonwhatqualitiesaremostrelevantin
drawing attention in social media.
Additional qualities may be developed with further analysis of the data.
Class members then hope to produce an industry-style research report that
will be made available to campus and local media.
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Background
Socialmediahaveemergedasbeingamongthefastestgrowing, mostwide-
ly used, yet leastwellunderstood news outlets today.
Todeterminewhichfactorsaremostconducivetoeffectivelymanagingaso-
cialmedianewsplatform,16studentsinMDIA290/JOUR480SocialandDig-
ital Media for spring 2016 created The’Nois, an experimental Facebook and
Twitter feed designed to serve students at the University of Illinois.
The class was an outgrowth of a Scripps-Howard Foundation grant. The
grant allowed the class instructor, Associate Professor Eric Meyer, to spend
part of the summer at the Dallas Morning News as a visiting professor of so-
cialmedia.Italsobroughtthenewspaper’ssocialmediaeditor,MikeMcCray,
to campus as a professional in residence for part of a week this spring.
Literature review
Fewscholarlystudiesfocusonspecificcontentandpresentationtechniques
forsocialmediapostings.Backgroundismorewidelyavailableinindustrylit-
erature regarding presumed “best practices,” such as:
u Using a consistent voice.
u Developing a humanistic, engaging approach that does not come
across as one-way.
u Grabbing attention by focusing on unique content expressed in
unique ways.
u Connecting each posting to a trending, popular topic.
u Considering the varying demographics of social media users.
u Using data analytics to determine what’s working or isn’t.
u Updating regularly but without overwhelming the audience.
u Engaging the audience with topics of specific interest.
u Creating dialog.
Onestudyasked1,443Twitteruserstorank43,738tweetsaccordingtowheth-
ertheyweredeemedworthreading.Findingssuggestnotoverusinghashtags
andnotretweetingconversations.Percentagesoftweetsdeemedworthread-
ing, by researcher-assigned category of content or presentation:
u Funny,exciting:36%
u #ConnectNoisfor academic and career news
Social media posts were strategically written for each persona and were tar-
geted using the hashtags. After several weeks of live posting and evaluating
ofengagementmetrics,however,theclassbecameconvincedthatthecam-
pus’sdiversestudentbodycouldnotneatlybedividedintonichesandthat
individual students’ broad ranges of interests often crossed over into multi-
ple niches, which could not be demographically defined.
Theclassalsoconcludedthatcontentincampusandcommunitymediawas
notsufficientlyengagingandthatoneoftheessentialcharacteristicsofso-
cialmediawasthedevelopmentofhuman-to-humanmessageswithgreater
personality than was present in most local media coverage. With apologies
to MacLuhan, it’snotthemedium;it’sthemessage.
Astheclassshiftedawayfromre-postingmaterialfromlocalandcampusme-
diaandbeganassessingstudents’informationalneedsandinterestsin-
dependently, it again relied on engagement metrics and review of scholar-
lyliteraturetodevelopcontentandpresentationalstandardsthatithypothe-
tized might prove the most engaging.
Italsoincreasinglyemployedimagesor“memes”astheseseemedmoreen-
gaging.Withthefeedrefinedbypreliminarypilotexperimentation,theseul-
timate research questions emerged:
u RQ1: What are the most effective methods social media platforms
can use to reach and interact with readers?
uRQ2: What attributes of postings done by The ‘Nois are likely to at-
tract the most attention from readers?
AfteranalyzingTwitterandFacebookengagementdatafromtwomonthsof
postingmultipletimesdailyviaBuffer.com,theclassdevelopeditsownsetof
10 attributes that it believed might be most likely to engage readers.
uImmediacy:Doesthepostingcontainspecificindicatorsofcurrent
timeliness?
uUnexpected:Does it deal with unique or uncommon oddity?
uEngaging:Does it ask a question or urge a response?
Methodology
Initially, the class relied on referring readers to existing content published by
traditional local media, a strategy employed by most traditional media out-
lets with their social media feeds. The class attempted to use social media to
segmenttheaudience into separate niches, divided by demographics and
perceived interests. Content was designated for each niche or “persona” by
separate hashtags:
u#EnjoyNoisfor entertainment news
u#ActiveNoisfor sports and fitness
u #DiscussNoisfor political news
u #IdentityNoisfor news of cultural diversity
u #NowNoisfor breaking news
Pilot experimentation
u Self-promotion:36%
u Questiontofollowers: 35%
u Informativenews:33%
u Opinions:30%
u Catchingup:27%
u Presence:20%
Another study measured engagement, replies and retweets based on time
of posting and other factors.
uFrom7a.m.to8p.m.,TwitteroutperformsFacebook;from8p.m.to
7 a.m., Facebook outperforms Twitter.
u Engagement on Twitter is 17% higher on weekends.
u Four or fewer tweets per day are ideal.
u Adding images, links and two or fewer hashtags increase engage-
ment.
u Specifically asking followers to retweet encourages that behavior.
u Using fewer than 100 characters seems to increase engagement.
In social media marketing, industry literature advises:
u Adding URLs and hashtags increases number of retweets.
uUsersprefersharingofinformationandthoughtstostatusupdates.
u Tweets with negative sentiments are more likely to be retweeted.
These are other guidelines and studies were used to structure the strategies
by which class members posted to Facebook and Twitter.
THEMDIA290/JOUR480class
Advertising
uMike Brodecki
uRyan Donlan
uMichele Ellis
uMolly Gordon
uAlia Kamal
uHenry Prystowsky
uAaron Swearingen
Communication
uRuoxi Su
uBrea Thompson
Generalstudies
uMasic Chen
Journalism
uKhaoula Dellahi*
uRhea Kressman*
uColleen Romano
uBlaize Stewart*
uRyan Vasicek*
Visitingscholar
uAhmed Orabi
* Graduate students
Identifying effective practices in social media
Rising above the ’Nois:
uConversational:Is it written in informal language?
uHumorous:Doesitattempttobeamusingwithoutbeingdeprecat-
ing?
uPersonal utility: Is the content specifically relevant to, or can it be
acted upon by, the target audience?
uTalk factor: Does it spark conversation or deal with a popular cul-
ture topic?
uEmotion:Does it invoke or relate a human, emotional response?
uActive visual: Does it contain a realistic or active visual representa-
tion of the topic?
uSimplify:Doesitmakeacomplicatedtopicseemmoreunderstand-
able.
Eachclassmemberthenrated100actualtweetsfromThe’Noisandotherlo-
cal social media channels, scoring each on five-level Likert scales measuring
each of the 10 qualities. Intercoder reliability was confirmed using a test of
standard deviation of scores. An online questionnaire was developed to ask
adiversegroupofapproximately750studentstoassesstheirlevelofinterest
ineachof20tweetsrandomlyselectedfromthepoolof100.Responseswere
on a five-level Likert scale to facilitate curvilinear analysis of possible correla-
tionwithresearcher-assignedqualities.Demographicdataweregatheredto
ensure an appropriate, though still convenient, crosssection was contacted.
Datacurrentlyarebeinggatheredforanalysisinthefinalweeksofthesemes-
ter. To participate, visit:
Next steps
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H
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Immediacy Unexpected Engaging Conversational Humorous Personalutility Talkfactor Emotion Activevisual Simplify
4.2 4.1 4.4 4.3 4.3 4.3 4.5 4.4 4.3 4.5
1.4 1.3 1.4 1.4 1.0 1.4 1.4 1.4 1.4 1.3
ENGAGEMENT
CLARIFICATION
VISUAL ENGAGEMENT
EMOTION
TALK FACTOR
PERSONAL UTILITY
HUMOR
CONVERSATIONAL
ORIGINALITY
IMMEDIACY
54321
Emotion
HIGH
LOW
ENGAGEMENT
CLARIFICATION
VISUAL ENGAGEMENT
EMOTION
TALK FACTOR
PERSONAL UTILITY
HUMOR
CONVERSATIONAL
ORIGINALITY
IMMEDIACY
54321
ENGAGEMENT
CLARIFICATION
VISUAL ENGAGEMENT
EMOTION
TALK FACTOR
PERSONAL UTILITY
HUMOR
CONVERSATIONAL
ORIGINALITY
IMMEDIACY
54321
Emotion
HIGH
LOW
MEAN SCORE FROM 15 EVALUATORS