The American Heart Association's 2014-2015 social media ambassador program aimed to unify volunteers and employees in sharing health messages through online platforms. The program emphasized training, engagement, and leadership support, successfully generating over 8,500 uses of the #weareheart hashtag and fostering various volunteer initiatives. Future plans include website improvements, increased contests, and enhanced youth engagement opportunities.

1. Case Study:
2014-2015 American Heart
Association Western States Affiliate
Social Media Ambassador Program
July 14, 2015

2. GOALS
For Volunteers:
Create a unified ambassador program for our volunteer advocates who utilize social
media. Allowing them to share health messages regularly with their virtual networks,
learn different facets of the organization and connect with us in between events.
For Employees:
Our employees are some of the biggest proponents of our organization and most
knowledgeable about what we do. The employee ambassador program encourages
staff to share health messages with their existing online communities. We also provide
training to make employees feel more comfortable knowing what they can or should
not share and helping them create (if they wish) new social networks, separate from
their personal profiles, where they can establish themselves as experts in their field.
United:
Our employees and volunteers become an online army working to improve the health
of all Americans by meeting them where they are.
Together #WeAreHeart

3. Hashtag
We want our
ambassadors to feel
empowered,
connected and
inclusive.
Together #WeAreHeart
Initial Set Up
We consulted with our
Digital Strategies Task
Force, a team of
volunteer experts, for
feedback.
Website
• Simple program description
• Links to all social profiles
• Registration Form (try to limit
the information we request)
• Shareable messages that
change monthly
• Photos of ambassadors
• Storify using hashtag was
included
#WeAreHeart

4. Internal Promotion
We utilized department meetings as forums to promote
the external and internal benefits of the program. New
staff orientation was another opportunity to ramp up
excitement. By the end of the year, our affiliate wide
meetings include live tweeting. Externally we highlighted
this as an opportunity for volunteers looking to do more,
new volunteers who are just getting their feet wet and
especially for our younger audience for whom an online
presence is second nature.
With the support and encouragement of upper
management, we set up Twitter trainings to teach our
staff about the platform and how it can help the American
Heart Association/ American Stroke Association achieve
our mission.
We set up internal contests to incentive use of the
#WeAreHeart hashtag as well as recruitment of new
volunteer ambassadors.
Our Executive Vice President, Kathy Rogers, joined Twitter,
as did our Senior Vice President of Health Strategies, Lisa
Jones Barker. Leading by example sparked interest in
throughout the affiliate.
Trainings
Meetings
Contests
Leaders

5. External Promotion
Email isn’t dead! The largest and most successful promotion
was through email campaigns. Our existing customer base is
vast and has already opted in to our communication so this was
a natural next step for many.
Social media promotion: Another natural next step. We have
many followers on each of our social networks, those who want
to take their commitment to the next level can opt in.
Direct asks: On platforms like Instagram it’s apparent who your
most outspoken and invested fans are – why not flatter them
by asking them to become an official ambassador?
In person asks: You won’t know which of your current
volunteers are active on social media unless you ask.
Board meetings: Our local Communications Directors were
encouraged to attend a board meetings, share the value of
social media and ask board members to engage in the program.
As it turns out, a few of our board members have large
networks.

6. Results
volunteer social media ambassadors
employee social media ambassadors
uses of the #WeAreHeart hashtag
from July 1, 2014 – June 30, 2015
212+
50+
8,500+
Ambassadors have:
• Become Heart Walk fundraisers
• Volunteered to live tweet at events
• Become survivor speakers - two of our bilingual young adult
Congenital Heart Defect survivors have been featured in our
national publication, Heart Insight Magazine
• Interned with their local division
• Become Go Red For Women
lifestyle change speakers

7. What this looks like

8. What this looks like

9. What’s next:
• Intern to the rescue! This program is growing and can use all
of the support and creativity it can get.
• Regular bi-weekly emails with content ready for volunteers to
share.
• Website redo! We will be the first to admit our website is less
than ideal. We have limited possibilities with heart.org so we
will reevaluate our website options.
• Contests – We’ve run internal contests with mild success,
create more engaging external contests.
• More, leading by example! All of our Executive Team will be
joining Twitter if they haven’t already. Trainings will be
available.
• Youth Engagement: Possibly a young professionals board or
committee. Looking at opportunities to work with our Youth
Market colleagues – community service hours for students or
integration into Red Out events.