This document provides an overview of using social media for marketing and promotion. It discusses key principles of social media like engaging in conversation rather than just promoting, listening to audiences, and being authentic. It then gives examples of how Queen's University and its alumni relations department use social media like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Finally, it offers tips for building a social media presence and promoting teams through websites, communications, and working with the athletics department. The overall message is that social media is an important way to connect with students, alumni, and fans if used strategically and conversationally rather than just for one-way promotion.

1. Social Media & Marketing

2. Presentation Overview
• Principles of Social Media
• Queen’s & social media
• Alumni Relations & social media
• Promoting & marketing your team to your
community

3. Principles of Social Media

4. What is Social Media?

6. Technology
It is important to remember that
it is not about the technology
... the tools may change but the
underlying concepts of social
media will remain the same

7. Principals of Social Media
Social Media is not a megaphone
... It is a conversational medium
• You can’t shout your promotional
message
• It is not about talking at people
but engaging with them
• It is a place you should offer value
rather than simple promotion

8. Listening
• Take the time to listen to what is being said
– what are they interested in?
– what is your audience talking about, it will not all be
positive

9. Authenticity
• Speaking with a human voice - remember you
are speaking for the university or your club
• Not just your voice - you need to share other
people’s content
Letting go
• You will have to deal with the good and the bad
• You aren’t IN control but you HAVE some contr

10. Community
• Great for building a sense of
community
• People who are no longer on campus
can still join in on the conversation
Being present and responsive
• Social media takes time!
• It takes time to build good
relationships
• You need to consistently monitor the
space
• If you don’t know the answer you

11. Why should we care?
Social media is here to stay!
We want to represent our school & faculties, connect with
students & alumni
• Cost effective
– Does cost time and people, but the tools are free
• Measurable
– Can measure links, followers
• Shareable
– Easy for your message to be spread, easy to pass it on to
friends

12. Planning for Social Media
Why are you doing this?
• connect with alumni, communicate
with students ...
What are your goals?
• engagement, recruitment...
Who is your audience?
• what do you want to tell them?
• what do you want them to do?
• what do they need/want?

13. Queen’s & Social Media

14. facebook.com/queensuniversity
7,200 Likes/Followers
@queensu
8,800 Followers
youtube.com/QueensUCanada
65 videos with over 140,000 views

18. !
!

19. !
!

20. !

21. Alumni Relations & Social Media

22. Alumni Relations & Social
Media
Use what is already created:
Queen’s University Alumni
2118 Likes/Followers (1847 active users)
@queensalumni
1025 Followers
Queen’s University Alumni
5091 Group Followers
*Started by a Queen’s alumnus and supported by
Alumni Relations

23. Using Social Media
• Post photos to increase nostalgia (archival and
current events)
• Poll alumni on potential events and programming
• Acknowledge successful/notable alumni
• Promote alumni champions of Queen’s
• Promote alumni businesses/employment
opportunities
• Build awareness about upcoming events
• Career networking opportunities for alumni
• Program promotion (benefits & services available to

24. Building Your Presence
- Planning, Tips, Considerations

25. Facebook Options
Pros:
- Larger audience = larger reach to promote events/
fundraising/alumni/volunteering
Central Queen’s - Increased exposure of other varsity teams and their
athletic team projects
page/group
where all teams Cons:
administer and - Followers would have to read about topics/news not
post to one page related to varsity team
- Page/group admin would need to agree on changes
to site
Pros:
Separate
- Followers of the page/group are the “more
athletic
engaged”
team page or
group
Cons:
- Fewer followers/likes would mean less reach
- Pages can easily be neglected if admin users
change constantly

26. Facebook Page vs. Group
Facebook Pages
• Enable public figures, businesses, organizations to create public
presence
• Visible to everyone by default
• Pages offer more opportunity for customization (tab/apps)
Facebook Groups
• Allow people to come together around a common cause, discuss
issues, post photos and share related content
• You can determine the visibility of your group (open, closed,
hidden)
• Ability to share documents

27. Facebook Ads
Why/when do I use an ad?
• Build awareness:
Reach a large audience with a widely targeted ad
campaign
• Drive sales:
Offer special deals and giveaways in your ad
campaign to bring people to your event
• Grow you fan base:
Encourage people to like your Page by offering
valuable benefits for engaging

28. Facebook Ads
Who/how can you target?
• Location, Language, Education, and Work
• Age, Gender, Birthday, and Relationship Status
• Likes & Interests: Select Likes & Interests such as
"hockey" or "engineering"
• Friends of Connections or Connections

29. Facebook Ads
What is our current reach?
• Alumni Reach
- Estimated 65,000 people identified as graduates of
Queen’s
(40% Male, 60% Female, 85% living in Canada)
• Student Reach
- 9,720 people identified as students at Queen’s
(45% Male, 55% Female)

30. Twitter
It is only as good as you make it
• Create a #hashtag for your varsity team (i.e.
#queensfootball) and make sure that all members
include it in tweets
• Follow the right people/organizations that share your
athletic interests and get them to follow you
• Create a “list” of others that share an interest or
participated in the same varsity sport. When you
click to view a list, you'll see a stream of Tweets from
all the users included in that group

31. LinkedIn
• Estimated 37,000 people identified as current
students/graduates of Queen’s University
• Search on where Queen’s alumni are working
• Join Queen’s groups (and/or create a group) and post
career related information (discussions, promotions,
jobs)

32. Other Communications
Tools
• @Queen’s Monthly e-Newsletter
(michelle.lean@queensu.ca)
• Alumni Review Magazine (review@queensu.ca)
• Branch Bi-Weekly Updates to Alumni (45 branches)
(branches@queensu.ca)
• Branch Facebook Pages (branches@queensu.ca)
• Mass Email for Booster Clubs/Fundraising Projects
(brenda.forbes@queensu.ca)

33. Promoting & Marketing your

34. Website

35. Website
Club Page Admin
• Each club should have a designated admin person to
post results, update pictures and stories
• Follow story style of other
• First paragraph should include a recap of the whole
event
• Following paragraphs can include more details about the
event
Uses for the homepage:
• Tryouts
• Team meetings

36. Promote Your Team
• Results Reporting
• Email scores to scores@gogaelsgo.com within one
hour of the end of the game.
• Provide the name of your opponent and some brief
details about the game (high scorers, overtime,
upset, etc.)
• These results will then be posted to
www.gogaelsgo.com
• Build a fan base
• Regular updates and results

37. Promote Your Team
We are always looking for photos for:
• Updated images on sport homepages
• Colour awards program and video
• Other department requirements

38. Gaels Communication
Ways to communicate with Gaels fans:
• Visit www.gogaelsgo.com
• Follow us on Facebook: www.facebook.com/
queensgaels
• Follow us on Twitter: www.twitter.com/queensgaels
• Contact Shawn MacDonald, Sports Information
qsports@queensu.ca
• Website training
• Send photos
• Social media inquiries

39. Questions?