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Digital & Social Strategy Ideas The University of Sheffield

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Page 1: Digital & Social Strategy Ideas

Digital & Social Strategy Ideas

The University of Sheffield

Page 2: Digital & Social Strategy Ideas

Where We Are & Where We’re Going

Digital & Social

Page 3: Digital & Social Strategy Ideas

DIGITAL & SOCIAL | THE UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD | 2014

Where We AreStrengths

The University of Sheffield is well-established on a broad range of social platforms in both the UK and internationally.

We successfully publish a solid flow of content from our central accounts for a range of purposes (news stories, recruitment, events promotion etc).

We have a strong presence on YouTube and have produced good quality video content on the platform with things like the Laurbubble series and the We Are International VISA video.

We have recently updated our website with a new design which allows for further integration of social and digital media content.

The broader University is capitalising on the opportunities provided by social media – we currently have over 500 different social profiles attached to the University across faculties, departments, groups etc.

Weaknesses

Not enough of the content we publish through social media is tailored to be relevant, shareable and interesting to audiences on the platform.

We are not operating in a fluid, flexible structure that allows for the quick regular production of interesting and engaging content that is truly in the spirit of social media.

We are being heavy handed in our use of digital content on occasions and focusing too much on producing content that fits our key messages compared to content that is actually interesting, shareable and engaging. See UG video vs Gillian Finnerty Mars video statistics.

We aren’t approaching opportunities with a digital first or digital by default approach meaning that a number of opportunities to do interesting and engaging digital activity have been missed.

Not enough of what we are doing on social media is focused on telling stories.

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DIGITAL & SOCIAL | THE UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD | 2014

Where We AreOpportunities

With the expanded digital and social media team, we now have greater resource to begin producing more consistent content that works better on social and digital media platforms.

The new social and digital reporting framework (along with Google Analytics) gives us the opportunity to use data better to inform our approach going forward as part of an iterative and flexible strategy that evolves in line with what works.

We also have opportunities to expand our social and digital media offering by using new platforms and producing experimental content.

We have a great opportunity to provide tiered levels of guidance to social media managers across the University to enable them to improve the work they are doing already.

We have the opportunity to develop a digital and social newsroom approach to help us become the top university in the country when it comes to telling our stories in interesting and engaging ways and reaching the right people with quality content.

Threats

One of the primary threats to any digital and social strategy is that we mistake the opportunity to inform, engage and entertain for a platform to boast, self-aggrandize and sell.

A lack of pace and dynamism is also a threat to the digital and social success of our University as they are vital attributes for success.

A lack of adventure and experimentation is also a potential threat to our success as we should aim to be an early adopter of new digital and social media opportunities and be known for having a developmental approach to what we do.

A lack of understanding as to how important digital and social media is, is also a potential threat to making this work as well as it should.

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DIGITAL & SOCIAL | THE UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD | 2014

Where We’re Going

What do we want social and digital media to do for us?

Digital and social media gives us a simple, cost-effective opportunity to inform, educate and entertain people in our key target audience groups by telling them the great stories of our University in interesting and engaging ways.

Digital and social media is vital in 2014 because audience consumption habits are changing how news and information reaches people.

The myriad digital and social platforms gives us the chance to highlight different aspects of our brand identity through well-told stories, interesting content and engaging conversations.

This is the most effective means available to promote the strengths, qualities and key messages of the University in a palatable, nuanced and engaging way.

The beauty of this in 2014 is that it’s easy and low-cost to do because the growth of digital and social media has removed production and distribution costs found in traditional channels.

Ultimately, the challenge for us is to find ways to creatively and natively tell all the stories of our University on the platforms being used by our target audiences and to use this wealth of content to engage with them.

What is the future of digital and social media at the University?

To tell these stories well we are needing to view them through the different lenses of the platforms available to us and then create as much interesting, relevant and tailored content as possible.

What’s more, we need to do this quicker than ever before because social and digital media thrives on timely, relevant micro content due to people’s ever reducing attention spans.

In 2014, it’s much better to consistently and continually produce bite size pieces of interesting, impactful and shareable content than it is occasionally provide a feast of information that people may find too much to stomach, too rich with corporate key messages and ultimately not that interesting.

Put simply, it is telling our stories consistently, quickly and interactively that will be most effective in illustrating what an amazing place The University of Sheffield is.

It is also an incredibly useful tool for engaging with prospective applicants, current students, academics, researchers and business partners who we want to be part of the university’s story in future.

The University of SheffieldDigital & Social Team 2014

Lindsey Wilson Head of Media & Digital Engagement

Steve ThompsonDigital Manager

Leon MallettSocial & Digital Media Officer

Andrew TwistSocial & Digital Media Coordinator

+

Sean BartonMedia Relations Assistant

Graham McElearney iTunesU Manager

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Creating A Social & Digital Strategy

Digital & Social

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DIGITAL & SOCIAL | THE UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD | 2014

Ethos Of Digital & Social

MOVE FAST AND TRY THINGS

TELL STORIES • TALK TO PEOPLE • BE INTERESTING

PUT CONTENT FIRST

EXPERIMENT WITH NEW

PLATFORMS & WAYS OF

DELIVERING CONTENT

SUPPORT SOCIAL ACTIVITY ACROSS THE UNIversity

SHOWDON’T TELL

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DIGITAL & SOCIAL | THE UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD | 2014

Objectives & Aims

How can digital & social work help with the objectives of the Reputation & Engagement team?

Objective: Build Reputation & Trust.

By telling a wide range of stories about the University using digital and social media we can help to shape people’s opinions of us.

By creating interesting content that people want to share we can increase the audience of people that know about our qualities and subsequently improve our reputation with more of these people.

Using social media in an honest and transparent way will also be beneficial for building trust in the University.

Objective: Grow Our International Profile.

The global nature of social media is vital for reaching the widest possible audience with our content and messages.

Creating interesting content with a global appeal across a range of international and region-specific channels gives us the structure to communicate more effectively and efficiently.

We Are International is a great example of a digitally-led project at the University.

Objective: Manage The City Narrative.

Implementing a framework of created, curated and commissioned content will enable us to articulate and promote the very best of Sheffield as a city.

By using a range of microcontent that tells different stories about Sheffield we can avoid the pitfalls of giving people overly glossy promotional material that only scratches the surface of why we are based in such an interesting city.

Objective: Work Quicker And Smarter.

Digital and social media works best when it is created by agile, alert and fast-paced teams.

Implementing a digital newsroom approach within Reputation & Engagement will instill a faster, more focused and sharper work ethic that helps us capitalise on the news agenda and zeitgeist to reach more people with our stories, news, research and events.

Objective: Surface More Content & Stories

Similarly, a story-centric digital newsroom approach will naturally help us place more focus on content excellence and what is interesting to our audiences, rather than just focusing primarily on what we want to be saying about ourselves.

The University of SheffieldDigital & Social Team 2014

Lindsey Wilson Head of Media & Digital Engagement

Steve ThompsonDigital Manager

Leon MallettSocial & Digital Media Officer

Andrew TwistSocial & Digital Media Coordinator

+

Sean BartonMedia Relations Assistant

Graham McElearneyiTunesU Manager

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DIGITAL & SOCIAL | THE UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD | 2014

Digital & Social Top 5: 1. Tell Stories Like A Digital Newsroom

Media newsrooms are story-obsessed, iterative, alert, chaotic, alive to opportunities, ready to try things out, prepared to drop them if they don’t work and willing add more resources quickly when they do.

This is what we should be like.

We are a media company now thanks to digital and social media so we should start acting more like one.

When it comes to planning, producing and managing digital and social media content at the University of Sheffield it makes sense to develop and organise a newsroom-style approach as it is inherently geared towards the importance of stories and interesting content.

The newsroom culture facilitates important attributes needed by a top class digital and social media team, such as pace, flexibility, awareness of audience consumption habits and ambition to try new things to reach as many people as possible.

These characteristics should be considered as important to the digital and social media team at the University of Sheffield as any planning and strategy documents because it is impossible to properly succeed in the restless, chaotic and constantly changing online world with long term charts and plans alone.

We are lucky to have so many fantastic stories at the University of Sheffield that reflect the amazing students, academics and researchers we work with on a local, national and international level.

To tell these stories well we need to think of ourselves as a media company and view them through the different lenses of the platforms available to us and create as much interesting, relevant and tailored content as possible.

Ideas

1. Develop a dynamic digital & social mediacontent framework and editorial calendar so that we begin to plan our content more like a newsroom.

2. Host regular ‘Editorial Conferences’ with allteams within Reputation & Engagement with targets set for stories, pieces of microcontent and speed of turnaround.

3. Experiment with new ways of telling storiesin terms of snappy social content and interactive long form work. Lets not assume that the best way of telling this story is to write a press release and put it on the home page of our website - because that won’t always be the case.

Media newsrooms are story obsessed, alert,

iterative, alive to opportunities, ready

to try things out, prepared to drop them if they don’t work and

willing add more resources quickly

when they do.

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DIGITAL & SOCIAL | THE UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD | 2014

Digital & Social Top 5: 2. Create Content With Our Audience & The Platforms In MindThere is an ever expanding pool of platforms available to us with varying audience-sizes, demographics and features.

Our success will be defined by understanding which ones are being used by our main target audiences and the psychology of how and why they are choosing particular networks.

The most important thing to remember is that social and digital platforms are all inherently different in a range of obvious and subtle ways.

One of the biggest common mistakes made in digital and social marketing is a failure to acknowledge this and therefore it is important that the stories and content we produce is tailored accordingly for each platform and designed to be interesting, engaging and shareable in the eyes of our audiences.

This includes practical details like working to develop appropriately-sized, shareable graphics for Facebook posts and Twitter cards that capture an aspect of our story in a way that is engaging and interesting — rather than ‘just’ uploading the photograph that was sent out with the press release.

It also includes things like thinking about how we could record short form video footage for Vine and Instagram at the same time as filming footage to be edited into a longer video

for YouTube — in fact, we might also debate subtle differences between Vimeo and YouTube and decide to produce something more akin to a short film in tone for the former.

By better considering the nature of the platforms and the habits of our audience we can work to deliver bite size pieces of interesting, impactful and shareable content that makes a bigger contribution than the occasional feast of marketing information that people may find too much to stomach, too rich with corporate key messages and ultimately not that interesting.

Ideas

1. Create platform guides to ensure that theReputation & Engagement team (and social media managers across the University) know how to tell their stories in the best way on different platforms.

2. Implement a 10-point framework foranalysing how to tell our stories in the most interesting way a la Coca Cola.

3. Develop and test graphic/video contenttailored specifically for different platforms and test how this impacts on engagement levels.

4. Use engagement analytics to inform thetypes of content we invest time and money into going forward and adjust our content framework / editorial calendar accordingly.

Will our audience be

interested in The Content?

HOW WILL THE CONTENT WORK ON DIFFERENT PLATFORMS?

WHAT IS THE BEST WAY OF TELLING

THE STORY?

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DIGITAL & SOCIAL | THE UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD | 2014

Digital & Social Top 5: 3. Use Analytics & Insights To Improve Output

Digital and social media activity is blessed by access to a huge amount of feedback and analytics and if harnessed properly this can help us to create a dynamic and flexible strategy that allows us to analyse our performance and improve it accordingly.

The new Digital & Social media reporting framework compiles analytics from various platforms and gives us regular insight into what’s working and what isn’t.

The analytics provided by Hootsuite Enterprise on some of our key social profiles already give us a clear indication into what content is connecting with people and we need to use this more to improve our storytelling and content production going forward.

For instance, if you look at the audience retention analytics on our YouTube channel it is clear that, on average, some longer videos can lose up to 50% of viewers after about two and half minutes.

This insight could be incredibly useful when it comes to planning the length of videos and the positioning of key messages and calls to action within them.

Similarly, it is possible to use insights from other digital and social media producers to improve the quality of our output.

For example, Quartz, a digitally native news outlet built primarily for tablets and mobile phones has found that while there is currently an appetite for short-form shareable micro content and long form analysis pieces, there is a grey area of content between 500 and 800 words that struggles to gain any kind of traction on social media.

This kind of intelligence could be useful to our media team when thinking about the length and content of news stories and press releases and help them develop a framework based on producing both short and long form content that can work on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram for the former and Medium or WordPress for the latter.

Ideas

1. Develop the social media dashboard so that it becomes a crucial document for informing our content framework and editorial calendar.

2. Experiment with different approaches based on the best practices of the major players within digital media and social journalism.

3. Use this analytics-based approach as a clear justification for breaking the status quo for particular projects/content that demand a more experimental or innovative approach.

If harnessed properly analytics and insights can help us to create

a dynamic and flexible strategy that factors in

our successes and corrects our failures.

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DIGITAL & SOCIAL | THE UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD | 2014

Digital & Social Top 5: 4. Facilitate Great Digital & Social Media Activity Across The University The University of Sheffield has over 500 social media accounts across faculties, departments, courses, services, groups etc.

These 500 profiles are made up of a broad range of social networks including Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google Plus, Weibo, YouTube, Flickr etc.

Within this network of University focused social media activity there are a number of different purposes for the accounts such as marketing and PR, recruitment, customer services, pubic engagement, communication with students.

The central Digital and Social media team has a crucial role in providing advice, guidance and support to other University staff responsible for social media profiles to enable them to do the best possible job of telling their stories on social media.

As part of this we need to make sure we are responsible for providing training sessions, presentations and interactive support for social media managers as well as a steer on how to articulate the right aspects of the University that their department, service, group etc. represents.

This would also work best with the development of strong connections with social media managers across the University

that enables us to collaborate on certain content for mutual benefits.

Driving awareness and adoption of social media across the University should remain a priority so that we can effectively orchestrate a network of activity that permeates through the whole University infrastructure and articulates a wide range of positive stories from within the organisation.

Ideas

1. Create a broad, flexible social media strategy for social media managers across the University that focusses on the ‘how to’ aspects of social media rather than on dictating what they should/shouldn’t be saying.

2. Develop content templates / best practice guides for all the different social platforms that helps them to create more engaging content that will work better on social media.

3. Update the ‘Digital & Social’ team’s page on the website with these documents and more support guidance for how people can maximise the use of social media as part of their role with the University.

4. Continue to collaborate with departments on social activity as a means of quality control, editorial influence and content sourcing for the central University channels.

THE UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD HAS OVER 500 SOCIAL MEDIA PROFILES

HOW do we make sure that these

profiles are telling their

stories as best they can?

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DIGITAL & SOCIAL | THE UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD | 2014

Digital & Social Top 5: 5. Work Faster & Experiment MoreWorking quickly and efficiently is one of the most important characteristics needed for effective digital and social media work.

At present the digital and social media output at the University isn’t as agile and nimble as perhaps it should be, in part due to the focus on traditionally planned marketing campaigns.

On the other hand, the recent short video about Gillian Finnerty and her bid to travel to Mars is an example of digital content that can be turned around extremely quickly and reach a large number of people.

Going forward it would ideal for the Digital & Social media team to be able to accommodate reactive content production into their workflow so that there is more fast-paced and relevant microcontent being published in addition to the campaign work being done.

The fast-paced, short-attention-spanned nature of our audience suggests that we need to focus our efforts on producing as much engaging content as possible and doing as much as we can to get our stories into their newsfeeds, timelines, read-it-later apps and aggregators.

In addition to this, it is important for digital media producers to experiment with new ways of telling stories and delivering content in order to remain ahead of the curve.

For the University there are currently a number of new platforms that we aren’t experimenting with i.e. Instagram, Snapchat, Vine.

The culture within the Digital & Social team at the University should be to experiment with new platforms, assess how they are working as part of the analytics process and either drop them or advance them accordingly.

Similarly there are certain projects within the University that may benefit from Wordpress microsites or a more experimental, interactive approach that is removed from the University’s main CMS and website templates.

Ideas

1. Produce more reactive, quick turnaround videos and assess their impact compared to more structured and planned videos.

2. Develop an experimental ethos within the Digital & Social team that encourages test-runs and trial periods of new ideas.

3. Use analytics and insight to inform the pace at which we need to work and the outcome of the experimental work we do.

Working quickly and efficiently is one of the

most important characteristics needed for effective digital and

social media work.

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DIGITAL & SOCIAL | THE UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD | 2014

The Digital & Social Cycle

The Digital

& SOCIAL CYCLE

EVALUATION

MEASUREMENT

ENGAGEMENT DEVELOPMENT

STRATEGY

PLANNING

PRODUCTION

LISTENING

Work Out Which Metrics MatterUnderstand Which Content Is WorkingReflect On Why Certain Content Didn’t

Work

Get Involved In Relevant Conversations

Use Additional Content To Add Value & Context

Monitor Ongoing-AnalyticsCreate Monthly Dashboard

Factor In Qualitative Anecdotal Feedback

Create ContentCreate More Content

Create Even More ContentShare All Content

Research Our AudiencesWatch Competitors

Monitor Google, Twitter & Facebook Trends

Assess Multimedia Potential Of StoriesPlan Platform-Specific Content

Secure As Much Forward Planned Content As Possible

Populate Editorial CalendarAssess Current News Agenda

Factor In Upcoming Diary Events

Agree Editorial FocusAgree Key Messages

Set Targets & ObjectivesCreate A Point Of View

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DIGITAL & SOCIAL | THE UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD | 2014

Social Media Policy Ideas

1. We encourage University staff to embrace social media, use it as aplatform for telling stories and having conversations about the work you do and the difference it makes.

2. Social media is free and open and we must be in our use of it. Thereforewe will not encourage staff on one hand and then overly restrict them with rules and regulations on the other.

3. We have the central Digital & Social Media Team available on board toguide and talk to staff and help them as they get to grips with social media from a strategic and operational perspective.

4. We advise staff using social media to be thoughtful and use commonsense as social media is public and not private.

5. As a staff member your reputation is on the line as well as that of yourorganisation. Respect both.

6. Don’t just ignore criticism. Being active on social media means youmust engage and take part in the conversation. Radio silence will be talked about and work against you.

7. Be friendly, respectful and open. Listen to what your followers and fansare saying and then then work out how best to respond and add value to the conversation.

8. Remain level headed and do not get annoyed and post an immediateresponse. Disaster this way lurks. It might only take a second or two to type a comment but it will be permanent.

9. Be prepared to admit when you are wrong and quick to correctmistakes. People like this and respond well to it.

10. Make sure you have the facts and know the issues before you respondto questions. Do not shoot from the hip and hope you can bluff it.

Guiding Principles

BE CREATIVE AND ENJOY TELLLING THE STORIES OF HOW YOUR WORK AT THE UNIVERSITY

MAKES A DIFFERENCE

Ethos

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Different Platforms,Different Approaches

Digital & Social

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DIGITAL & SOCIAL | THE UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD | 2014

University Home Page A Magazine Format With Content Optimized For Sharing

The new style www.sheffield.ac.uk home page provides the perfect layout for a dynamic magazine style approach for our content.

To maximise this opportunity it would make sense to include home page possibilities in the editorial calendar and content framework.

This approach should hopefully help the team to think about the potential for all digital content produced being used within the ‘magazine’ format rather than simply thinking of news releases or stories that can be picked out and highlighted.

As part of this we should aim to reflect the news agenda and broader online trends within the content to improve search discoverability and ensure the content is as timely, relevant and interesting as possible.

Measuring The Success Of Content With Google Analytics

Google Analytics should be used to improve content relevance and interest in the same way that the digital and social media dashboard will be used to inform what we are doing on our social and digital channels.

The home page could in fact be curated in such a way that we look to boost the position of and emphasis on content that is demonstrably proving interesting and engaging to visitors based on key metrics such as time spent on a story, number of views, bounce rate etc.

Optimizing The Content For Sharing

The nature of media consumption in 2014 has seen a shift from people seeking out news and information to them discovering it from their friends and other influencers on social channels.

Therefore the stories we publish on our website should be optimized to capitalise on the potential for summaries, images and multimedia content being ‘pulled through’ by social channels when links are posted.

Facebook, for example, aims to pull through a thumbnail image and paragraph summary of every link posted. However, we can customise this content to make it as engaging, pithy and shareable as possible with tailored summaries and graphics.

Twitter has taken this process one step further with its Twitter Cards. Twitter Cards allow for significantly more multimedia content to be incorporated directly into people’s timelines when links are posted.

At present a link from the www.sheffield.ac.uk domain does not render a Twitter Card so we are missing out an opportunity to automatically create large summary images, native videos and photo galleries directly into people’s streams whenever links are posted by any Twitter user.

We should change this for home page stories going forward to maximise the potential impact and interest of our content on social media.

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DIGITAL & SOCIAL | THE UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD | 2014

TwitterA Non-Stop Stream Of Conversations & Content

Twitter has evolved into one of this generation’s primary sources for news and information but using the platform to its fullest potential relies on understanding the importance of conversations and context and how they work in combination with content.

Content Distribution & Twitter Cards

Twitter used to be an extremely simple platform based on 140 characters worth of text, links and photographs. However, the introduction of Twitter Cards has opened up more options for content distribution as people increasingly stay ‘within the stream’ on their tablets and smartphones.

The first step to take with Twitter Cards is to optimize our own web pages with the appropriate HTML code to enable the creation of interesting summary cards when the links are posted.

There are a number of different Twitter cards that can be engineered including photos, galleries, article summaries and videos that natively appear in the stream.

Getting The Content Right For Twitter By Adding Context

The problem with Twitter as a news and information distribution channel is that everybody is constantly scrambling to be first to tell the story.

Therefore an effective way to use Twitter is to think about what we can add in terms of additional multimedia content.

Extra content should serve to add further context and give people a reason to be interested enough to choose our story over another version.

For example, we often post links to our press releases on Twitter - however there is little to differentiate the content within our links to that within the media coverage secured on The Guardian or The Huffington Post for example.

Therefore, it would be more useful to us to produce supplementary social-specific content such as images, graphics and short form videos that add value to our story and help us stand out from the crowd and retain the interest of our audience.

Tapping Into Conversations

Twitter is a two-way street and one of its greatest strengths is that it facilitates direct conversations between us and members of our target audiences.

To maximise the efficiency of this we need to monitor the subjects of conversation and have a structure in place that allows the right person within the University to respond and add as much value as possible.

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DIGITAL & SOCIAL | THE UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD | 2014

FacebookA Socially Curated Newspaper & Storybook

Facebook is one of the most mature platforms in the social marketplace and it is important to consider its evolution in order to best utilise it on behalf of the University.

Facebook is now increasingly looking to act as a personalised newspaper for its users and this refined proposition is a clear effort to keep itself relevant at a time when single use apps and platforms are usurping one-stop-shop social networks.

What is becoming apparent as Facebook evolves its news feed and develops apps like ‘Paper’ is that more emphasis is being placed on Facebook curating top quality content and delivering it to the people that are likely to find it interesting, engaging and emotionally stimulating.

Produce Tailored Content

To produce quality content for Facebook there are two important questions to be asked.

Firstly, have we tailored the subject matter of our post to be as interesting and captivating as possible? Secondly, are we using the right post type and multimedia assets to tell the story as best we can?

The different post types on Facebook allow us to distribute words, images, videos and audio and the different combinations of multimedia assets should be considered in the planning of every story we want to tell.

Use Sponsored Stories To Reach More People

As part of the content strategy and editorial calendar it is important to include a process for evaluating which key stories we should ‘promote’ on Facebook to maximise their reach.

Using small amounts of promotion frequently is a great way to grow the audience for our content and deliver it into the news feeds of more people.

Understand Why EdgeRank Is Vital To Us

Facebook’s engagement metrics (likes, comments and shares) are incredibly important for creating a successful presence on the platform.

Unlike on Twitter where every follower will see every piece of your content in the chronological waterfall of posts, Facebook tries to curate the content that appears in people’s news feeds based on the likelihood that it will be of interest to them. This means that not all of a page’s fans will see every post made.

Therefore, it is hugely important to craft each piece of content to inspire engagement so that Facebook will consistently be provided with data that implies our stories, photos, videos and links are interesting.

This will serve to secure a place for future content in more people’s news feeds.

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DIGITAL & SOCIAL | THE UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD | 2014

YouTubeA Hub For Entertaining & Educational Videos

YouTube is the most popular video sharing platform on the planet and with video becoming an ever important asset in digital marketing it is important that our YouTube channel is firing on all cylinders.

Produce The Right Types Of Videos

YouTube is not a platform for distributing overly slick corporate videos because that type of content simply isn’t what the audience is looking for.

The success of a YouTube channel is defined by how interesting your videos are. Now, ‘interesting’ in a YouTube sense can be defined by asking:

- Is this video entertaining/will it make people laugh?- Is this video inspiring/is there a strong emotional angle?- Is this video educational and informative?- Does this video tell a really interesting story?

The content strategy for YouTube should be centred around these questions. Making the videos ‘interesting’ first and promotional second is the only way to find an audience and hold their attention long enough to change their perceptions and opinions of the University.

Learn From Audience Consumption Habits

Within YouTube’s admin section there is a fairly comprehensive analytics function that provides

in-depth information on which videos are working and which ones aren’t.

These analytics should be used as a starting point to construct and improve the video strategy.

Using data on which videos are most popular, which videos retain people’s attention for the longest amount of time and which videos people are most likely to engage with will help us to more consistently produce video content that finds an audience rather than simply sitting unwatched on our channel.

Produce More Series Based Content

Series-based content can work well on YouTube as it allows you to build an audience that will return to your videos and content on multiple occasions.

As part of the content strategy and editorial calendar we should look for patterns and themes in the stories of our University that would work well as part of a video series and factor them into our planning.

Equally we should look to create series based content around the news agenda and zeitgeist that is likely to give us valuable content for engaging people on other social channels in conversations taking place at the time.

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DIGITAL & SOCIAL | THE UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD | 2014

Ideas For Next Steps

1. Agree Digital & Social Team Objectives, Priorities & Targets The first step in the process should be to clarify the objectives, priorities and targets of the team so that we can develop a comprehensive action plan on how to do what needs to be done and hit our targets.

With the workload planned out more it will allow us to understand our capacity for more experimental, reactive and fast paced ad hoc content production that is an essential component of digital and social activity.

2. Outline Social & Digital Strategy Within A Content Framework & Editorial Calendar It would be beneficial to create a framework that outlines the composition of created, curated and commissioned content as well as an editorial calendar that can be used to plan content and develop a more focused collaborative approach on projects with the wider team.

This calendar should be dynamic and iterative while providing a broad indication of where we are heading.

3. Develop A Content Workflow To Share With Media & Marketing Team A content workflow would be useful for helping the media and marketing teams approach stories and projects from a digital first mindset.

This document would provide an overview of the different types of digital content we can produce, their uses, timescales and how they can maximise the reach/impact of their stories.

4. Implement Dynamic Dashboard/Content Strategy Review Process With the new Digital & Social Analytics Dashboard in place from January 2014 onwards, we should implement a clear structure for using the document to inform our content strategy and editorial calendar going forward.

This should be used to help us determine things like frequency, type and content of social media posts and length and subject matter for audiovisual content.

5. Implement Newsroom Processes To Improve Pace, Quality & Newsworthiness Of Content Adopting newsroom practices such as editorial conferences, daily/weekly content deadlines and a reactive approach to the news agenda will help us create more engaging digital and social content.

Thinking more about what is interesting to our audiences first will also help us to tailor our content to be more engaging and shareable.

6. Create Platform Guides & Content Advice Documents To Drive Quality Content Production & Engagement Creating platform guides and editorial guidance documents for social media managers across the University will help us to improve the quality of content being produced across the many profiles.

These documents will offer tiered levels of guidance to make sure that all social profiles carrying the university name are working to an appropriate standard.

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Andrew [email protected]

The University of Sheffield