Creating a social media community that every student wants to join

18 June, 16.00-17.0 CEST

Noah Kuchins – San Francisco State UniversityGuido de Wilde – University of Amsterdam

Why universities (or any other organisation) should embrace the [social] in Social Media?The social web is

becoming more like a realityIn fact, that is why

[social] media are still growing

It is not as [dynamic] as we are.

In the behavioral sense, people are acting the same as

always…

However, we can now analyze,

interpret and predict [social] behaviors across the globe, across language

barriers, and cultures...

Thanks toWhere does international education fit in?Where does it not?

The Elements of

[social]

Channels Listening Engagement

Community Building Mobile Groups

• Creators• Conversationalist

s• Critics• Collectors• Joiners• Spectators• Inactives

Levels of Participation

Poll 1

Paul Adams: the real life social network

Social Media is a means to an

end… you need to understand

what the end is.

ChannelsFacebook has +1 billion users

Youtube is the 2nd largest search engine

...where the audience is.

The future…

…belongs to teenagers

China is a whole different ballgame...

Traditional media are one-way...

• Newspaper• Magazine• television

...Social Media are two-way(e.g. “Mean Tweets” on Jimmy Kimmel)

Listening to your costumers and what they’re saying online is the best way to

understand your customers and how, where, and why they

are discussing your brand.Li & Berhoff, “The Groundswell” 2009

Listening

What to Listen for...

Listening

[social]• Visual

Activity• Key words• Sentiments

[stats]• Number of students reached• Number of posts• Number of likes, shares, retweets

Once you listen, not monitor, but truly listen to customer activity and observe online behavior, you cannot help but feel both empathy and harmony. Empathy is the secret ingredient in what I refer to

as the ART of Engagement. It is the source of inspiring desired Actions, Reactions, and

Transactions that means something to all those involved in commerce and relationship models.

Brian Solis http://www.briansolis.com/2012/03/social-media-is-about-social-science-not-technology/

Engagement

• 90% of the community obeserves

• 9% of the community will occasionally have an active contribution

• 1% is very active. Superfans

Target superfans

• Identify positive contributions• Show appreciation• Ask opinion• Give them a role

Content• Personal• Trustworthy• Neutral• Timely• Likeable• Shareable• Interactive• Simple• Student generated

Strategies• Timing is

important• Exclusive

content• Interaction• Be personal• Draw attention• Use photos

Get everyone involved• Creators, ask students to help build the page• Conversationalists, offer option to update status• Critics, create tools to create improvements• Collectors, provide information to share with the

network• Joiners, provide info on other interesting

pages/groups• Spectators, post information to read/use• Inactives, give instructions on how to use social

media

Community Building

Objective:

• How will a social media community support your work?

• What is the added value?

• Are there measurable targets?

• What defines success?

Understanding BehaviorWhen considering student behaviors on

social networks, it’s important to think about:Relevance Immediacy

+=

Target Audience

• Prospective Students?• Current international students?• Exchange Students

(inbound/outbound)?• Partner institutions and

organizations?

Community Building

• Is the community open or closed?

• Big or small?• Defines target audience?• Relevant and immediate?

• Destination [groups] per semester for incoming & outgoing students

• Fellow exchange student [groups]• International Student Organization [groups] & [pages]• Host University [page] • Home University international office [page]

Community Examples for International Students on Facebook

Management

• Establish rules: do’s and don’ts• Assign a community manager• Pick a style of moderation (community or central)• Reward active community members

Roles of a Community Manager

• Explorer: find out what interests, motivates, influences and challenges. Be curious, dare to ask, analyze findings

• Builder: build relationships, react to community, make new content, dare to experiment

• Translator: share findings, translate findings to organizations

UvA Students Born in 1990A Study

2013–2.405.000.000 people on internet1995 – 16.000.000 people on internet

1995 – Altavista search engine

1997 – Google

2000 – Wifi

2004 – Facebook

2005 - Youtube

2006 – Twitter2007 – Iphone

Media Use of Students

• Include graph

Contact International Office

• Before • During exchange

Using Facebook

• In the Netherlands• While on exchange

Channel to find information1. Host uni website

2. UvA website

3. Blackboard info database

4. Contacts former exchange students

5. Student reports

6. Destination specific facebook groups

7. UvA paper brochures

8. Host uni brochures

9. General UvA facebook page

10. Host uni facebook page

11. Host uni youtube

12. UvA youtube

Takeaways

• Students have grown up in a digital world• Very frequent use of internet, social media

and mobile phone in everyday life• Preference of face-to-face and email contact

with i.o. Not facebook• Practical information found on websites and

databases• Experiences shared face-to-face, reports, and

social media

Poll 2

Groups

• [I]nternational• [E]ducation• [E]xchange• [C]ouncil

317 members

Show several graphs of activity

Priority registration

• Show example

Spoking

• Groups that form bigger groups• Activity migrates to spoke groups

Marketing

• How is Social Media being used in International Higher Education beyond advertising, posting and gaining fans, followers, views and likes?

Marketing• Youtube video blogs• Facebook coverphoto campaigns• Twitter keywords• Twitter newsfeed engagement• Target language / location based / date specific• Website Automation• Country specific facebook groups• Chinese social media• Wordpress plugins• Facebook events

Social Media Transitions

• So... Where’s it going and how does it help me?

• Impact: Students will be able to become more social offline while being even more connected online and so will you...

• Gauge success by activity• Focus on building a community• Get everyone involved

Questions?