Layla, Lynn, and Elizabeth’s ninja tips for engaging your audiences:
General
- Don’t auto-post everything to everywhere, but do learn how to selectively auto-post in your chosen platforms.
- Check out the administrative interface of every platform you use – you’d be surprised at how much information is available on things like which links got clicked, who likes you, what they’re doing, etc.
- Use URL shorteners and your regular web analytics tool to track how effective your posts are. (Are people clicking on what you want them to click on?)
- When people contact you (@ replies, direct messages, posts to your FB page’s wall), respond.
- Don’t forget about direct mail, which is still the most effective way to reach people, and email, which is still the most effective online way to reach people.
- Figure out ways to reward your most ardent supporters, and make sure they’re ways that are meaningful to them.
- Don’t ask LESS of social media in regards to ROI than your other communications channels…but don’t ask MORE, either.
- Make sure more than one person in your organization knows something about your chosen tools – you don’t want everything to come to a screeching halt if s/he chooses to leave.
- Dial back your efforts on the platforms that aren’t helping you meet you goals, so you can dial up your efforts on those that are.
- Regularly revisit your goals to ensure your tools and efforts are still meeting your needs.
- Follow thought leaders to keep up on the newest tools and new features your existing tools may have added.
- Promote your top social media outlets in your e-mail signatures and business cards to drive visits and use.
- Tag your items using searchable keywords and include those in descriptions whenever possible. That’s how people will find your stuff online.
- Understand Twitter’s #hashtag power – they spread your words far beyond your followers – and use a tool to track how far your tweets spread.
- Use general hashtags (#nonprofit, #marketing) to help your tweets get more exposure.
- BUT don’t use more than 2-3 hashtags per tweet.
- Use a real picture of yourself for a personal account and a logo for a branded account.
- If it’s taken you a while to respond, RT the original tweet in your response. It will help give the person you are responding to context.
- Check the trending topics every time you log into to Twitter to see if there are any ties you can make to the association’s content.
- Thank those from your target market (i.e. potential or current members) for following you.
- Create a general hashtag for the profession or trade and use it religiously when you have any content that relates to the profession. Avoid weird spellings or shortenings if possible to make it easier for them to appear in Twitter searches.
- Identify in the Twitter bio which employee(s) monitor the Twitter account to give others a sense of who they are talking with.
- Don’t forget to brand your Twitter background. Use it as an opportunity to inform other Twitter users about your other channels or as a place to promote upcoming events.