15 Tips for All Social Media Administrators
1. Reason for social media. Are you trying to communicate a campaign, generally promote
your department, and communicate with constituents? How will your social media presence
be different than other communications with your audience?
2. Define your goals. Before jumping into social media for your department, program,
or office, spend some time determining what you want to accomplish. Understanding
this will help you choose the appropriate tools, create relevant content, and understand
the best way to reach your target audience.
3. Post regularly and consistently. Posting too much can cause your audience to leave
the community. So can posting too little. No platform should go more than two weeks
without any activity.
4. Be accurate. Be sure that content is timely, relevant, and interesting, as well
as credible and consistent with your professional role and with UWG’s standards. Make
sure all of the details and facts are accurate and grammatically correct before posting
or responding to inquiries. It’s better to verify information with a source first
than to have to post a correction or retraction later. Cite and link to sources whenever
possible.
5. Correct your mistakes. If you make an error, correct it quickly and visibly. Deleting
inaccurate data is discouraged on social media because of the amount of emphasis put
on transparency, so it is important to get things right on the first post.
6. Regularly monitor university social media sites.
7. Be prepared to accept and respond to comments. Social media is, by design, a conversation
and not a one-way broadcast.
8. Have a comment response plan. Both positive and negative comments require a response
from the organization in a timely manner. Who will respond to these comments? What
is your unit’s acceptable time frame?
9. Treat every post like it will make headline news. Remember that media professionals
are monitoring social media for lead stories. Should the media contact you, please
contact UCM before responding.
10. Be a valued member of the social media community. If you join a social network,
make sure you are contributing valuable insights and posting quality content regularly.
11. Be responsible and judicious. Please keep in mind that comments may be made that
aren’t favorable or may not coincide with your own personal views. Take the high ground
and be civil in your postings and responses.
12. Avoid profanity and obscenity. Stay away from statements involving sensitive language,
including but not limited to obscene language, profanity, or ethnic slurs.
13. Do not engage in a back-and-forth argument. We respect freedom of speech as long
as it does not violate any guidelines, laws, etc.
14. Measure results. To evaluate post activity and interaction with a community, make
use of analytics and tracking tools, which can help to refine your strategy and better
understand your audience’s preferences and behaviors.
15. Adjust. Be prepared to realign your strategy in response to who is viewing your
site and how they are doing so. If you realize that social media is not meeting your
needs or the needs of your audience or public, it is best to close the account rather
than leave it inactive.
Profile Recommendations
Content is Everything
Accessibility
As social media managers, it’s up to us to create accessibility content on the web
and on social media. With that said, certain platforms now offer ways to create accessibility
content for users who may have vision and hearing impairments. This is now best practices
and should be implemented within an content strategy. Below are ways to create accessible
content on social media.
Analytics
Disclaimer
Post a link (https://www.westga.edu/ucm/social-media-disclaimer) to this Disclaimer on your site.
“The University of West Georgia (UWG) welcomes the exchange of ideas about university
programs, issues, events, and activities on social media websites. The material posted
does not necessarily represent the views or policies of the university. The university
reserves the right to remove pages, posts, comments, or other content from UWG social
media sites that do not adhere to university standards. The university may remove
content that is deemed a violation of intellectual property rights or privacy laws,
commercial or promotion of organizations or programs not related to or affiliated
with the university, or otherwise in violation of applicable policy or law. By submitting
content to any UWG social media site, users understand and acknowledge that this information
is available to the public and that UWG may use this information for internal and
external promotional purposes. Links to content or other Internet sites should not
be construed as an endorsement of the organizations, entities, views, or content contained
therein. UWG is not responsible for the content of those external websites. Also be
aware that other participants may use posted information beyond the control of UWG.
Users who do not wish to have information they have made available via these sites
used, published, copied, and/or reprinted, should not post on the social media sites.”
