Digital Communications

[Katarina HongParticipant]

Think about how many emails you get on a daily basis. Your organization may send out tons of emails and post everything on their website to get out information. While that is effective, social media is a quick simple way to get the word out and interact with them. So, how can you use social media to effectively communicate with your audience?

Things on social media have to be short and sweet. A simple summary and picture on Facebook or Instagram or something under 140 characters on Twitter. Social media is becoming a source where people want to find information about events or what’s going on with you. It also gives you a chance to show your personality and make things look more interesting.

GovDelivery came out with a checklist, 5 Steps to Government Success in Social Media. It states that 1 and every 4 minutes spent on the Internet is on a social network. That is a ton of time on social network sites! Government organizations need to know how social media is an effective tool they should utilize.

Step 1: Understand. To fully grasp the power that social media has, you have to understand it. First, you need to figure out the rules on different social networks. Know the potential it has to reach to your audience and how you can communicate with them. You also need to understand your audience. Send out a survey and see how they want information brought to them and what you can do to better engage them.

Step 2: Focus. Government organizations need to focus on how audiences are getting their information. Obviously, email is a huge factor to get information out because it is a digital world. You should use this as an opportunity to direct people to your social media sites. Have your social accounts linked and noticeable so people will be directed towards it. Once you target your audience to social sites, your followers will increase.

Step 3: Visualize. Social media is all about visual content. It needs to look appealing and have all the information. In a recent GovLoop survey, 80% of government agencies on Facebook said photos are the most popular content. Clearly, photos are effective and people are drawn to pictures more.

Step 4: Measure. Measuring the reach you have from your social network sites is so important. What’s the point of using these sites if you can’t see how engaging you are? There are so many analytic tools to help you measure these stats. Going over these numbers will help you better use social media sites. You will be able to see what is working and what’s not.

Step 5: Monitor. You should always be up with the times. Of course, things change over time like how Pinterest has become a big social media platform. There are always new ways to connect to your audience. You always have you basics like Facebook and Twitter but trying new things and following the trends could help you engage with people better.

Overall, social media is a great way to engage and connect with your audience. In a growing digital world, we need to effectively digitally communicate. Using social networks gives you another way to connect. The digital world is always evolving so you will need to adapt your strategy to your audience.

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