Communicating With Constituents via Social Media

7/31/2019 Communicating With Constituents via Social Media

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Communicating with ConstituentsUsing Social MediaPresented to the Georgia Democratic House CaucusJanuary 25, 2012 (Updated: June 2012)

Presented by Audience Matters, Inc.

(404) 913-3340 * [email protected] * www.myaudiencematters.com

Winning the Future Begins with Engagement


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Who Am I and What Do I Knowabout Social Media?

Im Dahna Chandler, a professional social media, digital publicity and

editorial content development strategist.

I am an award-winning journalist and former reporter for Black Enterprisemagazine and other major publications and websites.

Ive worked with nonprofits, government agencies, small businesses, arts

organizations, artists and politicians.

Ive been conducting social media marketing strategy since 1992 and used

it in 1998 to make myself an international journalist.

Ive created and executed successful social media and digital publicity

campaigns since 1992.

I have approximately 17,000 friends, followers, fans and connections andsubscribers across social media.

I manage multiple social media accounts for clients.

Im a social media marketing fanatic. Passion counts!

2012. Audience Matters, Inc. All Rights Reserved.


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In this Presentation, Youll Learn

What constitutes social media.

What the focus of your social media efforts should be.

What social media networks are most important to and

most used by most constituents. The basics of using those social media networks

effectively.

The basics of measuring your social media

effectiveness. Where to get started (or re-started) and how to keep

engagement going.



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What constitutes social media?

Social media combines online technology and socialinteraction to share content that is interesting, high-quality and/or valuable to a common group of individuals.Content includes:

video and audio content

photos, images, cartoons

posted textstatus updates, tweets, blog articles

documents, slides, news articles, polls

Social media in the political context is developing adialogue(two-way conversation) with your constituentsabout whats most meaningful and important to them.



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Why Social Media, Why Now?

Social media is no longer a novelty; its necessary.

It must be part of your political organizations 360 messaging strategy.

Your constituents are on social media and expect you tobe there, too.

Your constituents want engagementtwo-wayconversation withyounot a monologue fromyou theway you would communicate to them traditionally.

Its the best way to garner support, get volunteers, hirestaff, build an organization, generate influence andmaintain communication with constituents.



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Besides, youre probably on social media

whether you know it or not.

so, what are they saying and dont you want to help influence

the discussion? If so, then, you need to effectively use socialmedia.

People are probably talking about you on social media

2012. Audience Media, Inc. All Rights Reserved.


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But, there are more reasons to engage withconstituents on social media.

2012. Audience Matters Media, Inc. All Rights Reserved.


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Six Reasons You Need to Engage withConstituents on Social Media

1. To develop relationships because constituents supportlegislators they know, like and trust.

2. Its an ideal, relatively inexpensive, fast constituent servicestool; youll learn about your constituents in a way that helps

you effectively aid them with theirs issues and concerns.

3. To influence constituents, share and get support for yourlegislative agenda, initiatives and causes and raiseawareness of issues by sharing relevant-to-constituents andsupporters content.

4. To connect meaningfully with the media and volunteers.5. To encourage your constituents and supporters to influence

others on your behalf.

6. To learn about detractors and manage your online/social

media reputation and presence. 2012. Audience Matters, Inc. All Rights Reserved.


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What are some well-known social media

platforms?

Facebook

Twitter

YouTube

LinkedInGoogle+

Flickr

Blog Talk Radio

Blogs

Wikipedia



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But, those are just a few



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So, Which Should You Be On?



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At a minimum, you need to be on:

Facebook

Twitter

LinkedIn

YouTube

Which combination depends on your purpose for usingsocial media, what kind of networking you will do on

social media, the kind of content you or yourorganization will share and what your overall messagingstrategy is.



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But, before you get started, here are 10Constituent Rules of Engagement

you should know



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10 Basics of Constituent Engagement onSocial Media

1. Be transparent, credible, authentic. Constituents spotfakes quickly and faking is worse than not trying at all.

2. Remember, it is meant to be a natural extension of you,the legislator, and the legislation, issues and causesyoure championing on behalf of your constituents.

3. But, its about yourconstituents, not you.

4. Do you research. Know what your constituents careabout and post relevant content and responses to them.

5. Remember, this is a two-way conversation. Be willing toask questions, even hard ones, and be involved in anhonest dialogueeven when challenged.



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10 Basics of Constituent Engagement onSocial Media

6. Remember what you say anywhereon social media may beshared everywhereon social media.

7. You must dedicate resources appropriately to social mediaengagement meaning using professional strategy and help to

supervise interns or volunteers.8. Dont just set up an account on a network and neglect to

monitor or update it regularly with fresh, new content orrespond to constituents or supporters or allow someone whodoesnt know what theyre doing to do it for you.

9. Know when and what to post in order to capture and engagewith the audience that will benefit your organization.

10. Knowyour message and stayon message.



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And, now, the verybasics of usingFacebook, Twitter, YouTube and LinkedIn

In other words, these tips are just the beginning.



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Facebook

Set up Facebook Profiles, Pages, Groups or Causes andmake them social search (keyword) optimized.

Share your legislative initiatives, your votes, key issues ofconcern in your district or in the state.

Ask constituents to share their concerns, ideas, opinions andvalues then RESPOND; this is a discussion platform.

Share personal (carefully!), business or political content ornews and values.

Conduct polls and rally supporters around particular causes.

Announce appearances, specific legislative activities, townhall meetings or other events.

Post podcasts, photos and videos (but dont forget to give

them captions or descriptions and tag people).



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Facebook (contd)

Share internal content created by your organization andexternal content created by outside sources.

Dont just post content about yourself; post or allow

posting of constituent or supporter content.

Ask and answerquestions (including hard ones that mayget answers you dont like), start discussions, respondtoposts, deal with detractors.

Give constituents and supporters ways to connect withyou (invite to events, the State Capitol, call times, etc.).Let them know youre available to hear their concerns.

Be authentic and transparent. Be natural. Beapproachable. Be relevant.



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Twitter

Its a microblogging site thats not much different to usethan texting. In fact, you can tweet from your smartphone.

You share information about yourself, your agenda withyour constituents and information from them withfollowers in under 140 characters.

Share links to valuable content.

Find and follow constituents and supporters; share theirtweets by retweeting.

Retweeting encourages people to follow you andretweet your content.



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Twitter (contd)

Find and follow members of the media and tweet pressreleases; develop relationships with news organizationsand journalists. (Useful for publicity.)

Share photos of your events and activities, videos youmade about what youre doing or of press interviews you

got; audio recordings, including podcasts.

Do tweetup events, live tweeting of town halls or tweetmeets town halls to connect with constituents and

supporters.

Remember that twitter is about conversations, not justpushing your own content, initiatives, ideas or opinions.



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YouTube

Share pre-recorded videos and conduct live events.

Create and upload messages in response to otherlegislators, state officials or the governors speeches or

announcements.

Share segments of sessions where youve introduced

legislation, have presented (or have been presented),commendations, awards, proclamations, made importantannouncements, etc.

Share content made by or for supporting or opposinglegislators and respond to detractors, media reports.



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YouTube (contd)

Share constituent and supporter videos of outside eventscreated by them, media or your staff.

Make use of the Favorites and Playlist features to collect

and share other users videos on your channel.

Link your Facebook and Twitter accounts to your YouTubeChannel to share content across platforms.

Share video content directly from YouTube in emails and onyour website.

Keep adding fresh content to your YouTube Channel; addnew content at leastseveral times a month.

New content doesnt always mean your own but it should be

yours most of the time.



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LinkedIn

LinkedIn is primarily for business networking and many smallbusiness owners and nonprofits use it.

Perceived by some as more professional than Facebook somore comfortable for these constituents and supporters to

use. Most of you are entrepreneurs who understand their issues so

connect with those constituents and supporters here.

Join groups that your constituents and supporters aremembers of to monitor their interests, concerns, opinions and

values.

Do research by using Answers or posting questions to

groups to ask specific questions about small business and

nonprofit issues, social concerns, political issues, etc.



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LinkedIn (contd)

Post your own blog articles (if you blog for business) andother content created by you.

Use for your business activities not just legislative affairsas a way for constituents and supporters to learn aboutyou, professionally.

Create a profile with a full work/business history, start aCompany page, follow other professionals, experts,strategists and legislators.

Build your credibility by learning and leveraging theplatforms features.



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A Word or Three on Websites

You need a basic website to facilitate your social media (andoverall messaging) strategy.

Its often the first place where many go to find out about you

and where you are on social media.

You can put content from social media on your website todrive people to your social media accounts.

Use it to build lists for email campaigns.

You can put more content on your website than you can onmost social media platforms.

Keep it up-to-date with recent content; know search enginecontent rules because they change.

Make sure you link to it from your social media accounts.

Make sure your websites are keyword optimized. 2012. Audience Matters, Inc. All Rights Reserved.


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Getting started on social media and keepingthe engagement going.



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Prepare & Integrate

Make sure you do your demographic research. Its best to

integrate social media strategy into your overall messagingand media plan.

You need to know what social media platforms your

constituents and supporters use most frequently and commitresources there.

Know how youll integrate social media into your overall

messaging strategy; it should, for example, overlap with youremail marketing and be part of your publicity strategy.

Combine social media with offline networking (like tweetupsand Facebook and LinkedIn events) to build relationships thatmake your other media, messaging and advertising initiativeseasier.



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Cover All Social Media Bases

Are there other social media platforms you need to be on likePinterest, Viddy, Flickr, Foursquare, Instagram or Blog TalkRadio?

Are your constituents on ethnic, lifestyle, values or gender

specific platforms, too? Are they on forums or listservs?

Only robust research into your messaging needs will tell youthat.

2012. Audience, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

D l S i l M di St t f E h


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Develop a Social Media Strategy for EachPlatform You Use

Theyre all different and require a different but integratedstrategy.

This is where you decide whether youll continue to do

social media yourself or hire an expert or strategist.

Dont use an inexperienced intern or volunteer. Theywont know the professional social media strategies you

need to use to be successful and may not understandconstituent relations.

How you use each platform should be determined by thesocial media strategy you developed as part of youroverall messaging plan.


D l S i l M di St t f E h


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Develop a Social Media Strategy for EachPlatform You Use

But develop a social media plan for each social mediaplatform that incorporates each social media network asseamlessly as possible into your overall strategy.

Know the language and methods of use and sharing for

each platform.

Youll need to know how to build a fanbase and findfriends on Facebook, get subscribers on YouTube, findfollowers on Twitter, make connections and join the right

groups on LinkedIn. Again, make sure you integrate the social media

platforms with one another and your social media intoyour overall messaging strategy.


After developing (or revising) your


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After developing (or revising) yoursocial media strategy

You create your first or revamp your current social mediaaccounts.

You find appropriate friends, fans, connections, subscribersand followers among your constituents and supporters.

Begin sharing content and engaging in discussions with themonline.

To show genuine interest in constituent and supporterengagement, on social media, ask, ask, askpeople toconnect with you on social.

You do this via email, your website, ads, at events, duringinterviews and speeches and in all other messagingcampaigns and vehicles both online and offline (print andbroadcast media, for example).


After developing (or revising) your


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After developing (or revising) yoursocial media strategy

You conduct ongoing demographic and legislativeresearch using social media tools like surveys, polls anddiscussions to find out what your constituents want, needor are thinking.

You share appropriate personal and businessinformation about yourself to humanize yourself. Let yourconstituents and supporters get to know you.

You post constant requests for involvementask

constituents and supporters to volunteer, join, help,participate, share and comment.

Keep your website current, fresh and interactive so yourconstituents will keep going back and keep engagingwith you online and on social media.


Get Started (or re started) yesterday


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Get Started (or re-started) yesterdaybut do so strategically.

Rushing into social media can do more harm than good.

Once you start conducting social media activities, you mustcontinue them regularly and do them right. Failing to do socan ruin your engagement strategy, lowering support.

Not understanding with whom youre trying to engage andhow to effectively engage them is a turn off to social mediasavvy constituents and supporters.

We already know saying or doing the wrong thing on socialmedia can ruin your reputation. What happenson socialmedia stayson social mediaforever. (Think Rep. AnthonyWeiner (D-NY).)

But, be as aware of what others are saying aboutyouas whatyou say on social media.


Get Started (or re started) yesterday


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Get Started (or re-started) yesterdaybut do so strategically.

We know damaging your reputation or having it damaged bysomeone else on social media is more costly thanoffline...except if you do it on television. Actually, its close

reallyclose.

Learn what not to do on social media by researching socialmedia blunders and try to avoid them.

Make sure your media strategist is involved in your socialmedia activities.

If your media strategist isnt a social media expert, either hire

one who is or hire a separate social media strategist.

Commit the necessary time and resources to a strong socialmedia strategy for social media success.



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Monitor & Measure Effectiveness

Set up Google Alerts to learn what people and the media aresaying about you online.

At a minimum, use Google analytics to track web traffic andtools like YouTube Insights, Hootsuite Analytics, Twitter

Counter, Social Mention, LinkedIn statistics and FacebookInsights to monitor effectiveness on social media. (There aremany others, too.)

However, you need to understand those tools and how to usethem in order to develop effective metrics and analyze data.

The best measure of your success is the level of actualconstituent engagement on your social media accounts andwhat your constituents and supporters (and the media) aresaying online and off about you and your organization.



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Monitor & Measure Effectiveness

For example, shares and comments on Facebook (as well asongoing discussions), retweets on Twitter and direct engagementand mentions anywhere on social media (positive, negative,neutral) are measurements you should care about.

Monitoring allows you to shift, tweak or scrap strategies that are not

working and increase activity that is.



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A Final Word

In politics, social media can be used as:

A marketing tool.

A conversation with constituents and supporters.

A gauge of your civic responsibility.

Any or all of the above, depending on an organization orlegislators political strategy or requirements.

However, regardless of the social media tool used, themessage (and its dissemination methods) remains themost critical part of any political messaging strategy.



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Audience Matters Media, Inc.When Your Audience Matters, Your Message Matters

Audience-Driven Social Web Branding Strategy

(404) 913-3340

#audiencematters

(404) 913-3340

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Communicating With Constituents via Social Media