1. Skills for change Using digital media
“This session is split in to three sections. The first section is a presentation detailing 10 tips to remember when using digital media in campaigns. The second session is group-work, where students are put back in to campaign teams and asked to apply those tips to the campaign they are working on. The final section is an opportunity to feedback ideas, and to discuss improvements between groups.
It’s an interactive session, so please do shout if you have any questions or son’t understand anything.”
Using digital media

2. Learning objectives
Learn the ten top tips for using digital media for campaigning
Explore how you can apply these tips when creating a campaign plan

3. Tip one: understand your audiences
Who’s following you on twitter and who’s looking at your website?
Look at your followers and who replies to posts
Do this for all of your channels
Build an understanding of what your audience respond to
Use this link to help:
“To be successful at inspiring people to get involved through digital media, you need to spend some time working out who uses each platform. For example, is it mainly students following you on Twitter, and who looks at your website? When you understand this you can start to work out what messages and content would be relevant for each digital platform. You can do this by simply looking through who follows you and who has responded to previous posts on digital media. You can also pay for a media monitoring software that will help give you a bit more background on who your audiences are. By doing this, you will instantly become more relevant to your followers and this should help increase engagement in campaign activity.
An example of a tool you could use to learn more about your followers: which will be on a handout I’ll give you all at the end.”

4. Tip two: build an online community
Be relevant to new and old followers
Communication is a two-way process
Post information that is valuable to your audiences
Post simple campaign actions
Make a plan to interact with audiences
“Once you’ve started to understand your audiences, you need to build a network by interacting with them about information they are interested in. Ensure that you remain relevant to your current audience while trying to attract more followers. Communication is a two-way process and you need to post information online that is valuable to your audiences. When you start to gain interaction, then you can tap in to this and post simple campaign asks. If you do already use digital media for campaigning, make sure that you also have a plan to interact with your audiences outside of the big campaign asks. Digital media is a good way of informing your audiences of the issues.
Useful blog from Social Media Today about online community building: which will be on a handout I’ll give you all at the end.”

5. Tip three: interact with your online influencers
Work out who your big online influencers are
Who sets the trends?
Send them direct messages, have conversations with them about your campaign
Ask them to spread the word to increase campaign activity
Online influencers may not be those with the biggest following
“At this point, you will have analysed your followers and thought about how to build your online community. The next step is to work out who your big influencers are online. Who are the people that set the trends and that others follow? You can work this out using a number of different applications, just Google for social media monitoring tools. Once you know who they are you can direct messages at them, get in touch with them and have conversations with them about your campaigns. If they agree to help spread the word it will increase the reach of your messages and encourage more people to engage in online campaign activity. Remember that your online influencers may not always be those with the biggest following, they might just be the people that are the most passionate about the campaign. This can go a long way online.
Interesting infographic about online influencers from Mashable:
This article gives examples of how you can identify your online influencers:
Both of these websites will be on a handout that I’ll give you all at the end.”

6. Tip four: integrate your digital platforms
You can’t use digital media as your only method of communication
Use it with printed materials and other platforms
Ensure your image and message are consistent
Relevant content for the relevant channel
Think about how each one can interact with each other
“One piece of digital media isn’t a standalone communications tool, it works with printed materials and other platforms on digital media to make sure that image and message is consistent. This helps people identify with your campaign and your union. When you are creating a communications plan for your campaign, it is important to think back to which audience you are trying to talk to and what the best way to do that is. Don’t automatically write in a communications plan for Facebook, Twitter and YouTube – carefully select all the channels that you would like to use based on the networks of people that follow you and where your main online influencers are. Once you have carefully selected your channels, including those you use offline such as posters, think about how each one can interact with each other and write a plan based on that.
Here is a good case study video about how Bing! worked with Jay-Z’s publishers to create an integrated marketing campaign for the launch of Jay-Z’s new book:
A blog by Laura Lake about why integrated marketing is important:
A blog on big Dot Media about integrated advertising campaigns:
Again, all of these resources will be on the handout.”

7. Tip five: original content is everything
Content needs to be well thought out, linked together and relevant for the channel it’s on
Facebook has a higher interaction rate if you use images and videos
Allow yourself time to resource your content properly
Be creative with multimedia
“It doesn’t matter if you understand your audiences and have a consistent and engaging tone of voice if your content is not relevant. It isn’t enough to simply push out adverts about the campaign and its actions. Content needs to be well thought out, it needs to link together but it needs to be relevant for the channel it is on. For example, we know that Facebook has a higher interaction rate if you use images and videos. To be able to create original, quality content you need to ensure that it is resourced properly and that you allow yourself time to do this. Of course, with some reactionary campaigns it can be crucial to get your messages out as soon as possible but it is worth spending an extra hour getting the content right to ensure that it spreads the message as far as possible.
Article from Social Media Today about content marketing and why it’s important:
Further information about content marketing from Mikal E Belicove:
You can read them in detail later – they’re on the handout as well!”

8. Tip six: tone of voice is important
Accept that people will view your campaign differently
Don’t change your tone for different audiences
It’s important to engage people in activity that is relevant to them
Check your posts before publishing them
“The changes you are campaigning to achieve are serious, however that doesn’t mean your tone has to be. For this to work, you need to accept that people will view things in different ways but that doesn’t mean you should change your tone of voice for different audiences. When talking about a campaign, your tone does not need to be serious; you need to engage people in activity that is relevant to them. Re-read all your posts before you publish them and, if you have time, send them to a few people to ensure that the intended message is the one that people are reading.
Article by Philip Webb about finding your tone of voice online:
A blog by Kevan Gilbert that contains a simple tool to guide tone of voice:
Again, these will be on the handout.”

9. Tip seven: think about the structure of your post
Using links in tweets gets more retweets
Tag people in Facebook posts and tweets
Analyse the time when you get the most interaction
Blog posts should be no longer than 250 words
Think about using ‘Anger-Hope-Action’ in your campaign writing
Make sure your digital content is accessible to mobile users
“When creating your own content, you need to think of structure as well as tone of voice. We have already touched on the fact that you get more interaction on Facebook if you use a picture or a video. We also know that using links in Tweets gets more retweets, and if the link is have way through the post the chance of being retweeted is doubled. Try to include hashtags on tweets where you can and tag people in Facebook posts and tweets. To complement this, you should spend some time analysing the time that you get the most interaction. Is it over breakfast? Throughout the afternoon? When using YouTube make sure you tag the video properly – think about what your audience will be searching for around the issue. Blog posts should be no longer than 250 words and it is useful to think about the apathy staircase and anger-hope-action tools as a way of structuring your campaign writing. More people are using mobile devices to access digital media, think about if your digital content is accessible by mobile users.
A blog by Heather Leonard that examines the best times to tweet, what to put in Facebook posts and other social media tips:
That’ll be on the handout too!”

10. Tip eight: be prepared Proactive campaigns are great
More time to plan, target and achieve goals
Reactive campaigns require you to be prepared
Have a plan of action for launching a campaign
Create a flow diagram of activity
Only thing to react to will be to decide the message for each digital platform
Having a plan will allow for more time to develop the right messages
“A campaign can be proactive or reactive. If it’s proactive – great! You can spend your time planning how you are going to achieve your campaign aims online, using all the tips available to target the right people with the right information in the right way. However, when the time comes for you to react to a situation you must be prepared. Make sure that you have a plan of action for launching a campaign quickly online. This could include creating a flow diagram of activity so you know exactly what type of message to post on each digital platform to reach the right audience. The only thing that you will have to do to react is decide the message, the rest will be done for you. Having this plan in place will allow you to spend more time of developing the right messages.
More information can be found about crisis management here:
Although this article relates to communicating in a crisis, it is still useful to look at what you need to have ready. Applying these principles to a plan for a reactive campaign will come in very handy.”

11. Tip nine: respond Responding to people will:
Give them more trust in your campaign
Encourage them to engage in campaign activity
“People will always have questions and different opinions, and you need to provide them with a space online to have their say so you can respond accordingly. Responding to people will give them more trust in what you are doing and will engage them further in your campaign activity. Know when not to respond is more tricky. However, if you break people down in to three categories this can help make your decision, these are: people that are supporters, people that sit on the fence, and people that will not change their minds. If there are people online that are constantly disagreeing with that you say but offering no proactive solutions or alternatives then they fit in to the final category. Although these people can be ‘loud’ on social networks, it is still better to focus your activity on the other two categories of people by responding to them and engaging them in honest debate. And remember, only post things online that you are absolutely sure about and would say on a public podium. Think about your tone of voice, your message and your campaign aims.
An example of how not to respond:
That’ll be on the handout too!”

12. Tip ten: evaluate your work
Analyse your audiences activity
Use feedback to help you plan in future
Set up free monitoring tools
Recognise the work of online supporters
“You are never going to understand what works on social media if you are not analysing your audience’s reaction to your activity. Measuring your impact on digital media will also help you understand what role you had in creating the change, which is always good to feed in to an impact report. You will also be able to feed this back to the people online that helped you with the campaign. Recognising the work that your online supporters did is just as crucial as recognising the work of offline volunteers. You can evaluate your activity by using free media monitoring tools. Most of these tools need to be set up before the campaign takes place. It is harder with the free tools to go back over past activity, so make sure you build this in to your initial plan.
An article that includes links to free media monitoring tools:
How to make the most out of Google analytics:
Okay, that’s the end of the presentation and top tips – hope it wasn’t too much information to take on all at the same time!
Are there any questions about any of that?”

13. Exercise: communicating your campaign
List the digital media channels available to you
Write down the types of audience you think you have on each channel
Create a post for each channel to promote your campaign
“What I think might be useful now , is for , in your groups, write the beginning of a proactive communication plan for your campaign.
You should list all the digital media channels available to them and who they think the audiences are, obviously further work can be done on this outside the session.
And then create a post for each of those channels that details the first message of the campaign, bearing in mind the tips that have come before.”

14. Communicating your campaign
Current situation: how much do people know about your campaign?
What are your communications objectives?
Who are your audiences and what do they need to know/do?
What channels do your audiences use?
“This is just a bit more information for you to go away and think about when planning the communication of your campaign. Understanding how much people already know about the campaign will help set the right tone and messaging of the communication activity. Setting separate communication objectives will help focus your communication activity, these objectives should be SMART and an example could be: Receive 10 retweets of our campaign launch post within 24 hours of the campaign launch. Working out who your audience for the campaign is will allow you to create the right messages and use the right channels of communication.

15. Communicating your campaign
Who are your online influencers and campaign supporters?
What resources do you have available? (Time, money, staff time)
Plan a timeline of communication activity
Create a process for evaluation
If you work out who your online influencers and campaign supporters are then you can communicate with them and ask them to help spread the message. It is important to think about what resources you have available to ensure that you plan an activity schedule that is achievable.
Good video about social media statistics and trends if you need more content:
Here’s a handout with all of the article’s websites that I’ve mentioned today for you to have a look at for more information.”
Give each student the handout.

16. Learning objectives
Learn the ten top tips for using digital media for campaigning
Explore how you can apply these tips when creating a campaign plan