Ds-connex: A social media success storySeptember 23, 2014

Today’s session• Background on ds-connex

• Social media & the Buddy Walk

• Strategic approach

• Content as cornerstone

• Key lessons learned

o Earned – owned – paid

• Measurement & metrics

• Parting Thoughts

• Discussion

Who am I?• Career PR pro since 1991

• Social media advocate and strategist since 1994

• Blogger since 1999

• Now “mom blogging” at lara-mom.com

• Columbus transplant since 2005

Tony R. Wells Foundation Founded in 2001 by Tony and Dana Wells after selling their

international IT training business Mission: Create Value for the community by developing

stronger nonprofit leaders and investing in the next generation of social innovations

Work with more than 90 nonprofit organizations More than 25 years experience serving on nonprofit boards

Vision for helping families and children with special needs – especially Down syndrome, due to a Wells family connection

Phase one: research• Attended regional Buddy Walk events

• Reviewed more than 225 Buddy Walk events

o Number of teams and participants

o Average money raised per team and individual

o Size of market

o Staffing model – volunteer vs full time office staff

o Use of fundraising solution

o Extensive review of social media activities

o Search Engine Optimization (SEO) audit

o Website performance audit

Phase two: analysisAnalyzed Buddy Walk research findings as well as results of other national walk events. Keys to success:

Highly engaged community of event organizers, sharing knowledge about how to create a great experience for participants

Clear, common voice through social media to promote advocacy and to recruit support from the local community for sponsorship and participation

Year-round event promotion to maintain a high level of engagement

Use of a peer to peer fundraising solution to expand teams and create a healthy competition to raise money

Social media research

Social media research

Social media observations Most Buddy Walk events have a Facebook page but

rarely update Only 17% use Twitter and less than 5% use Pinterest Audience is primarily female Buddy Walk events leveraging social media raise

more money than other events of equal size Adding new content is the largest challenge for

individual event coordinators Inconsistency of language about the Buddy Walk

causes confusion Most organizers only promote the Buddy Walk event for

four months or fewer per year Celebrity endorsements and press coverage are largest

contributors to awareness

COMMUNITY + OUTREACH + FUNDRAISING

The goal:

Increasing Buddy Walk fundraising results from $11 to $40 million per year within five years

The strategy:

Ds-connex 2014: Launch

• Recruited staff with specialized skills• Developed ds-connex website, including Connexions blog• Converted DSACO’s fundraising solution to Stride• Validated strategy with NDSS, other Down syndrome orgs• Launched ds-connex in January 2014• Rolled out national social media program for ds-connex• Developed hub & spoke strategy for Buddy Walk partners

o Local implementation plans customized by marketo 23 Buddy Walk partners ramped up on social by May

By the numbers

• Grew from 12 Facebook fans to 840 engaged fans in six months

• Built Twitter following from zero to 408 fans • Grew Pinterest following from zero to 83• Social media is consistently the top traffic

driver according to Google Analytics• Managed social media for 23 Buddy Walk

partnerso Total of 72 profiles monitoredo 43 profiles actively managed

How we began

• Strategic focus on owned and earned social media

• Content as foundation and cornerstone• Blog posts• Content aggregation and dissemination via Twitter,

Facebook and Pinterest • Campaigns to encourage content creation and sharing

• Engagement and follower growth as ultimate goalso Demonstrate credibility, authenticityo Lead by example

• Daily social media monitoring/listening

Simple, effective social strategy

1.Perfect your profiles• Ensure bio, about page or description is complete and includes

website• Demonstrate expertise, credibility, humanity in each post

2. Listen more than you speak• Search for key words across platforms• Observe conversations before you jump in

3.Build your community• Develop relationships over time• Focus on engagement

4. Contribute great content• Share ideas and insights through status updates• Focus content on audience – not just on your own needs

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Content strategy

• Differentiation through unique content• Posts modeling community building• Social media knowledge sharing• Fundraising tips, especially about online

fundraising and peer-to-peer

• Showcase positive, inspirational content about Down syndrome

• Give ‘em what they want

Recommended content ratio

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Creating a content calendar

 

- Can include many social platforms- Can be done in any format (Excel, Word)- Use as a guide; be able to adapt accordingly

- Beware of over-reliance on scheduling- Use Facebook Page Insights and URL shortener analytics to

determine which type of content is most appealing- Think beyond text to great visuals- Keep character count in mind – less is more!- Align messaging and themes with other marketing communications

Listening strategy

• Why listen?o Contento Ideaso Trendso Complimentso Complaintso Pain points

• Free listening toolso Hootsuiteo Facebook and Twitter Lists

• Down syndrome associations (includes Buddy Walk organizers) on Facebook

• Buddy Walk organizers on Twitter• Down syndrome associations on Twitter

Using Lists as a tool• What are Lists?

• Hand-selected group of contacts with a common interest

• Create your own lists or subscribe to lists created by others

• Viewing a list will show you a stream of content from only the users on that list

• Benefits of using Lists:• Easily segment followers, fans or

influencers• Industry experts• Media outlets/reporters

• Monitor competitors• Follow or participate in events in real time

Using hashtags• Useful in organizing and tracking trends

• Use Hashtag.org or Tagboard to find and track relevant tags

• To search hashtags, go to your navigation bar and enter it into the search field. Results will populate below

• Searches can be saved by clicking on the gear

• Recommended uses for hashtags:• Find people/organizations with similar interests• Create conversations around a brand or event• Create structured online events (Twitter Chats)• Monitor topics of interest (i.e., causes, conferences, etc.)• Discover new sources and information• Quickly assess sentiment

Following to gain followers

• Ways to find new Twitter followers:

• Find through Twitter search

• Use Twitter’s recommendations

• See who is following/not following you

• Communi.It• Use Twitter directories

• Twellow • WeFollow

Engagement strategy

• If content is king, engagement is queen!• Ask questions• Answer questions• Use humor• Figure out what gets the best engagement –

and do more of it

Growth strategy

• Organic (earned/owned only) growth is S-L-O-W! (About 6% per year)

• Great content, solid engagement are the foundation

• To increase growth, it makes sense to “boost” with paid campaigns if you can

• Start small – experiment in $5 or $10 increments to see what works. Hint: Facebook typically drives more results than Twitter

#DownsyndromeDads campaign

• Facebook photo contest to grow our community, gain more followers, showcase our commitment

• Timed to Father’s Day 2014. 22 entries (dads nominated by wives, friends, selves)

• More than 65,000 Facebook users viewed the nominees' inspiring photo entries. Ds-connex more than doubled our Facebook fans (from 120 to our current 307 fans) and increased our Twitter following by 10% (from 250 fans to our current 276). Per Google Analytics, we drove almost 300 new visitors to the ds-connex website in one week, and had 318 unique views of our blog post. 

• Full details available at https://storify.com/larak/downsyndromedads-facebook-campaign

Paid media strategy

• Boost what is already doing well organically. Great content becomes great ads

• We "boosted" our social efforts with small ad buys on both Twitter and Facebook.

• Our tweet about #DownsyndromeDads reached 23x our usual reach, thanks in part to $20 in ad support. However, these results were not high enough to encourage us to invest in Twitter ads again for this particular program.

• Our boosted Facebook message about #DownsyndromeDads, however, was our most successful Facebook post ever, with an organic reach of 1,048 and a paid reach of 15,153

“Like” drive campaigns

• Facebook does not allow you to buy page “likes” BUT you can make a donation for likes

• We undertook like drive campaigns with select partners we knew were our biggest fans

• Gained approximately 200 new page likes from each campaign (and donated $200 to each Down syndrome group)

Community-building strategy

• Whenever possible, we lift up local Buddy Walk events – whether our partners or not

• Buddy Walk of the Day• Messages of congratulations and good luck

before their events• Tag other pages and organizations

whenever possible• Ask our fans to share our content with their

friends and family

Blogger relations

• Research the top bloggers in your topical or geographic area

• Find them via Google searches, ask around, check your Google Analytics inbound links

• Create Facebook and/or Twitter lists to keep track of them

• Down syndrome bloggers on Twitter• Down syndrome bloggers on Facebook

• Follow and like their content. Leave them comments. Link to their blog posts.

• Develop relationships over time so when you have an “ask” they’ll be receptive!

Metrics & measurement

• Facebook: page likes, people talking about, engagement, post reach, shares

• Twitter: followers, @ replies retweets, favorites, lists, engagement

• Pinterest: followers, likes, repins, comments

• Positive, unprompted mentions on any social platform

• Social media as a top traffic driver according to Google Analytics

Five stages of social media sophistication

Level 1 •Ignoring social media

Level 2 •Experimenting with social media

Level 3 •Supporting marketing campaigns with social media

Level 4 •Developing and executing a social media strategy

Level 5 •Embracing social media holistically throughout organization

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Top 5 social media mistakes

1. Just having a profile (often incomplete)

2. Self-promotional spamming

3. Assuming social media replaces networking

4. Thinking others will flock to you

5. Not being able to handle negative comments

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Who’s using social media?

Commitment is critical• Consistency is key to building and cultivating a

community online

• It can seem a bit overwhelming at first, but with a strategic approach, a social media program is very manageable

• Aim for 15 minutes per day at first

• Build up to an hour per day if you can

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General social etiquette

• Participate in conversations as if with someone in real life whom you respecto Talk like a real persono Try to express your unique personality in your

postso Be helpful and bring value to the conversationo Remember to always be professional in

communications

• Pay attention to how community members interact with each other

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Recommended resources

• Hootsuite.com – free social media management tool

• Smart Brief on Social Media – stay in the know about top social news

• Explore Facebook Insights as well as the Analytics areas of Twitter and Pinterest

• Look at your Google Analytics to see which social sites are working hardest for you!

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Thank you for your time!

Questions about social media:@LaraK (Twitter)Lkretler@frazierheiby.com614-702-2126

Questions about ds-connex or Stride:Twells@trwellsfoundation.org614-571-5195