Social Media Grab Bag for Higher Education Communicators

“Social media is an a la carte approach. Shop away,”

Here are some handy social media tips from the experts at The University of Texas at Austin. Courtesy of Drew Carls, the university’s digital content coordinator. Drew oversees social media assets including the UT Austin Facebook and Twitter accounts.

Six Tips for a Perfectly Timed Facebook Post

To ensure your Facebook posts reach the most people, timing is everything. Here are some tips for getting it right.

Want a Better Social Media Strategy? Try Stealing One

Social media marketers should “steal from the best” when developing their strategies, Amy Kauffman writes. That means shopping around, keeping a close eye on what your rivals are doing and copying the best elements of their strategies. “Social media is an a la carte approach. Shop away,” Kauffman writes.

Five Steps to Getting to Know Your Own Brand

Implementing a solid social media strategy requires developing a deep understanding of what your brand stands for and where it’s going, Amy Kauffman writes.

ABSAP Conference – Social Media Best Practices and Lessons Learned

When we talk about best practices we aren’t speaking of a particular social media technology or the latest technique.

My personal notes for a panel discussion on social media in higher education.

1. What are some tips on generating more engagement through social media?

Summary: Social media demands that we break the pattern of always talking about ourselves, an easy trap to fall into, because as professional communicators we’re paid to get exposure for our message. In the social media scene we risk becoming the party bore. No one enjoys being trapped at a party with someone who wants to drone on and on about themselves and their interests, or even worse, the chap trying to market the latest home business. With social media no one is trapped in your presence, they can ignore you at any time, so it demands we be sensitive, skillful and emotionally intelligent.

Social media in higher education best practices include:

The Stock Market Listens to Your Twitter Brand

“The chatter changes and the stock price changes.”

Citing results that surprised the researchers, a new study claims that Twitter conversations about a company or product have a direct relationship with the firm’s stock price. If online chatter goes up so does the market valuation.

While previous research had demonstrated a positive relationship between Twitter conversations and sales, this was the first time a strong connection to stock price was shown.

From Texas Enterprise at The University of Texas at Austin:

“It surprised the daylights out of me,” McAlister says of her latest analysis of chatter’s effect. “I had thought it might have something to with sales. I thought sales might have an impact on brand equity. And there might be a remote impact on firm value.”

But the relationship was stronger and faster moving than that. “It’s immediate,” she says. “The chatter changes and the stock price changes.” This sort of information is of interest to investors, and some hedge funds have already begun using online chatter to guide investment strategy.

If you’re looking for ammunition to convince your executive team to take social media seriously, these experts just handed you a sky rocket.

Read the full story at Say What? Research Reveals Impact of Web Talk by Mark Henricks, writing for Texas Enterprise.

Why Social Media Relationships Matter in B2B

It can bring great minds together, and give marketers daily opportunities to learn.

Aaron Strout of WCG

Social media is great for Coke, but what about JSR Micro? One has billions of thirsty customers worldwide, the other makes customized chemicals for a small cadre of high performance chip manufacturers. How much online socializing do you need when you can shake the hand of every one of your key customers during a two-day trade show?

Statistics gathered by Social Media B2B show that B2B firms have been slower to adopt social media and online marketing, with 36% of executives saying they had low interest in social media, and 46% believing social media is irrelevant to their company. “Nobody talks business on Facebook,” they say.

Aaron Strout, interactive group director at WCG, begs to differ. ”It is actually easier to have one-to-one relationships with B2B customers, where you might know by name the 100 buyers who matter the most to your company,” he asserts.

In his view, social media need not be a high-numbers game, but can effectively be used to enable relevant interaction between a customer and the people within the organization who have value to offer to that customer.

ProductCamp Austin Summer 2010 is this Saturday at UT Austin

So register today and I’ll see you there on Saturday.

There is only one problem with ProductCamp Austin. They insist on running their name together like it is one long word.

ProductCampAustinSummer2010. Quick, take a breath then try again.

But everything else about this unconference of marketing and product management professionals is first class.

“ProductCamp is a bunch of smart, passionate people coming together to discuss, debate, and collaborate on the issues they face every day.”

Many of us have paid registration money and traveled to faraway cities to attend professional conferences that are no better than what ProductCamp offers right here at the beautiful AT&T Executive Education and Conference Center.

For free.