Gracie Communications

Can You Survive the Four Seasons of Social Media?

by Jennifer Stringer, who provides content marketing, social media and direct communications management for Gracie Communications’ clients

In an ideal social media world, we would add new fans and followers every day because our posts, exciting videos and thought-provoking questions would result in consistent likes, comments and retweets.

In the real world, social media growth often occurs in a cyclical pattern, not a linear one. For some organizations, there’s a natural rise and fall to their organization calendar.  For example, if your organization has a big 5K or fundraiser planned in May, you’re probably going to have a period of growth prior to and leading up to the event, a gradual decline after the event and a significant drop a month or two after the big event.

If your nonprofit seems to follow a cyclical pattern, here are a few tips on how to survive each social media “season.”

Spring-Planting Your Seeds

How you know you’re in this season:

You are moving from brainstorming to developing and committing to a plan. You are letting your staff, partners, donors and partners know about your plans.

What you can do during this season:

Create a plan that is easy to follow and execute. Create an editorial calendar for posts, blogs and tweets. As you fill in your calendar, use Gracie Communications’ story arc model and develop a beginning, middle and end to your organization’s story.

Create your copy, shoot the videos and pre-write the posts and blogs.

Build excitement and relationships both online and off.

Summer-You’re Hot, Hot, Hot

How you know you’re in this season:

You’re launching your new service or the BIG day of your event or fundraiser is here! Your issue is “in” because it’s the latest, greatest thing, because a celebrity is talking about it, because it’s making national news and you’re a local expert, etc.

What you can do:

Take pictures and create videos and new copy as the event happens so you have info to share during and after the event.

Post, share and blog. Repeat.

Ask your fans and followers to post their photos, comments and reactions.

Comment and RT on others’ posts, blogs and tweets about the topic so you’re part of the conversation.

Fall- Sow Now, Reap Later

How you know you’re in this season:

You’ve pulled off your big event but the online buzz has moved on to the next big thing. Your Facebook posts and mentions start to dwindle.

What you can do:

Remind everyone about how successful your product launch, event or program was, how much money was raised after the final tallies, what programs can now be funded, how people can be helped, etc.

Check your harvest. Jay Baer, owner of Convince and Convert, offers these six tips for measuring your social media efforts.

Promote your partners and their events and programs now, and they’ll support you later.

Winter-Going Underground 

How you know you’re in this season:

Your Facebook page says no one is talking about you. You can’t get your BFF to RT a tweet. You don’t know what to post besides, “Happy Monday, everybody!”

What you can do:

Remind people of the work you do all year.

Reach out to potential new partners, donors and fans and invite them to be a part of the next event.

Experiment with new social media tools so you can use them for your next campaign. Check out Pinterest or other sites that are attracting new online buzz.

Go dormant – for a little while. Resist the urge to post just to post. Our friends at Firebelly Marketing emphasize that you should make sure content is relevant.

Peek through the soil – let people know you’re working on new programs and events and you’re excited about sharing more details soon.

In every season, you can be growing.  At times, the growth will show in your numbers, and at other times you will be growing underground in preparation for the next spring!

(Photos courtesy of IN.gov, atgeist.com, and indyhomesblog.com)

DDIY (Don’t Do It Yourself) Business

Last week I was reminded of a valuable lesson about being an entrepreneur.

You don’t always have to do it yourself.

I was helping my youngest daughter, Helen, work her stand at Lemonade Day Indianapolis’ kick-off event. She’s been a part of Lemonade Day from the start and I am wildly proud that she has made all the decisions, secured the venue. picked the charity beneficiary, and designed the booth all by herself.  She was pretty proud too, until she heard that her total revenue was way under the other kick-off event participants.

This wasn’t a case of the other kids having Daddy Did It All Syndrome (for the most part). The real difference was the other kids found locations using the resources of the Lemonade Day organizers. They were inside when we were out in the rain last year. They were working with corporate office support and marketing efforts.

Helen and I talked all the way home about what she was going to do differently at this May’s event. She is still going to raise money for Joy’s House, but she is going to get help from the organizers in picking a higher-traffic location. She is going to go to one of the preparation workshops. And she is going to borrow ideas she learned from the other kids at the event, including adding some entertainment to draw people in.

My 10-year-old’s story reminds me of my own (and many others in business for themselves). Entrepreneurs go into business for themselves to fulfill a lifelong passion or a dream. They’ve always wanted to be their own boss. To make the rules. They are excited every day to get to work. It is their great idea or unique way of providing a service and no one is going to tell them what to do or how to do it.

Here’s the rub. When you do it all yourself, you miss out on others’ great ideas on how to make your great idea even better.

Who should you be partnering with, listening to and emulating in your business?

Super Bowl XLVI: It’s Only Halftime in Indianapolis

Posted by Lisa Sirkin Vielee

Already the experts are saying the boost to Indianapolis from hosting the Super Bowl may be short- term and not as robust as the city may like. While city leaders tally the results and marketing and social media analysts, like Exact Target, crunch the numbers from the Super Bowl, I think any report about the impact of hosting the big game is premature.

Let’s face it folks. Indianapolis has only played half the game. Yes, Indianapolis hosted and executed a near flawless Super Bowl. Yes, it is important to assess what we’ve done so far. It’s okay to pat ourselves on the back for 5.7 million tweets, 1.1 million visits to Super Bowl Village, 8,000 volunteers and countless celebrity sightings.  But we still have a way to go to create a positive economic return on the Super Big investment and capitalize on the city’s national brand exposure.

Here’s what we, as marketers, social media experts; heck, as residents of Indianapolis, need to do next to help the ICVA, Indiana Sports Corp. and others make the big plays:

1. Don’t stop tweeting, writing and bragging about Indianapolis. Jolene Ketzenberger has a terrific story in The Indianapolis Star about celebrities shining a light on local, independent restaurants during the Super Bowl.  We have some great restaurants in this city. So the next time someone claims Indy is the chain-restaurant capital of the world, look them in the eye and invite them to meet you at Recess. Or R Bistro. Or Goose the Market. Or Ball & Biscuit. Fly them in if you have to. Just dispel this and the other many myths about our city.

2. Volunteer for IDI to help develop the plans for the Georgia Street corridor.  Don’t just wonder if Georgia Street will get the right mix of patio dining and cool events, be a part of making it happen.

3. Support local bands, events, museums and arts districts. The outlying areas had mixed reviews when it came to Super Bowl traffic. That’s too bad, because there are so many great places in central Indiana to experience. Use the Super Celebration Sites map as your guide and be a tourist in your back yard.

4. Enjoy the legacies of the Super Bowl. Visit the 46 for XLVI murals, go see the Chase Near Eastside Legacy Center (the Legacy Fitness Zone is free in February), and donate at the next Komen Tissue Bank SuperCure event on March 10.

5. Come up with the next the big idea. As the Super Bowl showed us, even scarves can become a big deal. We all have great ideas. But are we willing to do the hard work to make them happen?

6. Send convention leads to the ICVA. You may not work with the NFL but you might work with the top brass in your industry or field.  The next time you go out of town for a conference or training session, invite the event planners to consider Indianapolis for its next regional or national level event. There are plenty of hotel rooms and meeting space to go around – and they won’t fill themselves.

7. Stop the inferiority complex. When I was a teenager and would get in a mood, my father used to tell me to “pretend to be happy.” Sound dumb? Well it worked more often than not. So why not “pretend to be a big league city”? If we stop comparing ourselves to our larger counterparts and start taking pride in what we have to offer, we may just find others comparing themselves to us.

Twenty years from now, Hoosiers will talk about the Super Bowl the way we currently talk about the Pan Am Games – as a game changer. We are in the middle of changing the way our city is perceived and recognized.  But we aren’t even in the red zone yet. We can’t stop now, the momentum has just turned our way.

Image from flickr/indywriter

My Love/Hate Relationship with Social Media

Written by Jennifer Stringer, who provides content marketing, social media and direct communications management for Gracie Communications’ clients

I believe social media’s power is harnessed mostly for good. Social media brings awareness to a community need, educates people and mobilizes them.

For example, we donated some time to help Lemonade Day better use social media to get kids excited about setting up lemonade stands around Indianapolis, teaching them about entrepreneurship in the process.  I am going to be making a tissue donation to the Susan G. Komen Tissue Bank because I heard on Facebook about the need for minority women to provide samples for breast cancer research.

Despite its power to do good, there are still some things I hate about social media. Here’s just a few:

1. Social media has not lived up to the promise of diversifying the voices/ideas that are heard and shared.  As Jay Baer pointed out, the social media profession is not diverse by a long shot. I know this personally from being the only African American woman in the room more times than I want to count.

2. People who use the number of Twitter followers or a Klout score to validate their importance. Take for example, the recent brouhaha over who should be in the #social46 social media crew for Super Bowl 2012. Most of those who felt slighted did come around to realize that it wasn’t about them – it was about promoting all of the fun, wonderful happenings and places in Indianapolis. But I suspect there are still some bruised egos out there.

3. I hate to hear about someone’s death on FB and Twitter, whether it’s someone I know or a famous person. I think of how awful it would be for a friend or family member to find out about someone’s death from a tweet.  My point is: I think social media is not the medium for all messages.

4. The tendency to tweet first, confirm later.  Peyton Manning and Joe Paterno were the most recent victims of this practice. When incorrect information is posted, tweeted, retweeted, the only case it makes is that social media is a vehicle for shoddy citizen journalism.

Love it or hate it? What things about social media would you add to either column?

One Text. One HIV Test.

Earlier this week, I bought two designer coffees for a client meeting and spent just under $10. In less than an hour both coffees were gone and the cups were recycled.

Tomorrow, as part of a World AIDS Day text-to-give campaign – #knowpositive – for the Indiana AIDS Fund, I can text KNOW to 20222 and donate $10 for a rapid HIV test. With a rapid HIV test, someone can know whether or not he or she is HIV positive in less than an hour. And if the test turns out to be positive, she or he can get into care management and treatment that much faster.

Same amount of money. Same hour. Hugely different impact.

Not only does an HIV test put the person taking the test “in the know,” it also prevents the further spread of the disease by an unknowing carrier. With national statistics showing that 1 in 4 Americans with the disease don’t know they have HIV, it is as important to get an HIV test as it was 30 years ago when the first case of AIDS was diagnosed.

25% of those who have HIV don’t even know it. It’s a sobering statistic. But in this age of social media, we can all do our part to change that statistic. And that’s pretty empowering.

Here’s what you can do:

1. Text KNOW to 20222 tomorrow to donate $10 for an HIV test for someone without insurance or on the margins of society.

2. Tell others about the #knowpositive campaign on December 1. Donate your Facebook status update for the cause. RT a #knowpositive tweet. Follow the Indiana AIDS Fund.

The Indiana AIDS Fund’s goal is 500 tests in one day. Will you join me in helping them reach it?

Loyalty, Anti-bullying, Transparency & Communication: What Penn State Should Do Next

Like the rest of you, I’ve watched with horror as more details emerge about Jerry Sandusky’s alleged crimes against children, both on and off the Penn State campus.  As a parent, I’ve been sickened by the charges and the grand jury testimony. As a communications specialist, I’ve been appalled at the delayed and often confused response by the Penn State trustees.

Yesterday, the university took the long-overdue step in of appointing someone with no ties to the university, former FBI director Louis Freeh, to lead an internal investigation of the “governance, protocols, decision-making and oversight within the university.  While Freeh has reportedly been given free rein to take the investigation in any direction needed, other members of the special committee have many ties to Penn State. Only time will tell if the committee will make the difficult recommendations needed to both move the university past this ugly chapter of its history or get mired in the university politics and finger-pointing.

Interestingly only one student, Rodney Hughes, a doctoral student in higher education, was included on the special committee. More on this later.

As the committee begins its work, there are several issues they can and should consider.

1. This is an opportunity for Penn State to not only address the horrors of the child sexual abuse that happened on its campus, but to take the lead and spearhead a national effort to address childhood abuse.  Penn State students have already created a “support wall against child abuse” and are leading prayers and candlelight vigils. University trustees now need to create a system-wide awareness and support mechanism not only for the Sandusky victims but for all child abuse victims. And they should do it before the U. S. Senate mandates it.*

2. Pennsylvania media have reported that one victim has been forced to leave high school after classmates blamed him for Paterno’s firing.  This is unacceptable and Penn State should be the first to say so. Continued silence only condones a culture of bullying and implies they support a “blame the victim” mentality.

3. Vera Greene, a junior at Penn State and a guest columnist for The Daily Collegian, addressed the issue of loyalty in a recent column. As she wrote, “we need to take a step back and understand the societal efforts, the natural human tendencies that come into play when a decision [that breaks the bonds of loyalty] has to be made.”  Penn State should involve its faculty and staff in creating a forum to discuss the role of loyalty and the conflicts it can create.

4. The state of Pennsylvania is consideration legislation to remove the exemption for state-affiliated universities from Pennsylvania’s Right-to-Know law. Penn State shouldn’t wait. It should increase transparency now even though it doesn’t have to. Set the good example.

From a communications standpoint, it has taken Penn State far too long to respond, not just to the general public, but more importantly to students and alumni. While I am not privy to the university’s e-mail communications system, it has been reported that local alumni chapters acknowledged the crisis days after the story broke in the media.  As far as I can tell, University President Rodney Erickson, publicly addressed the university family for the first time in a November 21 message. (If I am mistaken, please let me know.)

I understand there are legal concerns that Penn State is grappling with, but it must make every effort to keep alumni, donors, faculty and students apprised of its efforts to address past wrongs and to put new systems into place to ensure this doesn’t happen again. Reach out beyond the university family as well. High school counselors are getting questions. Let them know what is going on and how to answer.

Back to the special committee. While I appreciate the inclusion of a graduate student and former student trustee in the special committee, allow the process to be open to the greater student body. This is a teaching moment.  Students should be allowed to audit the process and ask tough questions of their own. Healing takes hard conversation.

Please Mr. Freeh and company, use this special committee to make recommendations on how to move forward, not just to duplicate the efforts of the grand jury or devolve the process into a blame game.  Yes, this is the time for scrutinizing what went wrong. But Penn State can regain its national reputation by demonstrating a campus-wide desire to right the wrongs and leading the conversation to make sure other children don’t suffer at the hands of coaches, teachers and other adults they trust.

* The U.S. Senate has scheduled for Dec. 13, the first congressional hearing in the wake of the Penn State case. Pennsylvania Sen. Bob Casey requested a hearing by a panel of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee to examine how well the nation protects children from abuse and neglect.

Clients hate surprises

This may come as a surprise, but there are still communications folks out there that forget to work with their clients to make sure there are no surprises in the communications process. These same experts then act surprised when their strategic plan presentation is met with stony silence instead of cheers and celebration.  

Like my clients, I hate surprises. (Even birthday parties.) That’s why I forewarn all my prospective clients that the Gracie Communications planning process is extremely time-consuming for them as well as for my communications team. In fact, I tell them we are part of their team and they are part of ours. They have valuable insight and knowledge, and by sharing it they not only keep research costs down, they develop a buy-in to the finished product that results in a working plan instead of a plan that collects dust on a shelf.

Communications pros may know marketing and PR, we may have a general understand of the clients’ industry, but we don’t know their businesses. We may understand how to reach their audiences but we don’t know how they really interact with these audiences currently. We can’t because we don’t live in the day-to-day of running their businesses (or non-profit or charity event, etc.).

We also don’t really know the dynamics that govern our clients. Do they answer to a board of directors? Investors? How do they want their staff involved? Any strategic plan stands a much better chance of getting implemented if the client is able to champion it to his or her internal audiences. To do that, the client has to be involved in the process and given the opportunity to ask questions – prior to the big reveal.

It can be time consuming to include clients in every step of the strategic plan, but isn’t it harder to present a plan cold and have it rejected? Here are seven different phases during the planning process when you can – and should – interact with your client, rather than present to them:

1. The beginning. Explain the planning process. Make sure they understand the timeline AND that it fits with their business calendar.

2. Discovery and research. Involve them. They may be able to connect you with sources you couldn’t reach otherwise.

3. Communications objectives. If your communication objectives aren’t in line with their business objectives, it is better to find out early in the process.

4. Creative brief and/or talking points. This is a guiding document for communications professionals that is often misunderstood by clients. Since it sets the key messages and tone for a marketing campaign and the related PR, make sure you review it.

5. Target audiences. Again, make sure your suggestions are in line with their needs.

6. Strategies and tactics. This one goes without saying, right?

7. Creative/implementation.  Just like with #1, make sure the timeline and creative process leaves room for other business deadlines and needs.

Whenever possible, also try to meet with the client’s boss or board as well to introduce yourself and your goals so all the decision makers know what to expect and can put a face with the actions they will review later.  Yes it is more work, but it’s not called account management for nothing.

Bottom Line: If you want clients to trust your recommendations, you must respect their input and guidance. If you don’t, the one who will be the most surprised by their reaction may be you.