Attracting people to support and join your cause is now a huge part of creating social impact. Social media is a huge part of so many of our lives and it is one of the best ways of connecting with new people. As such, we are spending ever more time representing our organisations, connecting with communities, or creating content to support our work. The average person now spends 2.5hours on social media every day.
Using Social Media to Create Social Impact?
It can be difficult or impossible to make progress on social impact without attracting people to your cause. Ideally you want to create social movements in order to expand and build belief and support for your work. Social media can be to gaining service users funding, staff, volunteers. It can also be helpful in identifying partners for your work to build your organisations capability and be of more benefit to ever more people. Social media is a way you can reach and touch affect the lives of many people you’ve never met. It definitely beats walking up to someone on the street with a tin.
Are Social Media Algorithms your Enemy or Your Friend?
Social media though is a tricky beast to master, every website has its own algorithms and formats. These algorithms determine who views your posts and how easily they get seen. This means you have to spend considerable time, playing about trying to get the information into a format the system wants.
But do these algorithms really matter? If so, how much? If we are disappointed with the response to our posts it is very easy to blame the algorithm rather than look at why our message didn’t resonate. Causing us to spend ever more time tweaking our posts for what the algorithms want. I think we are all guilty of falling into that trap of being afraid of the algorithm. We didn’t get it wrong, it was the nasty algorithm. So we need to spend more time keeping it happy.
As someone who is content creator, there is always so much to do and it is difficult to know how most effectively to spend time. So I needed a model. After some research, I have been put together the Social Media Amplifier Model to help determine how we can greatest impact.
Social Media Purpose
We need to start off with deciding the purpose of creating the media. Having a clear understanding of what you want to achieve is crucial. We should know what our overall cause is. But how should social media fit into that cause. You need to decide whether you want to raise awareness, share learning, create a discussion, or gain more followers or feedback. Then you should design and structure your posts to get that response.
This is important as it is very obvious on many of the platforms that there is a strong prioritisation for posts and comments that get responses. If you are clear about the purpose and what response you want then you are much more likely to get it.
The LinkedIn algorithm is well known for giving a lower profile to posts and articles that have weblinks elsewhere. However, if the purpose of the article is to get more views on your website, or to sign up for tickets, etc, then it creates a dilemma. Should you put in the links? The answer to that question is an overwhelming yes. The fact is that if you don’t put a link in the chances of someone finding their way to your website drop off very significantly. Even if a 1/3rd fewer people see your article 33% of nothing, is still nothing. 66% of something is still a win, just a smaller one. However, you may not want to include links in all your posts, so you are still able to reach a larger audience sometimes.
Views
Most people choose whether or not to stop and read your post in just a few seconds (if that). It is vital you are able to get your message across straight away and make it visually appealing. The best-written articles may never be seen simply as they don’t stand out in the first few seconds. Whatever the format time spend on graphics and coming up with an enticing unique headline is generally time very well spent.
Perceived Value of Your Social Media
Your post is obviously competing for attention with every bit of other media out there. Why should people spend time on it? Well, it is because they believe they are getting something of value for the information. They have the choice at any time to skip and move on. Therefore it is not just what you want from your media. But they are getting something of value they need. If they get something of value from your posts, they are more likely to respond and view your future posts. So try and give people as much as you can in the time they have available.
Enrolled Community.
These people have either followed your work or interacted with it in the not-too-distant past. These are the people who are most likely to see your posts first. You have a relationship with them and have hopefully built up some trust. Almost always they will be the first to see your posts. They will act as the first test of whether an algorithm will even care about your post.
Building up an online community and investing time in supporting them is crucial if you are to get your posts out into the wider world. Therefore it is vital that you listen to your community and respond to their needs. At the same time. If you get into lots of arguments online. Guess what they are the people who are most likely to see your posts. Is that really what you want? If some random stranger is a moron. Just let them be.
Community Response.
The response of your community to the post will act as a trigger for the algorithms. People may even really like the content and find it valuable. But if they don’t respond the social network will likely count that as a downvote. This is why it is vital you build a network that connects with you and that you offer value to in return they will give value to you. Be part of a community that enjoys talking to each other. You can set the tone here by responding to their posts. Not only that when people do comment on your work respond to them in a positive way. It is important to remember that the community response acts as a gateway to the algorithm.
New Audience for Your Social Media
Whilst the goal of many people using social media is to broaden out their network and reach new audiences. The reality in most cases is this only happens after people in your community have viewed and responded to your post. The algorithm has to develop sufficient momentum behind your post to put it in people’s feeds who have no history of engagement. It is also competing for space amongst other posts by their own communities. Therefore, in reality, we can expect only a minority of posts to get any significant exposure to new audiences.
The Social Media Algorithm Tradeoff.
Whilst the algorithm acts as a limiter and an accelerator at each stage of the process. It really requires the information of the community response to guide who views your post from outside your community. This is the point where it shares your post beyond your immediate community. It chooses people it believes are likely to enjoy the same media as the people in your engaged community. If you have not done the work to keep the algorithm happy this is where your post is most likely to lose steam.
The fact is those in your community with histories of engagement with you are almost always going to see your posts. If your goal is to get some response from your current community, focus on their needs and don’t worry about the algorithm. The only time you really need to be afraid of the algorithms is if you are trying to get an impact beyond your current community. But even then your post will also still need a positive response from your community first.
Therefore you should be focused on creating valuable content for the community who follow you to connect with and respond to. First and foremost. Then, and only then, should you worry about tweaking your work so the algorithm reaches a wider audience. So you can stop fearing the algorithm and focus on building your engaged community.
You can develop a strong community using the web of stakeholder engagement. This will empower you to create an interesting portfolio of media designed to engage people with your work by building their understanding over time. This is particularly effective on social media, where spam approaches to content can easily disengage people.
Variety is the spice of life. The web of stakeholder engagement also makes you think about creating variety in your content. This will help create interest in your community and help you explore and discover new ways of connecting. Sticking to one successful format that the algorithm likes and everyone else uses, is likely to create a mundane uninspiring experience for every one. Yet sharing inspiration and fresh approaches, is surely what it is all about.
Raising Awareness Can be a Trap
The vast majority of content i see on social media from changemakers social enterprises and not-for-profit organisations, is ultra safe and unchallenging. Yes it’s great to celebrate success and show off the great work you are doing. But unless you are really clever with your content or it something genuinely surprising it is unlikely to get much of a response. The reason is that it doesn’t really give people a reason to respond, other than a like, or a polite well done. There is no tension to that type of story. Whilst it is good to show the impact you are making it is also important to think, how might be engage with this content. Try and see things from their perspective? What will get a reaction out of them? What will help people see things differently? Why is this so important? Because the algorithms LOVE a response, especially comments and conversations and reshares (with someone giving their take).
Multi-dimensional Engagement
Multi-dimensional engagement is a different approach to creating campaigns I’ve created. Rather than follow the straight forward and ineffective marketing funnels of most social media campaigns. It build on the ideas of the Web of Stakeholder engagement and The idea is to create a tension between the topics of your posts to aid conversations. With the goal of creating curiosity and tension in your audience.
Social Media a Strategic Approach to Engagement.
Social media is a powerful tool for creating social impact, but it requires a strategic approach to truly maximise its potential. To break free from the algorithmic trap, focus on building a strong, engaged community by creating valuable, diverse, and thought provoking content that resonates with your audience. Don’t shy away from taking risks or expressing an opinion, as these can fuel discussions and elicit the responses that algorithms crave. Ultimately, it is about striking a balance between catering to your community’s needs and understanding the intricacies of social media algorithms. By doing so, you can harness the full potential of social media to amplify your cause, expand your reach, and drive real, lasting social impact.
Conclusion
The Social Media Amplifier model indicates we need to build a strong community as an enabler for progress online. Creating value for them and acting with purpose. The algorithms do matter, especially for reaching new audiences. Tweaking where you can for the algorithm is helpful, but they matter much less than the needs of your community.
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Other relevant articles:
The Web of Stakeholder Engagement