Top tips from social media managers

This Saturday marks World Social Media Day. To celebrate, we thought we’d ask social media managers for their top tips. Enjoy!

Social media is about community
Nathan Murray, Social Media Manager at RNIB

Remember why social media is different to other marketing channels – it allows for two-way communication with your supporters. It’s easy, when planning digital campaigns, to focus on the broadcast elements but don’t forget the power of your online community; they can help bring your key messages to life and give credibility to your campaign. At RNIB, we’ve been blown away by the community response to our #HowISee campaign, where people across the country have been sharing their own experiences of living with different eye conditions.

Be kind to yourself
Susheila Juggapah (Sushi), Digital Content Manager at CharityComms

Running social channels can be exhausting, as you’re using a lot of emotional energy to create, find and share more and more content. Be kind to yourself. When you spend so much time curating content for an account that isn’t your own, don’t get hung up on the idea that your personal account isn’t constantly tweeting facts about your industry. Knowing your limits is a good thing. It means you can plan, scale up or get in more resource when you need it.

Tag your posts for greater impact
Ashley Sellwood, Communications and Marketing Officer at Plunkett Foundation

Make sure you are tagging any relevant organisations in your social media posts. This will not only ensure you receive maximum engagement, but shows that you are proud to work with them and they will most likely tag you in their posts in return.

Images are everything
Helena Hastings, Digital Officer at Sounddelivery

We’ve all heard the phrase ‘a picture is worth a thousand words’ and on social media adding a visual element to your post can really make the difference. Visual content is more than 40 times more likely to get shared on social media than other types of content.

There’s so many great free and low-cost tools that you can easily create visuals in-house. My favourites (both free) are graphic design-tool Canva (which also offers free premium accounts to non-profits) and Quik – GoPro Video Editor for quick video edits, slideshows and royalty-free music.

Don’t be afraid to test new ideas
Tereza Litsa, Social Media Manager at Lightful

It’s now easier than ever to create your own content, even with limited resources, but this doesn’t mean that your presence should be boring. Social media offers a great opportunity to experiment with new ideas. All the different content types (such as images, video, GIFs etc) can help you tell a story in a creative way that can be more appealing to your supporters. Don’t be afraid to be bold with your campaigns and use your channels as an opportunity to explore new ways to reach your audience. Just make sure that you’re measuring the results of your experiments to discover what works best and what you should avoid in the future.

Trust is key
Jo Eden, Senior Social Media Executive at British Heart Foundation

As much as you can read around your subject and prove yourself to be an expert, I’ve actually found that the ability to build trust with colleagues who don’t have as much knowledge in your area is really crucial. When the people I work with on a regular basis know that I’m doing everything I can to work to their objectives and support their goals, they’re much happier to give me a bit more free rein. Ultimately, they know I’ve got their back.

Have you got a top tip to share? Tweet us at @Lightful!