Social Media Got You Down? Best Practices to Launch an Education-Focused Strategy
In the fast-paced and ever-changing world of social media, it can be difficult to keep up with all of the trends and best practices to maintain your channels. And sometimes, the thought of starting a new channel can be overwhelming.
Social media channels have become the forefront of worldwide news and one of the only places for individuals to connect and engage in social activity, especially amidst a global pandemic. Despite this, many struggle to comprehend how to maintain a successful relationship on these channels. The four originals - Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn - are by far the leaders when it comes to dominating the social sphere. Each channel holds its own unique structure, all centered around the simple principle of sharing authentic content and engaging in a community.
With that being said, we’ve created a helpful guide on how to navigate the original four with best practices for education thought-leaders like yourself.
Setting Up Your Channels:
Create consistent, professional @handles across each platform for easy recognition.
If you are unsure about a specific channel, we suggest creating an account to reserve the handle for future use. Your account will not be deleted due to inactivity.
Leverage your social media bios with keywords about who you are and what you do, and make each channel public for a higher audience reach.
Always leverage a URL when applicable. Invest in platforms like Linktr.ee or Later that can help you add multiple clickable links in your bio.
Follow, add, and invite your friends and family to support your channels. This is an easy way to gain momentum. Use this video to help you get started.
Batching Content:
Find and develop your niche in education. Instead of focusing on a broad industry, your niche can be your core content area focus or a specific grade level. Examples could be SEL, secondary math, educational leadership, instructional coaching, principalship, ELLs and academic language, SPED and inclusion, etc.
Provide value on your channels by establishing content pillars in the following categories: educational, entertaining, inspiring, and promotional.
Use your content pillars to establish 2-3x posts a week - one post per pillar.
Educational: thought-leader articles from leading publications
Inspirational: something unique you’ve implemented in your classroom and how it boosted student engagement or a “tip of the day” for your followers
Promotional: highlight the book you’ve written or the services you offer to educators
These 2-3 posts can be cross-promoted on all your channels (FB, IG, T, LI), slightly modified depending on restrictions for each channel.
While it is not necessary to have an image with each post, it is mandatory when posting on Instagram.
Technology Platforms:
Now that you have your content batched, use tools like Hootsuite, Loomly, Later, or Sprout Social to schedule your posts throughout the week.
Tweetdeck is a great platform for Twitter users to easily participate in Twitter Chats, engage with users, and follow conversations.
To design social media content, Canva is a great option that offers hundreds of customizable templates that you can modify to your style.
For more advanced users, you can leverage mobile apps like Over, InShot, Boosted, and UNUM for video and photo editing.
Leverage Hashtags:
#Hashtags are the number one free resource to leverage across all social media channels, and you want to include a couple in each of your social media posts to reach a higher audience.
Here are best practices for how many hashtags to use per channel:
Facebook: 1-2
Instagram: 10-15
Twitter: 2-3
LinkedIn: 1-2
Try to incorporate a mix of high, medium, and low volume #hashtags that are relevant to your niche. You can find this information when you search for a #hashtag on the platform or you can browse competitors or similar accounts and see what tags they are using as a reference.
Community Engagement:
While batching content is half the battle, the other half is actively engaging with users on each platform.
We recommend setting aside 20 minutes 2x daily to like, comment, and engage with posts across all channels.
This engagement should be a combination of people you already follow, friends/family, and new users you can discover through #hashtags or suggested accounts.
Just as you engage with others, be sure to respond to all your comments and messages consistently by end of day.
With all of these tools and resources, think of social media as a new way to connect with your network and a way to advertise yourself as a brand. Just as Facebook was originally created with the intention of sharing your life updates, think of today’s social media channels as the same but elevated and intentional. The more value you can create through your content, the more growth you can expect to see on these channels. Download a helpful checklist here.
Looking for support with your social media? Explore our Ed2Market services.