An introduction to social media and social networks, covering the basic definitions, why they are important in today's web environment, and an overview of how to build a community yourself. Given at the Genesee Valley Psychological Association's 2009 Annual Conference.
2. 3 Questions:
What? Why?
...is social media? ...is this important?
...is a social network? ...bother?
How?
...do you build a community?
...do you keep it alive?
3. What is Social Media?
• a platform for
interaction and
relationships
• conversation
empowered by
technology
4. What is a social
network?
• A group of
interdependent people
• United by a common
interest or cause
5. What is a social
network service?
• an online space where a group convenes
• a conversation enabled by internet
technologies
6. a little history...
Four Major Landmarks in Human Communication:
Printing Telegraph/
Press Telephone
Pictures/ Radio/
Movies Television
7. The Internet
• Delivers all media types
• text
• images
• audio
• video
• Native support for conversation
• it took 35 years to figure this out
11. Why does this
matter?
• 75% of North Americans use the internet
• 96% of Gen Y reports joining a social
network
• Age 35+ is fastest growing demographic on
facebook.com
12. Why does this
matter?
50 million users:
Radio TV
38 years 13 years
Internet Facebook
4 years 3 years
13. Why does this
matter?
• Facebook now has 300 million users
• the last 50 million since July
• that’s almost as big as the United States
14. Why does this
matter?
• YouTube: 1,000,000 viewers each month
• 15 hours of video uploaded per minute
• Wikipedia: 14 million articles
• 200 million blogs online
15. Why does this
matter?
• Pieces of content shared on Facebook
in a single week:
2 Billion
16. Why does this
matter?
• By the end of 2008, social networks
have surpassed email in popularity
• Social media is now mainstream
• Technological value becomes social
value
17. Types of social
networks
• Extension of existing community
• Entirely new community
• Geographically independent
• Local to certain area
18. Building a
Community
Research
• What do prospective members need?
• What are perceived communication gaps?
• Survey, poll, interview, gauge enthusiasm
• Benchmark similar sites
• Look for niche if needed
19. Building a
Community
Action Plans
• Content strategy
• Engagement strategy
• Governance
• Feature list
• User experience
• Technology
20. Content Strategy
Where will content come from?
• Authors, guest authors
• User-generated content (UGC)
• Aggregators
• Licensed content
21. Engagement
Strategy
UGC Drives Growth
• perceived value to new user
• flywheel:
• zero inertia at start
• participation attracts more participation
• incentivise participation
• avoid ‘ghost town’... keep size ‘just right’
22. Engagement
Strategy
• Face to face events
• Email newsletters
• Traditional promotion, word of mouth
• Your users become your evangelists
23. Governance
• Convene your community, not control it.
• Community guidelines are key
• Moderation tools
• Community manager
• Listen well (both on and off site)
• Easily accessible feedback process
24. Features
• Member database • Ranking/voting/polling
• Blogs / Articles • Moderation control
• Article comments • Photo galleries
• Discussion Forums • Video galleries
• Event Calendar • File sharing
• News ticker • “Mysite” customization
• Links to other • Newsletters
25. User Experience
• Good user experience= good impression
• Well designed interface delights users
• Verify workflows are reasonable
• Usability testing is cheap with big payback
26. Technology
• Content Management System (CMS)
• Domain registrar
• Reliable hosting & database support
• Scalable hosting as traffic grows
• Service provider or custom- built