Of course social media became a topic of conversation at a recent PenSPRA meeting we attended, as it often does!
If you have a Facebook account, consider becoming a fan of “Facebook in Education” to follow other educators and to see how they are incorporating the use of Facebook into their district and organization communication plans. http://www.facebook.com/education
We began incorporating social media into Class Communications’ marketing efforts last fall. Here are some of the top reasons why:
1. It is important to meet people where they are. Professionals are on LinkedIn and many businesses are using Twitter and Facebook. Your students are “hanging out” online – now parents and grandparents are logging on too.
During the first half of 2009, the Facebook users, by age, broke out like this*:
Ages 0-17 –10% of all users
Ages 18-24 – 25% of all users
Ages 25-34 – 25% of all users
Ages 35-54 – 28% of all users
Ages 55+ – 8% of all users
(Even though we are missing 4% here, probably due to the lack of information available, this paints a pretty clear picture!)
2. It is an inexpensive means of reaching people with your message. In most cases – it is FREE.
3. Social media is here to stay (and yes - it is time consuming)! Many small and non-profit organizations are saying, “we know we need social media, but who has time to post AND monitor?” I sure wish I had an easy answer or a “quick click” to solve this dilemma. There are ways to streamline (i.e., when a post is made to Facebook you can set up your page to auto-upload to Twitter) and it may take some research on your part, a great technology director, and/or some workshops!