2. A new era of communication
• Erosion of traditional news media’s gatekeeper role
• Large institutions = trustworthy news sources
• Everyone’s a publisher
• If you don’t participate,
your voice won’t be heard
A new era of communication
3. News media: Still crucial for wide dissemination
• Press release/blog post
on research or other work,
to attract reporters’ attention
• Expert opinion
on a topic in your specialty
• Commenting
on research by others
or on a societal/policy issue
• In-depth stories on a weighty topic
• Crisis/problem situations
4. Who needs reporters anyway?
• Social media & search
• Institutions & individuals
create & share directly
• Visuals & videos are vital
• Rapid response to
controversy
5. Why should researchers use social media?
• Connect with others in the field & beyond
• Share new findings, publications, news items, observations,
opinions, timely links
• Engage with individuals/institutions around the world & next door
• Retain professional tone while engaging
• Get the most out of conferences & events
7. Your personal brand…
• NOT a logo
• Must be built, over time
• Comes from the ways you present yourself to the world…
and what people can find about you when they look
• Affects how people will interact with you
and your work
8. Why else? Altmetrics!
• Aggregating activity around journal articles:
• media coverage
• blog posts
• social media activity
• more
• Traces links & specific mentions of individual
papers by DOI
• Assigns a score & percentile
• Not perfect! But getting better
9. Why else? Journals, funders & societies!
Increasingly they ask researchers to:
• Connect with their own communications staff, and/or
the researchers’ institutional communication staff
• Write lay summaries and lay abstracts
• Tape videos and audio podcasts
• Write the tweets that they will send out about your work
• Make visual abstracts & infographics
• Share news coverage quoting you
11. Every researcher’s essentials
• A robust, updated
professional web profile
• Know your PR person &
when you should contact us
• Basic LinkedIn profile
• Google yourself/set up a
Google alert for your name
12. “Laying low”
• Start by “lurking” – follow individuals,
institutions, organizations, news media
• Monitor Twitter traffic at conferences
via hashtags (& use them!)
• Subscribe to lists of Twitter
users compiled by others in your field
• Join LinkedIn groups for professional societies
• Send ideas for tweets/posts to your PR person
to share on an institutional account
13. Take it to the next level
• Put your full name on your Twitter handle,
write a brief bio & link to your page
• Share links & posts on LinkedIn or Medium
• Write a “plain English” web blurb on your
research focus
• Post/tweet about each paper
you publish/talk you give
14. Engaging more fully
• Share links to your own work &
the work of others
• Post slide sets on website/SlideShare
• Take part in tweet chats, Reddit AMAs,
online awareness campaigns, virtual journal clubs, etc.
• On your personal social media, educate friends
by sharing news/observations
15. I challenge you…
• Take advantage of
this new era’s tools
• Don’t just hope
someone else
will do it for you!
• See it as part of a
research career.
16. Need more help?
My slide sets & social media “how to” sheets:
https://www.slideshare.net/KaraGavin
Help with writing in plain English:
www.aaas.org/pes/communicatingscience
NIH Checklist for Communicating Science & Health to the Public:
http://michmed.org/EzD1O
National Patient Safety Foundation: Health Literacy
http://npsf.site-ym.com/?page=healthliteracy
Joyce Lee, M.D.’s Slideshares on social media:
http://www.slideshare.net/joyclee/presentations
Find hashtags for your specialty:
https://www.symplur.com/healthcare-hashtags/
