Communicating in a networked world
Social media for PTAs
JD Lasica
Founder, Socialbrite.org
jd@socialbrite.org
California State PTA 5/3/13

What we’ll cover today
Big picture
Metrics & Planning
Storytelling
Facebook
Twitter
Pinterest
Use your community
Q&A
Hugs, tearful goodbyes

Hashtag: #CAPTAConvention2013
I’m @jdlasica
Creative Commons
photo on Flickr
by Prakhar
Today’s Twitter hashtag

http://socialbrite.org/pta
Relax!
Creative Commons BY photo
on Flickr by Tom@HK

Color handouts—be happy!
http://socialbrite.org/pta

Socialbrite Sharing Center
http://socialbrite.org/sharing-center

Glossary for new terms
http://socialbrite.org/glossary
Social media:
Any online technology or practice that lets us share
(content, opinions, insights, experiences, media)
and have a conversation about the ideas we care about.
”
“

Blogs
Social networks
Microblogs (Twitter)
Online video
Curation (Pinterest)
Widgets
Photo sharing
Podcasts
Virtual worlds
Wikis
Social bookmarking
Forums
Presentation sharing
Types of social media
T H E E C O S Y S T E M

Tablets: 120 million globally (incl. 20% Americans)
Smartphones: 1 billion (incl. 47% Americans)
Explosion in tablets, smartphones
M O B I L E

Text 'jdlasica' to 50500
Create your own at http://contxts.com
Create a mobile calling card
E X E R C I S E

91% of online US adults use social networks on regular basis.
200 million blogs; 1 million blog posts created per day
Twitter: 200+ million active users, 500 million tweets per day
Google+: 343 million active users
LinkedIn: 200 million monthly users
Pinterest: 48.7 million users
Instagram: 100 million users, 4 billion photos
YouTube: 4 billion videos watched per day
8.6 trillion text messages sent in 2012
Social media by the numbers

Communications among members of
the PTA family have undergone a major
revolution. PTA leaders, members, and
others interested in education and child
welfare can connect and mobilize
through online social media.
Put social media to work
N A T I O N A L P T A

1. Enhance educational experience at your school
2. Promote your PTA, school or school district
3. Involve the community in decision-making
4. Feedback loop with community
5. Enlist volunteers
6. Build online community of supporters
7. Raise funds for a cause or campaign
8. Get people to attend your events
9. Enhance existing communications programs
10.Connect with peers at other PTAs
Why use social media?

1. OK, let’s hear from you
What are your pain points?
Creative Commons BY ND photo on Flickr by optheatrefilms
And what can social media do for you?

Before you talk tools, technology or campaigns, consider:
What are you trying to accomplish?
What core values drive your org?
Are you listening to your
community? (See handout)
Why should people care?
Do you understand that
social media is a series of stages?
Have you done outreach to key teachers, community leaders?
Do you have a plan in place?
L A Y T H E G R O U N D W O R K
First, get grounded

Start with a Plan!
Spell out goals: What do you
want to achieve?
Who are you trying to reach?
What are the best tools for
the job?
Who’s going to do it?
Metrics: How do you know
if it’s working?
What are those other guys
doing?

Possible channels for your plan
Newsletter (print, online), email updates
Website
Blog
Facebook
Twitter
YouTube, live streaming
Calendar of events
Campaigns (legislative, fundraising)
Curation: Storify, Scoop.it
L A Y T H E G R O U N D W O R K

Because ‘data is better than gut’
Photos on Flickr by Emran Kassim, left, and Vee Dub (CC-BY)
S O C I A L M E D I A M E T R I C S
Why measure?

Internal purposes:
Inform decision-making about your organization or cause
Testing messages or products before launch
Market research into constituents, supporters, volunteers
Data about supporters’ giving habits, donation patterns
External purposes:
charitywater.org
Internal & external reasons

Business goals/objectives
Raise funds for a cause
Things to measure (metrics)
# of new donors & $ raised
# of volunteers & volunteer hours
Deeper dive—metrics: socialbrite.org/pta
Get more volunteers
Get people to attend event
Increase comments on blog
Grow newsletter list
Make our content more viral
Get people to take action
# of registrants, year over year
# of subscribers over time
# of shares, # of comments/post
# of people who signed petitions
avg. # comments/post
Map metrics to goals

Start with an Events or Messaging Calendar
Planning, planning, planning!
P R O C E S S E S

Create a Content Calendar
M O R E P L A N N I N G !

The power of story
Cave drawing, Lascaux, France, 17,000 years ago
Awareness > Influence > Action > Impact

Your nonprofit is a media outlet
Awareness > Influence > Action > Impact
C O N V E R S A T I O N F O L L O W S I N T E R E S T I N G C O N T E N T

Find emotional core, use videos or photos to make us feel
invisiblepeople.tv
Use personal storytelling

www.neafoundation.org/blog
Take a page from NEA Foundation
S T O R Y T E L L I N G

Don’t look now but you’re a content creator! Using Animoto
D E M O C R A T I C S T O R Y T E L L I N G
Create lightweight media

Find your internal storytellers
List volunteers’ skills
Who’s good at photos?
Video?
Writing?
Facebook or Twitter?
Create a Blog Squad
Who’s good at community outreach?
Open your blog to guest posts

1.11 billion members worldwide —
76% of US Internet users are on Facebook
0
500
1000
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
Today
Facebook’s global growth rate, 2004-2012, in millions
Facebook: The social network
L E T ’ S G E T F R E A K Y

Why do Facebook?
Remind parents of upcoming events.
Answer questions from parents & public.
Solicit feedback on events & programs.
Build community among parents.
Enlist volunteers.
Mobilize parents on legislative issues.
Educate parents on how the PTA benefits the school.
Discuss news & important issues. Tons of public education
officials are on Facebook & Twitter.

Setting up a Facebook page
Assign responsibilities, share tasks, appoint administrators
Find some good photos of your school or students for the cover
image
Use school logo as your profile pic
Fill in profile info, including links to
school website
Create a friendly url:
facebook.com/LincolnElementaryPTA
Get traction before you publicize
Cross-promote in other channels
Monitor updates, comments on your page
Use Facebook Insights to assess and recalibrate

Get into those news feeds!
edgerankchecker.com
Article: http://bit.ly/edgerank-checker
F A C E B O O K

Use a friendly url
Don’t do this:
K E Y S T O S U C C E S S O N F A C E B O O K

Use a cover image
Don’t do this:
K E Y S T O S U C C E S S O N F A C E B O O K

Rotate your cover photo

Try to foster engagement
What really works well: Photos!

What doesn’t work
Announcements. Without photos

How to succeed on Facebook
Update 1 to 2 times a day.
Keep your posts short.
Be topical and visual.
Share posts you spot elsewhere.
Answer or Like all comments.
Ask questions, stoke conversations.
Create Events pages, invite people.
Post polls.
Be civil. Almost never delete negative posts.
Cross-promote your Facebook Page in other channels/
sites. Link to your blog, videos, Flickr pages.

Secret groups on Facebook
facebook.com/groups

Aligned, integrated, strategic
Include social media logos on your PTA website

Conversation, not marketing
Give your content a social life

Highlight student news
H I K I N O

Stretch break!
Creative Commons photo on Flickr by tom@hk

Let’s talk Twitter!
T W I T T E R

Identify your Twitter team
Name the account the school name
+ PTA but keep it short
Make your Twitter profile keyword rich,
include a link to your Facebook page
Use the school logo as the profile image
For gosh sake, use a unique background image
For gosh sake, don’t make it private
Find parents or staffers who use Twitter & follow them.
Brand your newsletters, emails, flyers with your Twitter url
Getting set up on Twitter
T W I T T E R
No, no, no!!

Staff should be trained.
Not a broadcasting medium.
Start by listening & observing.
Be conversational, not officious.
Tweet several times a day.
Use it to solicit ideas, show support
for students, announce events, mobilize action, educate public &
students about current events, point to articles, identify experts.
#1 traffic driver: retweets. Use ‘Please RT’ strategically.
Tweets with a URL are 3x more likely to be retweeted.
Twitter drives 4%+ of traffic to NY Times, 12% to AOL, Yahoo.
Make Twitter work for you
T W I T T E R

See how other PTAs use Twitter

JD’s 60-30-10 Twitter rule
60% retweets, pointing
to value, sharing other
voices
30% responding,
connecting
10% promoting,
announcing

Search by location: twitter.com/search
Use Twitter strategically

Tweeting about PTA in San Jose

Tweeting about PTA in LA

At left, widget found at:
http://journchat.info
Find relevant hashtags through
Twitter Search or tagdef.com
Join (but don’t spam)
conversation threads
Start your own hashtag
Some hashtags to latch on to:
#women #pta #latino #education
#nclb #politics #Obama #news
#media
Use hashtags to join conversations
T W I T T E R

Don’t be like this guy!
Creative Commons
photo on Flickr by
Jason Means
Don’t do all the heavy lifting!
U S E Y O U R C O M M U N I T Y

here’s an amazing
difference between building
an audience and building a
community. An audience
will watch you fall on a
sword. A community will fall
on a sword for you.
— Chris Brogan
Author, “Trust Agents”
Build community, not eyeballs

Use Pinterest

Spread word through visuals
DonorsChoose.org
P I N T E R E S T

Find your champions!
Find the big kahunas in your sector by using your listening
post. Then, influence the influencers.
Establish a rapport and only then reach out to try to convert
them into evangelists & ambassadors for your cause.
Scope out Twitter Lists that intersect with your organization
or social cause.
Connect with other social media influencers through their
blogs and other networks.

Little Bird: getlittlebird.com
I N F L U E N C E R T O O L

Generate an Attention Wave to socialize your campaign
Use social love handles!

WordPress & its plug-ins
Dropbox, Google docs
Drupal, Joomla
Free content! Free resources!
Free services!
Free photos
Free videos (eg, TED talks)
Free music & audio
Socialbrite.org/sharing-center
Creativecommons.org
Techsoup
Free expertise!
BarCamp
PodCamp
WordCamp
Social Media
ClubFree software & platforms!
Google Grants
YouTube for Nonprofits
Google Earth for Nonprofits
The awesome power of free

Creativecommons.org
Rich source of free
commercial &
noncommercial images
Flickr: 260 million
licensed photos
Use them for your blog,
website, email or print
newsletter, presentations,
reports, etc.
Don’t just take. Share!
flickr.com/creativecommons

HootSuite Pro Dashboard to manage Twitter, Facebook
Best Twitter tools Twtrland, Twitalyzer, Listorious
Social Mention Monitoring, real-time search & alerts
Google Drive Collaborate in the cloud
Klout, Kred Find influencers
Eventbrite Grow your event audiences
Google Analytics Free, rich measurement insights
Evernote Largely free storage in cloud
P R O D U C T I V I T Y T O O L S
Use what works!
Libre Office Free open-source office suite

Free tutorials on the best way to use
Facebook, Twitter & blogs
24 online fundraising sites
Free reports
Free photo, music, video directories
Collaboration tools
How to use mobile strategically
What you’ll find at socialbrite.org/pta
Resources & tools

Lay the groundwork before
plunging in.
Create a plan, begin with a
strategy, not with the tools.
Measure, measure, measure!
Tell your stories.
Use your community — your
biggest resource: your supporters!
Key takeaways

If you do not change
direction, you may
end up where you
are heading.
— Lao Tse
Don’t settle for the status quo

JD Lasica, founder
Socialbrite consultancy
email: jd@socialbrite.org
Twitter: @jdlasica
@socialbrite
Thank you! Grab my card!
Tons of resources at
http://socialbrite.org/pta