Issue # 10 - 2014

Engage your audience – be social not scary

You can throw out as many hashtags and status updates as you like, but are they working? Get it

right and you can successfully build your community and ‘activate’ them with your

messages/products. Get it wrong and you risk wasting time and money … and even your reputation.

Here we offer some insights on how Europe can do it the right way.

In a world of iPads, smartphones and other gadgets, people have grown accustomed to instant ‘always

on’ knowledge, quite literally at the touch of their fingertips. Social media allows people to

communicate what they want, when and to whom they want without any of the traditional formalities

of the business world. This is liberating for individuals, but how do corporations and especially

government organisations handle such ‘social’ freedom? Should they be using it at all? And if so, how

can they find the correct tone and style to engage their audience without being scarily corporate or

bureaucratic or just plain boring?

Europe is getting very social

More than two-thirds of Europe’s population is now online, according to figures released earlier this

year*. Of the nearly 1.9 billion active social network users worldwide, the region accounts for some

300 million. Two-thirds of social media users in Europe access their favourite channels – dominated

by Facebook right across the EU – using hand-held devices.

Eurostat data shows that social media penetration among all adults is highest in the Netherlands

(65%), the United Kingdom (57%) and Sweden (54%), with an EU average of 40%. Among 16-24

year-olds, the average is 81%. With such a large proportion of the region’s population using social

media, EU institutions and leaders are catching on to the importance of the medium. And with a rising

sense that Brussels is disconnected from everyday lives, social media is increasingly seen as a key

channel to reach out and reconnect with citizens. Used correctly,

it can help to bridge this perceived ‘democratic deficit’.

Social media gives citizens a voice. It doesn’t just distribute a

message. For example, it featured in the run up to the European

Elections in May 2014, helping to air different viewpoints held

by citizens and decision-makers concerning a range of policy

proposals and projects.

With social media tools in the communication mix, one-way, ‘top-down’ communication from policy-

makers to citizens is transformed into fluid, two-way dialogue where feedback on decisions and

actions is instant and often candid. While the thought of this may put a public organisation off social

media altogether, continuing the top-down approach or not engaging at all carries a higher risk of

misinformation spreading than the possibility of a few ‘flaming’ messages from concerned (angry,

confused, crazy) citizens. The choice is simple: engage Europeans using their medium of choice and

don’t do it half-way. Be there to answer criticisms, provide solutions, point out additional information

European Service Network

Galerie Ravenstein 4

B-1000 Brussels – Belgium

Phone: +32 (0)2 646 40 20

INSIGHTS

SOCIAL MEDIA GIVES CITIZENS

A VOICE. IT DOESN’T JUST

DISTRIBUTE A MESSAGE

… in other words, join in on the conversation. This may mean adding expert resources to monitor the

social media programme on a regular (hourly, daily … not weekly) basis or hiring specialists and/or

communications companies to do it.

Getting noticed

Social media networks are able to spread news faster and in more instantly ‘consumable’ formats than

traditional media. Organisations, both large and small, inevitably need to embrace social media

channels to reach sometimes changing audiences, markets and communities.

But there are caveats to consider and lessons to be learned from the early days of the internet, where

just having a website and URL proved to be only the first step in this exciting new digital realm.

Pioneers soon learned successful sites did things differently; they gathered, developed and used great

content to bring people back time and again. With social media we are seeing a similar emphasis on

content and content marketing, because while it is a very powerful tool, social media still needs to be

used well to be a truly effective communication tool.

Just like a website or blog, the content needs to be appealing and engaging to the audience. The use of

images, videos, colour and humour – content that people can relate to in a personal way – has been

shown to have more impact with audiences on social media.

There is usually only a small window of opportunity to keep people’s attention and get your message

across, so the updates need to deliver the goods, fast. Whether it is news of a policy shift or

announcement about an event, the content needs to be punchy and attention-grabbing while still being

accurate. Short statements, using evocative and preferably less formal language help to personalise the

post and get people talking.

The timing of the update is also important. Choosing peak times to post can increase the chance that

the audience will see the news and hopefully pass it on or take note. Peaks are thought to be early

morning and late afternoon – during the commute – where workers swarm to their smartphones to

pass the time, or during the mid-afternoon coffee break.

Personalising tweets and directing Facebook statuses to certain locations, people and ideas engages

more people as well. Constructive dialogue with the audience (replying to tweets or posts for

example) – further ‘activates’ a community. Every time you reach out to someone, you are not just

talking to that person … you are potentially talking to his or her followers, fans etc. and their

community in turn. Thus from one exchange, you may have ‘influenced’ hundreds, or even thousands

of people. And while it is important to identify big fish ‘influencers’ and cast your net wide,

remember that every catch in the social media ocean is a good one with their own contribution to

make.

Knowing this can help social media planners justify assigning more of their (sometimes limited)

budgets and time towards deeper engagement – more regular contact every day – answering

questions, finding new ways to communicate the content, and stimulating the conversation around the

organisation’s key words and messages.

Story-led content, with a clear eye on entertaining and informing an audience, works better than a set-

piece loaded with key words and titles that people can usually sniff out as hype or marketing. Really

great content marketing therefore manages to entertain and inform better than the rest. And ESN

“If you do what you’ve always done, you’ll get what you’ve always gotten.” (Tony Robinson)

believes to succeed on social media, a community needs to be built around the organisation, its brand,

products, and its central purpose. Today, social media monitoring is a primary form of business

intelligence to identify, predict and respond quickly to market or audience behaviour. Listening to

what customers, competitors, critics and supporters are saying is essential to gaining an edge in

crowded markets and media. The ability to gather data and the tools to process it give an organisation

useful feedback based on which they can adapt their marketing and communications.

Some ‘insights’

ESN can offer a few short-hand insights to help organisations (private and public) decipher the best

approach to social media engagement in their field.

Extending the reach of traditional communications: ‘social media enabling’ of a website and its

content, better use of social media around events, inclusion of social media calls to action in print and

audiovisual content are just some of the areas that an organisation should consider in their wider

campaign.

Real discussion of the benefits – and challenges: Through experience managing the EU’s Share

Europe Online social media channels, ESN has learned that major organisations, especially public

ones, need an honest and realistic appraisal of their current use (if any) of social media and a set of

concrete, achievable actions and milestones aimed at boosting interaction with individuals

(‘engagement’).

Social media advertising (yes or no?): It is not as black and white as this but ESN advises its clients

on the benefits of investing in paid-for social media in addition to organic community management

activities. A key insight we can share is that this can be either incredibly cost-effective (using targeted

post-promotion based on good monitoring and analysis) or incredibly expensive and even counter-

productive if it is seen as the equivalent of print or TV advertising.

Massive range of uses: social media monitoring can be put to a broader set of uses than brand

building and fan feedback. Intelligent use of the information gathered through social media interaction

can also help to understand specific audiences and their needs, boost reputation management and

influencer identification, provide early warning of emerging communication threats and opportunities

as well as instant feedback on the organisation’s own communication, allowing for fine-tuning in real

time.

Not all created equal: Through experience, ESN has identified a clear distinction between the

different types of social media account that an organisation can use for communication. For example,

‘celebrity’ accounts for the likes of a Commissioner, CEO or other well-known leader; ‘corporate’,

‘thematic’ and ‘personal’ accounts which have different purposes and audiences, need to be run in

different ways, and require different resources, but together can form an ‘ecosystem’ that is vastly

more powerful and far-reaching than any of them on their own could be.

There are many specialised companies and services to help with these matters. But before contacting

them, you need to establish what you want to get out of social media and think about what level of

commitment – and how much time and money – you are prepared to invest in setting up and

monitoring your listening posts. The experts can then help you develop a better communications

strategy, and match the tools and approaches to achieve your goals.

Interested in these insights? If you would like to discuss how to improve your communications

efforts, ESN’s Consultancy Department would be glad to help. Drop us a line!

www.esn.eu/contact

* http://wearesocial.net/blog/2014/02/social-digital-mobile-europe-2014/