Creating a social media

management plan

Dom Sparkes, CEO & Founder

Why are we here today?

The format

• Slides you will be sent for reference

• Questions to get you thinking (no answer is too silly)

• Info is from our experience (apologies if you don’t like it)

• If any of this is too easy – good. Social shouldn’t be hard

• Please ask questions at any time

• Please do share you own experiences. We can all learn

from each other

About your host…

• Dom Sparkes, CEO & Founder

• Nearly 10 years at Tempero

• 4 at Granada as Head of Production

• 4 at EMI as New Media Manager

We work in partnership with our clients to help them navigate and thrive in this new landscape

What we do

Our Clients

Question One

What’s a Social MediaManagement plan?

What’s a Social Media Management Plan?

• We’re NOT talking about what platforms you should

be on and what creative route you should take

• We’re talking about the practicalities of running

social media activity, almost regardless of platform

What’s a Social Media Management Plan?

• A plan should detail what resources are required, the

guidelines you’re working to and outline plans for

activity and much more

• It should be detailed but if nothing else, the back of a

(large) fag packet will do

Why plan for management?

• Effective SM management takes time

• Without good management… Social = #FAIL

• Fixing mistakes is far more expensive &

tiresome than avoiding them in the first place

• Planning helps to assess future resource

requirements & financial impact

Why plan for management?

As a wise man in

fancy dress once

said:

‘Be prepared’

What do you need to consider?

Let’s pull out the relevant aspects from our strategy process:

Pre-Strategy/Genesis of a idea- Who are you aiming to target?- Why are you trying to target them?- What could the problems be?- Where will it take place?- When will it all happen?

PlanningInsight - Create foresight into the hypothesesStrategy - Expand the idea into a fully-fledged visionPracticality - Detail the details of how the strategy will be delivered

ExecutionModerate - Protect the brand and usersEngage - Drive loyalty & interaction via help &

entertainmentOutreach - Develop relationships to encourage new

audiencesManage - Monitor progress, develop initiatives & report

on results

What do you need to consider?

• We’ll whizz through the steps

…and then concentrate on:

• Moderation Guidelines

• Content plans

• Resource requirements

Things to think about before creating your plan

Pre-Strategy/Genesis of a idea

- Who are you aiming to target?- Demographics because of hiring relevant staff & child safety

- Why are you trying to target them?- Purpose because of mix of marketing vs editorial skills

- What could the problems be?- Get the issues on the table early (Volumes, content, budget?)

- Where will it take place?- Type or number of platforms can influence technology & engagement style

- When will it all happen?- Do you want a thriving real-time conversational community or a more

relaxed resource focused feel

Things to think about before creating your plan

Planning

Insight - Create foresight into the hypotheses

Insight will help with creative but it will also help to assess market size andpotential popularity of your project and therefore what resources may be

requiredto staff the project

Practicality - Detail the details of how the strategy will be delivered

The details from the other sections will help to inform the practical considerations.

What does your plan need to contain?

Delivering social media touches on:

•Recruitment•Industry guidelines•Child Safety•Customer Service•Guidelines & Policy•Technology•Legal•Training•And much much more

What does your plan need to contain?

At a minimum your plan should contain:

•Guidelines for moderation, engagement and

escalation

•A content plan, schedule or outline

•Details of the resources you require and the

breakdown of how they will be used

•A reporting template (for stats & KPIs)

Let’s start with guidelines & policies

Why bother? Especially if a department of one?

•Guidelines & policies create consistency

•They are invaluable in big organisations

•You cannot train effectively without them

•They feed into many other departments such

as Customer Service, Marketing, PR, etc.

What do you need?

Ideally, at a minimum you want to create:

1.Moderation guidelines (for content)

2.Moderation technology guidelines

3.Escalation procedures

4.House rules (even for Social Networks)

5.Responses (standard, tailored, bespoke)

6.Tone of voice guidelines

Moderation guidelines (for content)

These should be your moderators bible and at the least, cover how you want content dealt with in terms of:

• Legal issues (copyright, libel, contempt etc)

• Brand issues (competitors, negativity)

• Personal details (i.e. what’s allowed)

• Responses (standard, tailored, bespoke)

Moderation technology guidelines

If you are using any technology you need a set if guidelines for training and reference. See one, do one, teach one is not good enough.

• Always have a least 2 admin logins

• Which features can be used (and how)

• What’s the fall-back if they break?

• Use screenshots as much as possible (or

even video)

Escalation procedures

Who you gonna call?

•When you get a bomb threat or suicide post?

•You want as simple a escalation path as poss

•Detail organisations that can be called upon

• Keep records of everything and be very

careful with legal issues and child safety

House rules

How should people behave?

•You are limited on imposing rules on social

networks

•You can set brief house rules however

•Make it clear how you expect people to behave

•Communicate those rules in a friendly way

•Remind folks of rules before taking any action

Responses

You will need to write to users at some point

• We create three levels of response…

• Mods can post standard responses

• Mods/CM’s can post tailored responses

• CM’s/The client post bespoke responses

• Creating an initial database of answers &

building it over time is effective

Tone of voice

Following on from writing to users…

• Would you say hi, hello, hey?

• Consistency is key (esp. with multiple staff)

• ToV may differ across platforms

• The ToV needs to adapt the brand to social

• It should contain common phrases,

abbreviations, acronyms etc.

Content plans/outlines/schedules

Absolutely anything is better than nothing here!

• From ‘1 tweet a day will do’ to…

• A multi-territory, platform & language plan

that ties into the full marketing mix

• Workflow is important for multi-stakeholders

• Scheduling helps to measure success

Content plans/outlines/schedules

A content plan/outline/schedule should contain:

• Details of platforms & content type

• Broadcast times

• Content type (with sign off workflow)

• The content itself

• Error checking (spelling, grammar, URL’s

etc)

• Content tracking

Content plans/outlines/schedules

The ideal content plan/outline/schedule is

different for every organisation.

E.G….

Content plans/outlines/schedules

Other considerations:

• The CMS you’re using

• Feeding into marketing activity

• Asset databases

• Who has ultimate responsibility

• Objectives

• Compliance

Resource requirements

• Staffing is usually the biggest cost in social

• It’s also a nightmare to plan for

• Even some basic planning can help estimate

• Adding in contingency is advised

• Technology won’t remove human cost

What you need is the…

Social Media InsightEngagement & Moderation time estimating tool thing.

orSMIEMTETT

(for short :-)

Update:

This will be uploaded to our site in the very near future

Dom Sparkes, CEO

dominic.sparkes@tempero.co.uk

@domsparkes & @temperoUK

0207 278 3222

If you’ve found today useful, please tweet

mentioning @temperouk. If you haven’t.

Don’t

That’s all folks!

Any questions?