Creating a Social Media Plan for Your Firm
Whether a part of a student-run firm or a professional agency, public relations practitioners are often required to know how to use social media for their clients. However, we sometimes get so wrapped up in social media plans for our clients that we may forget about our own social media outlets and efforts to promote our firm, too.
In the last five years, ImPRessions, the Ohio University’s PRSSA student-run firm, created a Twitter handle, Facebook page and blog to promote the firm to students and clients. While the number of people you reach can make or break your influence in the social media realm, the quality of connections to your followers and fans are often more important.
For ImPRessions, and many student-run firms, the majority of social media interactions are with students, alumni and clients. Managing multiple platforms for the firm, your clients and yourself can be a difficult balancing act. To combat social media overload, ImPRessions executives and the firm’s Professional Adviser created a social media plan to increase their social media efforts and structure the multiple accounts throughout the firm.
The social media plan includes a goal, analysis, types of audience, objectives, strategies, tactics and evaluation.
1. Goal
Create a specific goal of increasing social media interaction through chosen social media platforms.
2. Analysis
A thorough analysis provides a background of the firm and the current social media platforms and strategies.
3. Audience
Unique to each firm, your audience may depend on whether the firm is PRSSA Nationally Affiliated, what types of clients it serves and how many students are involved. For ImPRessions, we included all PRSSA Chapters, Ohio University, current students, alumni and potential clients in various industries.
4. Objectives
Create an objective for each of your social media platforms with measurable outcomes. Each objective should have at least two strategies and two tactics per strategy.
5. Strategy
Your strategy should provide the rationale for how you will achieve your objective.
6. Tactics
Each tactic should include specific channels and actions and fit into your overall strategy for that objective.
7. Evaluation
Measure the success of each objective and individual strategies. Compare the outcome to your desired objective using analytics and social media metrics like retweetrank and Klout to help measure the impact of your social media efforts.
Every firm will have a different social media plan, but it is a good idea to have a common structure. The earlier you have a plan in place, the easier it is to distribute tasks, set a goal and evaluate what works best for your firm. We’ve created a plan to allow ImPRessions to meet our social media goals. I hope you find the plan that is best for you and your team.
How has your firm or Chapter incorporated social media? How have you planned and strategized your efforts?
This is a guest post by ImPRessions CEO, Nicole Bersani. To contact Nicole or ImPRessions, email ouimpressions@gmail.com.
