Welcome! You’re here because you're responsible for one of Weber State’s many social media pages. Now what do you do? Here’s some tips to make using social media easier and more effective.

Know Your Platform

Audiences gravitate to each social media platform for different reasons and they use them in much different ways. Your approach to social media content should not be one size fits all. 

Cross-promote and tailor your content to different platforms. To reach your audience where they’re at, make sure your content is shared across all platforms when applicable. Be ready to tweak your content as necessary depending on where you’re posting. For instance, Threads and X (Twitter) have character limits; Instagram doesn’t allow links within a post. Your posts will do better if you customize them to the platform they’re on instead of copy and pasting from one to the other. 

Stay up-to-date with platform developments. New features are regularly launched and algorithms can change. Pay attention to how this can impact your engagement and how you may use them in the future. Social Media Today is an excellent resource for news about social media and tech updates. 

DON’T jump on a new platform without a plan. Will you have enough content and bandwidth to feed it past the first few weeks? If you’re already struggling to keep an Instagram account active, do you really need to add a LinkedIn account on top of it? Consult with your team or the Weber State social media coordinator before creating an account to see if it’s right for you.

Keep your account information up-to-date. Make sure multiple people in your department have access to the account’s login information in the event of a job change. Facebook and LinkedIn require user account access, while Instagram and others use passwords. Several established WSU pages have been lost because passwords or access were not shared beforehand, and now sit inactive and neglected. Departments who repeatedly lose account information will be strongly discouraged from creating new ones.

Content Creation

Social media is all about content. In fact, the algorithms for TikTok and Instagram often reward you for posting regularly and in their preferred format. But social media managers must be mindful and understand the importance of clear, quality content that advances the brand and messaging.

Some weeks will be slower than others… and that’s okay! It’s better to stay quiet when you have nothing to say rather than posting just for the sake of posting.

Content creation can be one the toughest parts of running a social media page, especially as social media shifts away from text and photo-based content to short-form video. Here’s how you make planning and creating content easier for you or your team:

Create a content calendar. Keep track of the posts you make, when you make them, and what kind of engagement they get. This will be helpful for making decisions in the future and keep you from scrambling to think of posts daily.

Consider your audience. As a niche university page, your audience will be smaller and more narrowly focused than the audience for the “Big W” main pages. While we’re all here to promote Weber State, we also have different areas to focus on and our content should reflect that. To determine your focus, you must consider your audience. Who are they? Why are they following you? What do they want to see from you? Is what you’re posting useful for them? Asking these questions will help you choose content or messages to amplify on your platform. 

Keep an eye on what’s trending. A good social media manager is aware of what’s happening in online spaces and has a general idea of what’s trending, whether it’s consumer, pop culture, politics, or meme-based. Capitalizing on a trend is a good way to engage your audience and bring new eyes to your page. Plus, it’s fun! But before you go all in, you should ask yourself some questions: Do I understand this trend? Does participating in this help further the institution’s goals and messages? How can I make this relevant to my audience? 

If you’re ever confused or curious about trends, don’t be afraid to ask your coworkers, student workers, friends, or family to help you brainstorm. Bonus: Later.com and HeyOrca.com provide lists of trending audio and content each week so you don’t have to spend all your time scrolling on your own to figure it out!

Read the news daily. Knowing what’s going on in Ogden, Utah, and the rest of the nation will give you a heads up on any big issues or what might be on your followers' minds. It may also help you decide content for the day, especially if Weber State is in the news. Be aware of what people are talking about, and when that conversation shifts to something of national importance. 

Know your holidays. National holidays and annual Weber State events like commencement and homecoming should be marked on your content calendar. You don’t have to acknowledge all of them, but it’s important to be aware of them just in case. NationalToday.com is a great resource for holidays of all types. 

Create video content in batches. Short-form video can be a time-consuming activity. Some videos can be created quickly using templates, but most involve finding time to shoot and then edit content. We recommend picking a few days a month to focus on video, specifically creating multiple videos at once that can be posted over several weeks, to ease the burden.

Stay on brand. Use Weber State’s approved colors, fonts, and graphics where possible. Visit the Brand website for more information. 

People often follow multiple WSU social media accounts, and we need to distinguish the main university feed from other feeds. To make this easier, use of the WSU shield in the profile image is reserved for the seven official university accounts, where messaging is managed by the Marketing & Communications team.

AVOID AI GENERATED IMAGES. AI can be helpful for social media managers, but avoid using AI generated images of campus locations, students, or logos. These are often inaccurate representations of Weber State and can be harmful to the brand. (Plus, social media audiences can be pretty mean about AI content!)

 

Interacting with Users

After content creation, interacting with your audience is a social media manager’s primary responsibility. You are the digital face of your college, department, or student organization, and often the first point of contact when someone has questions or concerns. Consider how you want to interact with your audience and how you’ll respond to negativity. 

Use your customer service voice. When responding to negativity, be polite and professional. Please remember that your responses can be screencapped and shared, so as good as typing out that snarky reply feels, it can create more problems for you. 

Respond to people with valid complaints and concerns. If the complaint is something you can help resolve, direct the user to an office or department that can help. If the user is venting, you can acknowledge their feelings, express sympathy, or explain, but avoid being drawn into an argument.

Don’t engage with trolls and negative actors. Unfortunately, social media is full of bad actors who enjoy leaving mean comments and causing arguments. Their goal is to get you to respond. Don’t feed them!

Explain, but don’t debate. Misinformation about Weber State on social media should be corrected when possible. We are a higher education institution – it’s okay to educate our followers! Explain the facts or the university’s position, but don’t engage beyond that. Remember, some people fight for fun. Social media managers should not make statements on behalf of the university.

Don’t delete negative or critical comments. Weber State University is a public institution and must abide by the rules of the First Amendment; our social pages are a limited public forum for the topics we post. Blocking users or deleting comments should be reserved for violations of social media policy, including hate speech, pornography, personal attacks, confidential information, spam and comments that are off topic.

If a comment section gets out of control, you can close comments on the post – but be aware that users may migrate to other posts to continue the conservation.

 

When there’s a crisis…

In the digital age, social media is the frontline for crisis communication. If the crisis doesn’t start on social media, it will end up there eventually. In the event of a crisis (physical or digital), you will receive instructions from the social media coordinator and the Marketing & Communications team on how to proceed. Some tips:

• Pause all social media messaging until the crisis has resolved

• Utilize the messaging provided by Marketing & Communications. Do not deviate from this, especially when it involves life and safety. 

• Amplify crisis messages posted by the main Weber State University account.

• Report misinformation to the social media coordinator