As UT Health San Antonio develops “WOW” content, the next logical step is to cleverly push that content across all of our existing social channels. As we deliver a strategic vision for UT Health San Antonio’s social strategy, it is critical to explore and understand what we are currently doing across all our social platforms to make strong, measurable recommendations that will drive growth.
Before You Start
GETTING STARTED THE RIGHT WAY
Establishing a new profile or page the proper way is critical for new followers to find you on social media, and for you to engage authentically and uphold the UT Health San Antonio brand promise. Here are a few tips on how to get started:
Determine your Need
What do you hope to accomplish with your new profile or page? Do you want to promote your department? Promote your services? Who is your target audience? What will they gain by learning about you? How will you know when you have achieved your goal? Who do you want for fans and followers? Who do you want to be loyal to your group/page? How will you keep them interested?
As you answer these questions, do some research to find out if there is an existing UT Health San Antonio page that communicates to the same type of audience and provides an existing platform for your message – you may find advantages using an existing page for your messages.
Assign Administrators
Determine at this early stage who will be responsible for maintaining and monitoring your group or page. This person or team of people must be willing to write content, monitor posts, answer questions and serve as the point of contact. If no one will commit to the responsibility, you should reconsider launching the page
Profile Checklist
Set Up Your Profile
Once you have determined that a need for your page exists, contact the UT Health San Antonio Marketing Department for advice to get up and running quickly:
The Marketing Department can guide you in choosing a unique username that aligns with the UT Health San Antonio brand naming structure. They can assist with attractive and professional Profile and Cover Photos. Your UT Health San Antonio marketing experts can also assist with using the appropriate assets to brand your page. Reference our Social Media Brand Toolkit in Chapter 10 for the appropriate assets and brand guidelines.
Be Clear and Complete with Your Descriptions
In your Info/About sections, be very clear about what you do. Use UT Health San Antonio’s brand tone and voice, and include one or two industry/brand specific hashtags to make it easy to find your profile. Let your personality show through as you describe who you are and what you do. The additional description fields vary across each platform, but the primary focus is to include the keywords and terms that most accurately represent what you do or offer. It is okay to use industry-specific jargon if that is how your audience would search for you on social media. Specify your location and hours – this is critical call-to-action information for your audience to contact you or visit you. Your call-to-action must be accurate and consistently applied on all About pages to help maintain overarching, professional online reputation.
Build Your Content Strategy
Think about what kind of content you will share. Videos? News? Engaging stories? Who are your experts? How will these kinds of posts engage your followers?
Publish timeless content (also called ‘evergreen’ content) first to avoid empty activity on your profile. Some social channels will let you backdate your posts over several timestamps to appear established. It’s imperative to build up your posts and activity before launching your page to your audience.
Stay Engaged
No one likes it when you constantly talk about yourself and make yourself the center of attention. Social media works the same way. Don’t promote yourself endlessly. Be a good conversationalist. Ask questions. You will sometimes get the best engagement when you ask a question that doesn’t have anything to do with the topic of your page – “Why Texas rodeos are the nation’s best”, for example. Most importantly, when a follower asks you a question, make sure you reply within 24 hours. In the same way, don’t be so focused on your own posts that you forget to listen. What are people saying on similar channels and pages to yours? Who is talking? What are their concerns? What opportunities can you take advantage of?
Evaluate Your Page
Schedule regular evaluations of your page’s performance based on the goals you set. Are you on track to reach your goals? Are you accomplishing what you set out to do? Are your strategies still relevant or do you need to adjust course?
Brand Usage Guidelines
Every social media channel has established their own best practices for how their brand assets should be used by organizations in social media posts and promotions. As a representative of UT Health San Antonio, you should follow these guidelines when you use the assets of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and LinkedIn. To quickly access channel brand guides, follow the links below:
For institutional best practices developed by the UT Health San Antonio Digital Experience team click here to view the UT Health SA Strategic Social Media Guidelines Overview PowerPoint presentation, as well as each channel-specific brand guides below: