Designing for Social Media

1. Introduction

Discussion:

  • Introductions, background, and expectations of the class
  • How has social media changed, affected, or influenced you?

2. Social Media vs. Social Networks

Discussion:

  • What is the difference between social media and social networks?
  • User Generated Content (UGC) - people participate in the creation and modification of content
  • Social networks reflect one's connections and associations, the paths across which we share information
  • There is a blurry line between social media and social networks: is a conversation within a network content to be shared with others within extended networks or outside of a network?
  • When does a conversation become content?
  • Does a conversation about shared content become part of that content?

Resources:

Readings:

3. Why Do People Use Social Networks?

Example Social Networks and Sites:

Functions (what sites and services offer):

  • Blogs
  • Micro-blogs
  • Videos
  • Photos
  • Chat
  • Comments, ratings, and reviews
  • "Friending"
  • Professional networking
  • Podcasting
  • Social bookmarking
  • Forums, discussions, and Q&A
  • Information and news
  • Location / Geolocation
  • Politics
  • Gaming

Purposes (why people use them):

  • Conversation and connecting
  • Sharing
  • Bonding
  • Networking
  • Collaborating
  • Work and business
  • Learning
  • Social credibility, social currency, and popularity
  • Validation
  • Playing and gaming
  • Avoidance, hiding, and insecurity

4. Who is participating, and what are we doing?

Demographics:

  • Age in 2010 in USA
    • 18-22 (16%)
    • 23-35 (32%)
    • 36-49 (26%)
    • 50-65 (20%)
    • 65+ (6%)
  • Sex in 2010 in USA
    • Male (44%) - except LinkedIn (63% male)
    • Female (56%)

Who is in our networks?

  • High School Friends (22%)
  • Extended Family (12%)
  • Coworkers (10%)
  • College Friends (9%)
  • Immediate Family (8%)
  • Voluntary Groups (7%)
  • Neighbors (2%)

What are we doing (on Facebook) everyday?

  • Update own status (15%)
  • Comment on other’s posts (22%)
  • Comment on other’s photos (20%)
  • “Like” other’s content (26%)
  • Send private messages (10%)

Self-described types of Social Network Systems (SNS) users (do these at least once per month):

  • Creators (24%) - generate content
  • Conversationalists (33%) - update status, post messages
  • Critics (37%) - rate, review, and comment
  • Collectors (20%) - RSS, add tags, vote
  • Joiners (59%) - maintain social profile
  • Spectators (70%) - consume content, read, watch, listen
  • Inactives (17%) - none of the above, do not participate

Why do we participate? (Summer 2011)

  • Feel part of a community (31%)
  • Peer recognition (28%)
  • Participate with people or brands you like (9%)
  • Make money (6%)
  • Recognition from colleagues (4%)
  • Other (22%)

When do we share?

5. Personal vs. Organizational Use

Personal Brand

  • Justin Seeley's Designing for the Social Web
    • Have a social strategy: where do you need to be? Find the community and listen to it.
    • Consistency promotes awareness: be consistent and recognizable across multiple sites and services.
    • Cross-pollination: include links to all of your online locations everywhere, and give people the ability to easily share everything you produce.

Organizational Brand

  • The Relationship with customers
    • Participation vs. control
    • Listening vs. shouting
  • Soliciting feedback and comments
  • Handling complaints
  • Vetting product ideas and new product testing
  • Identifying and rewarding brand ambassadors

Examples:

Where do social interactions occur?

  • On-domain vs. off-domain experiences
    • Bring the people to you
    • Go to where the people are
  • Which is more difficult?
  • Which is more effective?
  • Why are there "control issues"?

Moderation and Control

  • Cannot make community happen, but can provide the opportunity
  • Cannot control the conversation, but can participate in it
  • Cannot force the direction, but can hint or influence
  • Cannot create trust, but can be trustworthy

How large are our social networks?

  • Dunbar's Number
    • About 150, but then what happens?
  • Strong ties vs. weak ties
    • Our acquaintances and extended networks, not our closest friends, are our greatest source of new ideas and information

6. Designing Social Experiences

Sharing:

  • What do people want to share?
  • Why do they want to share it?
  • Who do they share it with?

Tools:

  • Facebook Like and Share
  • Tweet This
  • Google +1
  • AddThis
  • ShareThis
  • Wordpress Sociable plug-in

Readings:

Placing sharing opportunities:

Encouraging participation:

  • Social currency and social credibility
  • Points and credits
  • Earnings scale
  • Public recognition
  • Access and special or elite status (privilege and exclusivity)
  • Scarcity (limited amount or number)
  • Urgency (limited time or duration)
  • Beta testers
  • Brand ambassadors
  • Social influence

Social Media Influence:

  • Ten Tools for Measuring Your Social Media Influence
    • Klout, PostRank, TwentyFeet, PeerIndex, Empire Avenue, Sprout Social, Crowdbooster, Twylah, My Web Career, Appinions
  • The Six Factors of Social Media Influence
    • Credibility (expertise in a specific knowledge domain)
    • Bandwidth (ability to transmit expert knowledge)
    • Relevance (information offered matches information needed)
    • Timing (information available at the right time)
    • Alignment (information available in the right place)
    • Confidence (how much the recipient trusts the expert)

Social networks and social media across cultures?

  • Are there differences in attitudes toward and behaviors on social networks in different cultures?
  • Expectations and values within vs. among cultures?
  • Group polarization effect and stereotypes
  • Recognition of the greater humanity

7. Privacy, Persuasion, and Trust

Privacy:

  • Who owns your content? data? history? life?
  • How do we decide what to share and with whom?

Trust:

Persuasion:

  • PET: Trust, Emotion, Persuasion, Commitment
  • BJ Fogg's research (Stanford):
    • Motivation
      • Pleasure / Pain
      • Hope / Fear
      • Social Acceptance / Rejection
    • Ability / Simplicity
      • Time (not simple if we don’t have enough)
      • Money (not able if we don’t have enough)
      • Physical Effort
      • Brain Cycles / Cognitive Load
      • Social Deviance (not simple if I must go against the norm)
      • Non-Routine (not simple if it is not familiar)
    • Triggers
      • Sparks - a trigger that motivates / initiates behavior (enhances motivation)
      • Facilitator - a trigger that makes behavior easier / directed (enhances ability)
      • Signal -a reminder to perform a behavior (when both motivation and ability are present)

8. Social Strategy

Defining a social strategy:

  • Content (what will we contribute?)
  • Participation (how will we interact?)
  • Place (where will we participate?)
  • Frequency (how often will we participate?)
  • Influence (who can influence others?)
  • Errors (how will the inevitable mistake or misjudgment be handled?)
  • Escalation (how to handle conflict?)
    • USAF Rules of Engagement
      • Concur (positive, accurate) - allow, possibly reply and share
      • Troll (bashing and denigration) - monitor and escalate
      • Rage (anger, satire, rant) - monitor and escalate
      • Misguided (erroneous content) - fix the facts
      • Unhappy (negative experience) -address and rectify
    • USAF Response Considerations
      • Transparency - disclose your identity and involvement
      • Accuracy - cite sources with references, data, and links
      • Quality - take the time to craft good responses
      • Tone - respond in an appropriate voice and tone
      • Reference - refer to other relevant sites and resources

9. Metrics and Measurements

Measuring the performance of a social media effort:

  • Web analytics
  • Counting likes, shares, and tweets
  • Social media analytics
    • Influence (advocates and detractors)
    • Mentions
    • Sentiment
    • Affinity
    • Virality
      • cross-channel + rate of spread + range (depth or extent of spread)

Steps to measure social media efforts:

  1. Define measurable behaviors (KPIs, or Key Performance Indicators)
    • Number of followers or re-tweets or new subscriptions
    • Number of customer contacts, suggestions, complaints, etc.
    • Consider absolute vs. relative measures (e.g., total number vs. rate of change)
  2. Configure analytics services
    • Identify sources of incoming traffic
    • Use campaigns and events that can be tracked
    • Track which sharing options are being used
  3. Use specific social media analytics tools
  4. Study and understand the social metrics
    • Quantitative data (Likes, re-tweets, clicks, page views, time of day, number of comments etc.)
    • Qualitative data (language, location, profiles, followers, comment keywords, etc.)
    • Loyalty data (mentions, sentiment)
  5. Review and revise the social strategy based on performance
    • Is content properly targeted and in the right format?
    • Change the rate of publishing? Too much? Too little?
    • Do you understand the target audience needs and expectations?
    • Are you engaged in a conversation with the audience?
    • Who does your audience follow? What are they doing that you are not?
    • Are you performance goals realistic?

What is the value of sharing?

  • Is the social value the same if many share and few do vs. few share and most do?
  • Is it better to have many people with weak affinity share vs. fewer people with strong affinity share?
  • If no one does anything with what has been shared, what is the value of the content?
  • How does one measure the ROI (return on investment) for the actual cost of content production when the desired outcome is brand identity and strength?

10. Class Project

Create a social media project for:

  • Company / brand (e.g., KitchenAid, Ford Motor Company)
  • New product or service (e.g., Nook eBook Reader, Quora)
  • Interest community (e.g., Locavores, Steampunk)
  • Location community (e.g., San Francisco, Desert Dwellers)
  • Non-profit / philanthropic organization (e.g., Cure Cancer, Clean Water)

Identify the components:

  • Hub (Key point of interaction and engagement) (Facebook? Web site? Mobile application? Other existing SNS?)
  • Channels (Twitter, blog, web site, Facebook, other SNS, mobile?)
  • Activities (media, contests, games, conversation, rate/review/comment, participate, vote, submit, download, modify, etc.)

Create a plan:

  • What will you post and contribute? (updates, opportunities, seed content)
  • What do people want or need to do?
  • How will you engage people?
  • What will your hub connect to?
  • What is the value to people? What will they gain?
  • What is the value to your organization? What will you gain?
  • What are your metrics of success?

Create a design for your social media engagement:

  • Screenshots of similar sites, services, and features
  • Sketches of web pages, mobile sites, web apps, and/or mobile apps
  • Wireframes (for increased fidelity)
  • Storyboards (to describe the sequence of actions and interactions)
  • Click-through (to illustrate and validate the interactions)

Share your social media plan and strategy with the class!

Design by N.Design Studio, adapted by solidGone.org and IDUX
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