My last post on twitter and higher ed got a lot of attention…it seems higher ed communicators are trying to figure out how twitter works, while at the same time wrestling with what kinds of information and content would be helpful and appropriate for their twitter audience.
I do think that in many cases twitter can be an incredibly powerful tool for universities, as long as it is used with a specific goal and purpose in mind. With that in mind, here are 10 ways I recommend universities can (and should) use twitter.
1. Connect with alumni
Find and follow alumni and track alums discussing the school online. Include a link to your twitter account in all alumni e-mail communication, put a link to it on your alumni site and your career center site, and encourage alums to follow school news and alumni events through twitter. You can even set up a separate twitter account specifically for alums so that they are getting targeted information, like daily tips for job seekers. If you have a large alumni event, be sure to post event updates prior via twitter, and pictures and other follow-up on twitter afterward. Interact directly with alums, invite them personally to events, and share in the follow-up conversation after alums get together.
2. Share achievements of students/faculty
Bring more to your twitter feed than your standard news feed. Call out interesting projects you know about on campus, recognize students for awards or achievements, announce a faculty member’s new research etc. Be sure to call out the person’s twitter name if they are on twitter, and link to any online examples of work if they have it. This will make your twitter account more interactive.
3. Promote campus events
Hosting a great guest speaker or a regional conference? One of your faculty presenting at a major event? Promote through twitter. Include links, tell readers how to get involved, and engage the community outside the walls of the campus by inviting the general public via twitter. You’ll build the reputation of your school in the local community and beyond by engaging more personally with these audiences and bringing them onto campus for an event they find educationally or professionally valuable.
4. Disseminate university news
Ok, don’t go crazy here. Think about what your twitter audience (alums, current students, community members, etc.) actually care about. Don’t use your twitter account for JUST news either. You can put out announcements of major news items, but your feed should be a diverse set of information, not a regurgitation of your News page.
5. Interact during campus events
Don’t just use twitter to publicize the fact that you’re having an event, use it to make the event itself more interactive. Invite students, faculty or staff to “live tweet” the event, posting quotes, observations, photos and video of the event as it happens. This will give those who could not attend a live feed of what is happening, give those who are attending a way to interact and discuss the event, and everyone else an opportunity to learn from speakers, feel involved and even see a record or what happened if they missed the event.
6. Connect with potential students and their parents
Use twitter to provide a channel through which prospective students and their parents can communicate directly and personally with the school. Offer access to admissions personnel once a week for live question and answer sessions, or post daily tips on selecting a school, writing admissions essays, doing campus visits, getting through the financial aid process, etc. You may find you’ll reach an even broader audience that just your applications, and that’s great. These efforts build awareness and connection with your school with audiences who become influencers when their friends and family begin looking at schools.
7. Connect department, students and faculty
You can use twitter to reach outside audiences. But you should also consider the power of using twitter internally. Twitter has been used in a number of cases to spur greater live classroom discussion, link related classes in different departments, allow professors to share ideas with their students, and build campus-wide communication.
8. Share live coverage of sporting events
For many schools, sports programs are a key link to alumni and community audiences. Get these groups more engaged through twitter. Live tweet sporting events, providing not only score updates but commentary and interaction with fans. Use a unique hashtag for your events so that attendees can also post pictures and commentary, and interact live with the fans during the game. Often out of town alums can’t get access to your school’s events, so providing a free way for them to follow the games online is a great way to build an engaging community.
9. Share career advice
Of course one of the best ways to keep alumni involved is to make their professional experience and integrated with their educational experience as possible. Alums who continue to view their alma maters as first-tier resources for job advice, job postings, networking connections etc. are far more likely to stay engaged with the school after graduation. And you can use twitter to build this engagement. Simplify access to career services through twitter. They should be available to answer questions, but should also be sharing constant advice, posting the latest job openings, and connecting proactively with alumni and local businesses. Offer weekly live sessions with a prominent alum or a local business person who can offer compelling advice to students. Track conversations about job searches and trends in hiring. Make the connection as valuable as possible, and alums will definitely keep coming back.
10. Get personal!
This is a broad statement, but is one that should be applied across any and all of the previous nine suggestions. Above anything else, your twitter feed should ring out as a unique PERSONAL voice for whatever department, school or office it is managed from. There is nothing worse than an auto-updating, auto-messaging, auto-feeding string of campus news announcements through the PR office. If you can’t get creative and personal, then don’t bother with twitter at all because you won’t get anything out of it. It’s the personal, one-on-one conversations that matter most in this medium, so don’t be afraid to lend some feeling and personality to your posts!
Tags: higher ed, social media, twitter, university communications
