Twelve days ago, a second-generation alumnus of my university, the College of William & Mary, created a Facebook Page for his alma mater. In less than two and a half weeks, membership exceeded 1,700, roughly 30% of the current student body. Without any advertising or self-promotion whatsoever, this anonymous individual instantaneously had an audience almost certainly greater than that of the Flat Hat or Virginia Informer, two of the largest campus newspapers.1
Although we’re fortunate that this individual is a proud graduate of the College and a responsible steward of its Fan Page, I am dismayed that this is the effort of a former student rather than the actual administration of the university. In not embracing the powerful tool of social media, the College of William & Mary lost a valuable opportunity to officially communicate and interact with its student body, faculty, and staff via a website so popular it costs United Kingdom companies at least $250 million dollars daily.
Why social media should be a must
The Facebook Page is one of the most basic and easily accessible forms of social media available to a university like the College of William & Mary. I’ve created a few since the medium was launched last year, and it’s safe to say that the process of designing and implementing such a page can take less than 30 minutes if the creator is at least somewhat Facebook-savvy. As Facebook pages are virally integrated into the Mini-Feeds of connected users, it takes no time at all to accumulate members, such as the 141 per day that the William & Mary Fan Page did.
Other forms of social media and social networking such as Twitter and blogs provide excellent methods of reaching, educating, and interacting with a webwise student body.
Once members are established, keeping them informed of changes, updates, and other messages is extremely simple. If you were to take a seat in any crowded lecture hall on campus, you’d spot at least five to ten students browsing Facebook on their notebook computers; being integrated on Facebook increases the chances that students will be browsing information you’d like them to see when they aren’t focusing on the topic at hand (certainly the lesser of two evils).
The benefits of social media extend beyond Facebook, too– other forms of social media and social networking such as Twitter and blogs provide excellent methods of reaching, educating, and interacting with a webwise student body. William & Mary Rector Michael Powell, at a recent Convocation address, called the incoming class a “generation of YouTubians.” While Mr. Powell was forward-thinking in recognizing this, I wonder why the rest of my own campus has not yet caught up.
Why colleges should control their own social media outposts
I mentioned earlier that it was a disappointment that a student had created the page, rather than the College’s administration. Here’s why. First off, it is not immediately clear that the page is unofficial and is run by an alumnus. Often on social media sites, first impressions stick, and many users may not even take the time to question whether a social media outpost is legitimate.
What’s to keep a rival school or organization from creating a defamatory page, aimed to cause harm?
When such an outpost is not handled officially, all sorts of unpleasant circumstances may arise, the least of which is the devil of misinformation. If data on an unofficial Facebook Page contradicted information on the official homepage of the university, confused students wouldn’t know what to believe. Even scarier, prospective students, parents, and other groups who don’t know better could easily find themselves at the mercy of the third-party outpost. What’s to keep a rival school or organization from creating a defamatory page, aimed to cause harm? Although such libel would quickly be detected and caught if released under the umbrella of traditional media, if a college is not keeping an eye on its online reputation, such destructive influences could easily fly under the radar.
Lastly, colleges and universities often have many more resources than a single individual working alone. William & Mary has access to a myriad of photos, articles, interviews, and other materials it could use to really make its web presence shine. Instead, the student-created group uses one lackluster photo that looks like it was scanned out of a newspaper, unlikely to dazzle anyone.
What should colleges and universities do?
If colleges and universities wish to employ any social media leverage whatsoever, and I highly recommend it, it’s essential for them to establish or gain control of their brand on Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, YouTube, and Digg. More is better, but the aforementioned services will provide the biggest bang for the buck. If administrators are unwilling to go digital or are uncertain how to proceed, it’s highly likely that several to many students have the technical know-how to do what’s necessary. Don’t miss out on this opportunity to reach your students, faculty, and staff.
Your turn
If you’re a student at a high school, college, or university, how does your institution use social media effectively? How does it fail? If you’re an administrator, why do you choose or eschew media for promoting and interacting with your school? This is an extremely important discussion and I’d love to hear some new viewpoints.
If you enjoyed this article or want to do further reading on a similar topic, I highly recommend Corvida’s post entitled, “Social Media and the 4 Tools I Wish My University Used.” Corvida is a highly renowned blogger whose specialty in social media makes her a true resource. If you have any questions for me personally, feel free to leave a comment or get in touch with me by reading my Contact page.
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- I’m corrected in the comments that these newspapers do have large readerships, but keep in mind these necessitate enormous amounts of manpower, effort, and financial resources as well. [↩]
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Andy,
Good thoughts here. I’ve waged this unfortunately necessary war for years now. Why has it become a war, I wish I knew, but I think it stems from a combination of simple ignorance and fear of that which people don’t understand. As far as colleges and universities building the presences on these sites I’ve found it best to hire students to lead these initiatives as they understand their peers and the landscapes the best. Even then it’s a battle with admission along with administration to carve out a respected presence on these social sites that directs users back to what you want them to see on your branded .edu site.
Is there a lot to gain, yes, but we have to keep realistic enough to realize that us that understand the world of Social Media beyond Facebook and MySpace are the few not the mainstream.
Andy this article is great. I really love the point you brought up about brands and universities/colleges needing to take control of those brands when it comes to social media. I think that’s extremely important and I’ll elaborate on why in an upcoming post
My Union has a strong presence on Facebook and you have to join our college network using your college email so you can be verified. I dont think the college staff themselves post on these places yet though. On the positive side, they are hoping to increase awareness of social media as they develop their elearning provision so there is hope that things will improve shortly.
Hey Corvida, thanks for reading– it means a lot. Most wouldn’t think that a media outpost being run by a third party would be an issue, but the more I consider the potential, the more dangerous it seems. What makes me even nervous is that the individual who started the Fan Page said he took the lead from other alumni who had done similar things for their institutions– this may be more widespread than I thought.
Part of the issue may be the misnomer of ‘Fan Page’ itself; even though Facebook intended Pages to be for organizations and businesses to represent themselves, users are taking this a step too far and saying to themselves, “Hey, if I’m a fan, I might as well start a Fan Page.”
Looking forward to reading your post the minute it hits the digital newsstand!
Hey James, thanks for your thoughts! Your recommendation that colleges arrange for students to handle these things directly makes a lot of sense… but I can’t even imagine the amount of red tape you’d have to go through to ensure that the take-home message promoted by the social media outpost was the same as that of the branded .edu site.
And you’re right about the last bit, too, I think. Facebook and MySpace are crucial, but recommending Twitter and Digg may have been a little too progressive. The landscape may change over the upcoming and months and years, but I think we both agree that at least a modicum of social media knowledge in some department somewhere on campus is a must.
Do you have any anecdotes or examples of colleges that have been more successful and forward-thinking than most at accomplishing these goals?
Hey Julia! It’s good to hear a message of hope! Even having a presence like the one you describe is a great foundation for further growth, I think. And the e-learning point’s a great one and the educational opportunities and benefits of social media and social networking are worth a whole other post!
Hey Andy, Of course I have examples.
We have a Facebook and Myspace page for our college. I have student workers that help me monitor them. I guess the big takeaway that I would throw out there is that these groups/pages or whatever should be nothing beyond a glorified landing page. We don’t try and develop a whole bunch of content on those sites instead direct traffic to our offerings on our own site like, video, interactive maps, blogs, and signup for emails. I’ve actually written pretty extensively about Social Marketing for Higher Education including everything from Facebook and Myspace to Twitter, Digg, Delicious and StumbleUpon. I really need to get back on my horse cause I’ve got everything together to hit up Mixx and some others.
Later bud.
Hi James! Enjoyed looking at your MySpace page, seemed to be an error with that Facebook link. I’ll try to do some sleuthing in a bit to figure out where it’s at. I think that idea really makes a lot of sense, as you want all the info to be coming from one central location (that is, the official college site). Do you see any benefit in developing the content you mention, or do the costs and cons outweigh the pros?
I like that Social Marketing link and will definitely bookmark it to recommend for later. Thanks for introducing me to your work!
No problem dude. Hum… the Facebook link seems to be working for me? wierd…
I guess my biggest point wouldn’t be anything new as we all know content is king, so develop great and engaging content on your main site then link to it from your social outlets.
Okay, I think I get the picture now. Featuring great content on your main site provides the best bang for the buck as many more people are bound to check that out than a social media outpost. Not to mention, material coming from a more official location carries with it a bit more reputability.
Tried the link again and it’s working for me! Must have just been a glitch on my end. Looks slick!
Exactly. Plus your just creating content in one location instead of spreading it out to multiple sites.
The Flat Hat’s audience is considerably more than 1,700. The website alone is read by between 25,000 and 40,000 unique regular visitors. On a weekday during the academic year the site typically receives between 10,000 and 25,000 page views. The print edition moves about 2,500-3,000 papers per issue or 5,000-6,000 per week.
That said, I really love your blog. The design, the post topics, the writing, all very cool. If you get a chance, drop me a line via e-mail sometime in the next few days. We should chat.
Hi Max, thanks for your comment. Thanks for filling me in with more detailed statistics; the print numbers are about what I expected but I am impressed with that volume of site traffic. As you know, other metrics come into play, too, but it seems that I was mistaken for putting a now 2,130-member Page on the same playing field as the Flat Hat. Let’s call it, uh, editorial oversight.
At the same time, of course, reaching 2,000 Facebook fans is considerably less resource-exhaustive than reaching 2,000 in print, but I do think that print media does provide the optimal familiarity, accessibility, and level of content to the W&M campus. Plus, it’s also a great way for interested students to contribute to the paper’s goal.
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