My last blogs have touched a range of different topics; school visits, supporting Pride and seeking support in publishing my book. In all aspects of my efforts with my work, I have explored the use of social media as a means of further promoting what I am doing.
We have all heard of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat and many more. It made sense to get myself a social media presence. It is easier said than done though.
How did I start?
I started out with a personal Facebook account many years ago but had never thought to utilise this to promote my book. I had recently started using Twitter linked to work so this seemed the natural starting point. As I have done a range of different events, I have promoted this via Twitter, steadily gaining followers. However often people want things instantly. Still steering away from Facebook, I choose to experiment with Instagram. Instagram allowed me to develop a visual presence; the only issue was that schools and many education professionals are less well represented on Instagram.
When selecting the social media platforms to use, I had three main considerations; ease of use, relevance of use and potential viewers. Although I have used Snapchat, it’s blink and you miss it approach made this far less relevant than the other platforms, the fact it’s market share has recently dwindled to 188 million users meant this was quickly discounted as useful to me at the moment. I’d started using Twitter, however the number of users (335 million – July 2018) was tiny in comparison to Instagram (currently 1 billion users and growing). So returning to Facebook, with the number of users approaching 2.23 billion, it seemed only logical to create a Facebook presence with a dedicated “Best in the Whole Wide World” page, linking this with posts from my Instagram account.
As I worked with different people and met with representatives from a range of organisations, I have followed, tagged and tweeted them. Almost a ritual of linking events to my online persona. It has made it easier to track what I have done (almost like keeping an online diary) and only when looking back has it made me realise how much I have achieved in such a short space of time.
Making monitoring more manageable…
It wasn’t easy to keep track of all I was posting. It was around the beginning of my dalliances with using social media that my better half began working in the marketing department for a local company. I downloaded the Pages app to be able to monitor engagement with my posts. While I confess I am still learning about this, it is interesting looking at the analytics of each of the posts. I’ve learned the difference between organic and promoted posts – the vast majority of them have been organic (not paid for to boost the number of people viewing them). I’ve also been able to analyse who views accounts (including when and where). Why is this important? Because it tells me when is better to release information and which ones are more engaging.
Managing posts
Next on my list is exploring Hootsuite as a means to manage all my posts in a quick and easy fashion. So far, I have had to stick with copying and pasting. Fine but time consuming! Will I be able to have a one-stop-shop to manage all my social media?
Promoting in the media…
In promoting my work however I don’t want to just rely on social media. In my next blog I will touch on how I have begun to use a range of different local and national media outlets to promote my work.
But for now, you can follow me on Twitter (@jenkinson.troy), Instagram (@troy.jenkinson) and Facebook (@BestintheWholeWideWorld).
Troy Jenkinson 