1. SOCIAL MEDIA & THE THIRD
SECTOR: SOME PROVOCATIONS
simon collister
@simoncollister
CIPRsm

2. A NEW GOLDEN AGE?
“If the late 19th century was the „golden
age‟ of mutual institutions, clubs and
societies, the early 21st century is a
new golden age of networks and
online communities”
-
NCVO Report, ICT Foresight: how online communities can make the internet work for the Voluntary and Community Sector
CIPRsm

3. DRIVEN BY TWO KEY TRENDS
1. Self-organisation --> Networks created
and sustained through easy-to-use
technology
2. Social capital -- > Networks motivated
by rewards from social cooperation to
achieve shared goals
CIPRsm

4. MOMENT OF OPPORTUNITY
CIPRsm

5. BUT… PR INDUSTRY “MISSING THE BOAT”
“Within minutes of PRWeek's
interview starting, Grant is
lambasting the PR industry
for 'missing the boat' on
digital, allowing advertising
and media agencies to steal a
march.”
- Robin Grant, Global Managing Director, We
Are Social - PR Week, 24th May 2012
CIPRsm

6. WHAT‟S GONE WRONG?
CIPRsm

7. CURRENT CHALLENGES [IN A NUTSHELL]
1. Increasing commercialisation of social
2. Rise of the „social business‟ or „social
organisation‟
3. Growth of data-driven communication
CIPRsm

8. 1. COMMERCIALISATION OF
SOCIAL
CIPRsm

9. WHAT‟S HAPPENING TO FACEBOOK?
 Post-IPO social interaction within Facebook is
becoming increasingly commercialised
 Shift from „organic‟
to paid communication
pushes Facebook more
into the domains of
media and ad agencies
 Similar happening with
other platforms,
e.g. Twitter
CIPRsm

10. HOW…?
 Newsfeed not „open‟ communications channel
 Determined by Facebook‟s „EdgeRank‟
 Visibility determined by Affinity, Freshness & Weight of
„edges‟, e.g. links, photos, videos, etc
 Only about 16% of fans see Page content
CIPRsm See this link for a great overview and analysis:

11. THE WORD FROM WITHIN FACEBOOK
 „While news feed posts are fine for everyday
engagement, businesses should consider
using „Sponsored Stories‟ [i.e. advertising] to
ensure business critical information reaches
users‟
 Personal advice from Facebook employee
CIPRsm

12. WHAT THIS MEANS…
 Potentially useful for targeting specific audiences
with clear calls to action
 Makes day-to-day engagement and relationship
building more difficult ot costly
 Facebook is introducing a „Promote‟ feature to help
small pages market their content – but still costs
money
CIPRsm

13. WHAT THIS MEANS…
 Potentially useful for targeting specific audiences
with clear calls to action
In short, will there be no real free, effective way to
communicate with your Page fans?
 Makes day-to-day engagement and relationship
building more difficult ot costly
Will Facebook shift to become a paid media
 Facebook is with layersaof social underneath?
platform introducing „Promote‟ feature to help
small pages market their content – but still costs
money
CIPRsm

14. 2. THE RISE OF THE SOCIAL
BUSINESS
CIPRsm

15. THIS YEAR‟S THING…
CIPRsm

16. ABSORBED ACROSS ORGANISATION
CIPRsm

17. WHAT THIS MEANS…
 When social media becomes
transformed into:
 Social fundraising…
 Social CRM…
 Social campaigning…
 Social information and advice
 Who manages it?
CIPRsm

18. REQUIRES CULTURE CHANGE
 “Get your organisation and
culture right and the social
media will look after itself.”
 Martin Thomas, author of Loose:
The Future of Business is Letting
Go
CIPRsm

19. SOCIAL CULTURE
x Distrustful (C.Y.A.?)  Trusting
x Bureaucratic  Agile
x Process oriented  Informal
x Hierarchical  Collaborative
CIPRsm Source: Loose: The Future of Business is Letting Go

20. WHAT THIS MEANS…
 Opportunity to become more like social movements
 Tension between status quo and culture required for
effective use of social
 Investment in developing new internal guidelines and
policies
 Investment in training employees
CIPRsm

21. 3. THE RISE OF BIG DATA
CIPRsm

22. WHAT IS „BIG DATA‟?
 Term applied to the vast quantities of
data being generated by contemporary
socio-technological systems whose size
is beyond the ability of commonly used
tools to capture, manage, & process data
 David Bollier- The Promise and Peril of Big Data
CIPRsm

23. BUT...WHAT *IS* IT?
 Search engine marketing performance
 Digital ad acquisition metrics
 Website analytics
 Email communication performance
 Online surveys
 Social media conversations
 Media content
CIPRsm

24. AS A RESULT…
 Free tools becoming insufficient…
CIPRsm

25. AS AN EXAMPLE…
 Sysomos has database of 20bn social media
conversations
 Indexes 8m new posts every hour
 Social media and
news
sources
gathered
CIPRsm SOURCE: Sysomos MAP

26. IMPACT ON PR?
 “Metrics driven communication, advocacy and
outreach efforts are now becoming the
expectation.”
 Big Data comes to the Communications Industry
 Campaign planning now “involves the computer-
automated analysis of blog postings, Congressional
speeches and press releases, and news articles,
looking for insights into how political ideas spread”
 The Age of Big Data
CIPRsm

27. CIPRsm

28. BUT… INSIGHTS NEED HUMAN ANALYSIS
CIPRsm

29. WHAT THIS MEANS…
 Potential to plan and execute highly focused,
evidence-based campaigns that can be
measured across multiple levels
 Increased technology and resource costs
 Short-term skills deficit
CIPRsm

30. THANK YOU!
& QUESTIONS
simon collister
www.simoncollister.com
@simoncollister
CIPRsm

31. DATES FOR YOUR DIARY
 The next two Social Summer sessions
are:
 Wikipedia 101: The Basics – 21 June
 Social Media Newsrooms – 28th June
CIPRsm