Chris Syme, a communications/socal media strategist and former sports information director, is a frequent contributor and CoSIDA convention/continuing education presenter. In conjunction with the CoSIDA staff and Kristi Dosh, Esq., Syme authored and analyzed the last two CoSIDA social media/social media education surveys that the membership participated in. They plan to publish an e-book on social media strategies and education, and the information below is an excerpt from that upcoming publication.
Follow Syme via her blog and Twitter.
by Chris Syme
I began surveying NCAA athletic departments about crisis preparation and communication in 2002 when I was a graduate student in athletic administration at Eastern Washington University. In my thesis research I found that only 50 percent of NCAA athletic departments had a crisis management policy within their athletic department. That was BSM (Before Social Media).
Unfortunately, in 13 years not much has changed. In the
2014 COSIDA Best Practices of Social Media survey, we found that only 43 percent of college athletic departments (all divisions) have a crisis communications policy. What makes these numbers even more dangerous is the culture of crisis today After Social Media (ASM).
Today, thanks to social media, a crisis becomes a publicly owned event. Everyone with a cell phone is a news reporter. In order to lead the information pipeline, your brand needs to have a well-built social media presence and a dedicated group of social media influencers. Social media can be an irritant, but it can also be your best advocate.
Social Media: Friend or Foe?
Social media is an accelerant. It is gas on the fire of online conversations. It has the power to turn sentiment on its ear, either for the good or the bad. It can take an irrelevant local issue and turn it into a global crisis if left unattended. It can make you a hero or a villain. But whether you like social media or hate it, whether you are active or inactive, you are involved in the conversation whether you like it or not.
In the
annual mStoner/Huron Education survey on best practices in social media in higher education, 98 percent of institutions reported using social media. Social media is more than mainstream in university communications, it is mandatory. But that number also represents a risk. Maintaining public conversations means anyone who has an opinion can express it—in front of everyone else. Unfortunately, there is no “truth checker” on opinions, and conversations can turn toxic in the blink of an eye.
Start With Best Practices
In 2011,
Altimeter produced groundbreaking research that showed a direct connection between the social media readiness of a brand and the likelihood they would have a crisis. They determined that risky practices, many of which included social media practices, accounted for more than 75 percent of the crises experienced by companies.
Since the CoSIDA Social Media Best Practices survey began in 2012, five social media best practices have consistently emerged that define how athletic departments can build readiness and lower their risk of crisis.
1. Implement Social Media Policies and Procedures
The foundation of social media in the department rests on policies that reflect the department mission, are easily understood and implemented, define lines of responsibility, encourage innovation, and promote accountability to the brand. Over half of respondents in the recent 2014 survey indicated their department does not have a social media policy for those who manage or maintain athletic department and team social media accounts. Also a concern was that only 23% require social media training for users who represent the department on social media.
Here are some common risks related to a lack of social media policy and why you need policies in place:
• Nearly half of 2014 respondents (48%) reported allowing interns or students to post directly to department and team social media accounts. Interns and students need the same training and preparation as regular employees, especially if they are representing the brand on social media. Also, they are more likely to have a shorter tenure in your department, which means it will take longer for them to emulate your department’s collective voice and understand your messaging and branding. Guidelines and a minimal amount of training can diffuse this risk.
• There are no people more passionate than college sports fans. It’s not uncommon for that passion to turn into negativity directed toward department or team social media accounts. Does your department have guidelines for responding to negative comments?
Here are some tips on putting together a social media response system.
• An astounding 27% of respondents say passwords are never changed on department and team social media accounts. Only two percent indicated passwords are changed at scheduled intervals, with the rest doing so on an as-needed basis. Think about how many people have left your department and moved on to another job in the recent past. For those of you not changing your passwords, these people all still have access to your accounts.
Use A Department-Wide Social Media Management Systems (SMMS)
• A large majority of survey respondents maintain at least four department social media accounts. A small percentage have only one administrator while 37% have four to six administrators on a given account. Even though the largest percentage of managers reside is athletics communications, many reported that social media is a collaboration between marketing and communications. Your SMMS maintains a common dashboard where posts can be managed and supervised. Cloud applications such as Sprout Social, Buffer, Tweet Deck, and Hootsuite require a minimal investment and help social media teams mange administrative responsibilities and monitor online conversations around the brand. Larger enterprise-level systems by Radian 6, Meltwater Buzz, Mention, Trackur, and others can integrate social media into business practices across the board. At the very minimum, social media management systems should be used to track (monitor) brand conversations and coordinate posts to social media accounts.
Monitoring is essential for keeping track of real-time opportunities that can build or break a reputation. See also the chapter in this ebook on monitoring social media.
2. Social Communications Should Be Driven By A Department Social Media Strategy
Survey respondents communicated a need to be innovative and use social media channels to build their brand. However, we were surprised to find nearly 36% of respondents reported their department has no strategy or goals for social media.
Of those 36%, here is how they use social media strategically.
But goals are just the beginning. Without planned objectives (metrics), strategies, and tactics, social media can easily miss the mark—or hit one that is unproductive. Departments need to begin with an understanding of how to measure the effectiveness of those goals and implement strategies to each those objectives. The most common mistakes athletic departments make is to jump directly from goals to tactics. When that happens, there is no understanding of when the goal or reached or if you are using effective strategies.
Is your goal only to reach the highest number of people you possibly can? Then follower numbers are a good standard. Is your goal conversions, such as in ticket or gear sales? Then straight follower numbers can’t inform that goal. There is nothing wrong with vanity metrics (follower numbers, likes, favorites). However, brands need to remember that they have a limited scope in informing marketing goals. Metrics need to match goals.
Jay Baer’s Field Guide To Four Types Of Content Marketing Metrics will give you a great start.
If you lack a cohesive department marketing strategy, start there. The best social media will not fix a lack of strategic planning across all your business operations. Your social media managers should know how to write measurable goals that propel the department’s mission forward. They should also understand how to plan, execute, and measure a successful short-term campaign, and put together effective real-time initiatives that enrich the fan experience.
3. Establish Registration For All Department Social Media Accounts
At a minimum, every department should develop a system for registering social media accounts associated with the athletic department. This can be done with a simple database that tracks logins and passwords for all branded accounts. This allows you to develop a consistent message about social media use as well as access accounts for emergency purposes. It does not, however, mean that one social media manager should necessarily control the content for all the accounts. It is basically a way to keep track of all the channels that represent the department.
As part of this strategy, training should be mandatory for anyone who will have access to accounts associated with the athletic department. Depending on the size and capacity of your department, this training could be anything from a handout to a video to bringing in an outside consultant.
4. Crisis Communication Plans Need To Include Social Media Practices
An issue can become a crisis without the proper social media response (see Policies and Procedures above). The number of departments with crisis policies that include social media was only 57% in 2014, up only five percent in the last two years. Even though the number of reported negative social media issues continues to rise, few departments are taking the necessary steps to deal with them, much less prevent them. Oftentimes, because of the workload associated with a crisis, it is best to bring in an outside help to monitor conversations, sentiment, and volume of social media interaction in a crisis.
One of the biggest deterrents to a communications crisis is training—for staff and student-athletes. Departments that train student-athletes and staff to use social media responsibly have a lower incidence of crisis than those that do not. Departments that make reputation a priority also lower their risk of crisis.
5. The Importance of Influencer/Advocate Groups To Mitigate Negative PR
Recently, brands have been discovering the value of social media advocate groups to increase brand loyalty—recruiting rabid fans to help boost social media engagement. In addition to recruiting invested followers to help magnify your messages on social media, effective influencer groups can help a brand quench a brewing crisis on social media. Many brands are using applications such as
Social Toaster, Zuberance, and
Tap Influence to recruit and manage influencer marketing groups. Some, such as Social Toaster, add an element of gamification to incentivize the groups.
Final Words: Know How To Differentiate An Issue From A Crisis
Crisis manager Tony Jacques said, “It’s a major mistake to treat issue and crisis as interchangeable terms. Not only do they have very distinct meanings, but they need a different management response.” Most of what athletic departments experience when it comes to negative sentiment online are issues. It is important to develop a response plan with a triage system that clearly defines whether an issue needs to be addressed or watched. A bomb threat in a venue is a crisis. An athlete posting an inappropriate picture or comment on social media is an issue. Most of the trouble I have seen online comes when people don’t know how to tell the difference and respond appropriately. All negative issues are not created equal and all do not need a response. But you’ll never know what to do about them if you are not monitoring and watching.
Here is an article with some excellent information on differentiating crises and issues.
Clearly, using social media carries risk. But you can effectively lower your risk of negative events by implementing these strategies into your department communications plan.