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by Josh Gaventa
Content Manager, 8original

There are lots of new and exciting innovations and developments that will be hitting our small screens this year. Hootsuite¹ have a great breakdown, Twitter² released a trends report and there are countless articles online on this issue.

We have broken down the five trends that we think non-profits can take advantage of in 2022.

1. Start your Facebook group now!
2. If you’re not on TikTok, get on it ASAP.
3. Your 2022 goal should be to reach new audiences.
4. Live Audio is going to be a thing.
5. Posting good content often will be key.

1) Start your Facebook group now!

Organic reach for Facebook pages has been declining in recent years, and currently one in 19 of your page’s fans will see your content, which is around 5%³. Now is a good time to create or reinvigorate your Facebook group. Facebook recently released⁴ Insights for Facebook groups as a clear sign that they are promoting the notion that brands should be investing in community building via Facebook Groups.

Here are 3 examples of content for your Facebook group:

• Daily content like polls, questions and quotes are good ways to ask your group to interact with you. They don’t need to be ‘salesy’, have fun with it, let your community get to know you, your staff and vice versa you’ll get to know your audience.
• A weekly blog or vlog posted in the group would give your community a chance to see what you’re up to on a weekly basis. Like a newsletter, but something people actually read.
• Normal Facebook content – whatever you’d post on your Page could be posted in your group and might get more and better engagement.

Building a Facebook Group doesn’t need to be difficult, it’s about as difficult as creating content for a Page which you’re doing already. Take this opportunity to diversify your content to make it more personal, more fun, and likely more engaging.

If you keep up your current Facebook page behaviour, your audience probably won’t grow that much, and your engagement likely won’t increase too much either. In a year’s time you could have a group of dedicated community members who engage with your organisation on a daily or weekly basis.

Bonus:

You do need to promote that you have a Facebook Group, so make sure you let people know they can join it. Pro tip: You can now add links to Instagram stories, put the link there a few times a week with an engaging piece of content attached.

2) If you’re not on TikTok, get on it ASAP.

TikTok is an incredibly useful tool for organisations seeking to reach new audiences, particularly younger people. If that sounds like you, then it’s time to get over whatever issue you have with TikTok and get on it.

Ignoring TikTok in 2019 was a reasonable approach to take. It was young, it was mostly kids dancing and it wasn’t the mature social platform it is today.

Ignoring TikTok in 2022 is a big mistake, and one that isn’t necessary to make as TikTok content might be the easiest content to make.

Here are 3 examples of TikTok content you can make:

• Daily vlog content. Film yourselves in the office, or at home. Film your routine, a quick shot of your meetings, or even just get everyone in your team to wave! Put all the clips together, maybe add a voice-over or a fun song and post. Easy peasy.
• Show your whiteboard ability and film a quick explainer of your new initiative or go over an old one. Give your audience a reason to engage by teaching them something new.
• Show your personality. Does someone wear unique items of clothing? Does someone like to walk to work? Show them arriving or show their fun desk items and get them to explain it.

TikTok is about having fun, showing personality and being light-hearted.

There’s no need to have awkward videos of your CEO sitting behind a desk. Get your phone out and experiment.

The downsides could be that your major donors or friends think you look a little silly, but the major donors aren’t on TikTok so they won’t see it and your friends will get over it. The upside is that you reach a whole new audience of people who are younger than your typical demographic – pretty good!

Bonus:

Every TikTok can also be uploaded as an Instagram Reel. Pro tip: Don’t upload the TikTok video with the TikTok logo on it, create the same TikTok in reels directly.

3) Your 2022 goal should be to reach new audiences.

Gaining followers and then putting engaging content in front of them? That’s step one.

Social media platforms are creating features that will enable us to reach new audiences through organic reach algorithms in a way that we haven’t seen since early Facebook.

LinkedIn as a platform has excellent organic reach for B2B and B2C companies, and it is maturing in the way that Facebook did where users are communicating about more than just vacancies and skills endorsements. It is now very much a social platform.

Instagram Reels⁵ and TikTok⁶ are both ways to reach new audiences through organic reach. If you hashtag and put out consistent high-quality content, you’ll be amazed at the reach your content can have.

Communicating with new audiences doesn’t mean ignoring your existing audience as all the content you make will still be relevant to them.

Here are 3 ways you can reach new audiences on social media:

• LinkedIn content should be a key pillar of your social media strategy, and it shouldn’t just be ‘business related’ content. Show personality but with a slightly more business-like tone.
• Use TikTok as a way to explicitly speak to a new audience and use the best TikToks as Instagram reels.
• Use influencers and collaborations to gain access to new communities that are built around similar areas to your organisation.

4) Live Audio is going to be a thing.

Twitter Spaces could be what Clubhouse nearly was.

Twitter Spaces⁷ are where you can host a live conversation with your followers about your organisation.

Have you got a campaign coming up? Grab a few staff members, start a Twitter Space⁸, and ask a ‘celebrity’ friend of the organisation to join in.

Everyone who follows you, your staff members and that celebrity will be able to join.

Think of 10 people you’d like to have a conversation with, ask them to be part of a Twitter space and spend 10 weeks hosting a live conversation on a Tuesday morning called ‘Tuesday Talks with [our organisation]’ with a new guest each week.

Twitter Spaces is one example of how live content streaming is still going to be a major player in reaching new audiences and building community on social media. Instagram and Facebook lives, Twitch and YouTube lives are going to be massive players in 2022.

5) Posting good content often is going to be key.

Social media algorithms are a complicated business. Figuring out optimum times to post, best content to post and trying to ‘play’ the algorithm is not worth spending any time on.

All the platforms have always rewarded good quality content. If you post high quality images of people, or high-quality videos on the correct formats⁹ then your content has always done well.

If you post grainy, blurry images in the wrong formats or awkward videos with black lines on top as it’s in the wrong format, then your content will always have done badly.

A new trend for 2022 is that platforms are going to be rewarding a higher volume of high-quality content. It’s no longer just about being good, you need to be good more often.

Here are 3 ways that you can take advantage of this new trend:

• Develop a monthly/weekly content plan that you and your team can stick to. Be realistic but be ambitious. Have content that is native to each platform and its respective audience. Don’t have a one size fits all approach, it doesn’t.
• Instead of making a single 2min video, make four 30sec videos and post them as part of a series.
• Don’t be precious. Not everything you post has to be perfect. Don’t let perfect get in the way of good.

Here are a few of our personal favourite non-profits on Instagram. They might have a bigger budget than you, but most of their content is just good, wholesome, narrative driven and people (or dog) centred content.

Charity Water:
https://www.instagram.com/charitywater/

Dogs Trust:
https://www.instagram.com/dogstrust/

Pencils of Promise:
https://www.instagram.com/pencilsofpromise/

¹https://www.hootsuite.com/research/social-trends
²https://marketing.twitter.com/en_gb/insights/the-conversation-twitter-trends-2021
³https://blog.hootsuite.com/organic-reach-declining/
⁴https://www.facebook.com/community/using-key-groups-tools/using-facebook-groupinsights/
⁵https://blog.hootsuite.com/instagram-reels-experiment/#Results
⁶https://www.tiktok.com/business/en-GB/blog/small-business-marketing-tiktok-ultimateguide
⁷https://media.twitter.com/en/articles/products/2021/twitter-spaces
⁸https://media.twitter.com/en/articles/how-to/2021/how-to-use-twitter-spaces
⁹https://influencermarketinghub.com/social-media-video-specs/

by Ciara Shalome
Social Media Executive, 8original

A recent conversation I had with my boss, Joel Macadar, further educated me on the vast potential of Instagram graphics and their ability to convey important, yet subtle messages. It is truly no secret that social media has now become a hub for aspiring activists and educators who feel that it is their profound duty to insert their opinion into social and political issues worldwide. However, the information that often spreads like wildfire across platforms such as Instagram isn’t always the most accurate and can, in its quest to educate, further drive a wedge between users.

One such example of this would be the recent war between Israel and Palestine in March of this year, and the effect this flare up of violence had on media platforms across the world. Not only was the damaging misinformation surrounding the clashes a cause for concern, but also the many attempts from creators online to produce a blanket statement summarising the entire conflict for the sake of a graphic. As uncomfortable as it may seem, there is no one sentence that could ever possibly turn such a complex situation into a black and white concept.

Upon seeing this graphic for the first time, I focused on the words written and nothing more. I felt that the messaging was surface level and staring me in the face. Peace doesn’t fit inside a graphic, correct. How could I possibly be missing something?

What I failed to understand until speaking to Joel was the greater context and subliminal messaging that was intended whilst creating this image. During a time of heightened societal tension, a graphic such as this one is easily able to cut through the tedium of the Instagram algorithm and inspire brief thought to whoever sees it. The words are merely a vehicle for the underlying reality that definitive statements, no matter how positive, are unable to bring about peace.

From a visual perspective, an array of fonts have been used in order to guide the attention of the reader to the overall conclusion that text, just like peace, does not fit inside a graphic. This has been further demonstrated by the oversized lettering. The choice of font aims to create a general sense of irony before focusing on the main point. My eye is particularly drawn to the two words ‘peace doesn’t’ for the simple reason that the colour red and a bold font are tactics typically used to command attention. Aside from the more surface-level observation, I notice that the negative use of the word ‘doesn’t’ sparks intrigue and forces me to see that the message here is neither positive, nor negative but rather factual. If I were to imagine my Instagram feed back in March, this graphic would have been a welcome, neutral interruption in a sea of bias.

Initially, something else I missed was the line underneath ‘peace’ and the ‘fill in the blank’ template that had been used. Joel cleverly demonstrated here that there is a multitude of concepts that cannot be blatantly summarised in five words. The existence of this line seeks to show that this image is easily recyclable, which unfortunately proves just how prevalent the idea is that complex issues can easily be condensed to fit inside of a square space.

For many, this post would likely be overlooked and its overall symbolism ignored. However, I have further understood just how effective the use of graphics can be in relation to educationally illustrating important points in a non-threatening, subtle way. Ironically, ‘peace doesn’t fit inside a graphic’ is a blanket statement in itself. However, it is a blanket statement which seeks to remind and empower, instead of divide. This graphic illustrates that social media is not only a way to disseminate an opinion and gain followers, but that it can also teach people the importance of using their platform to spread a message of coexistence and create a positive impact.

by Josh Gaventa
Social Media Strategist, 8original

The most important aspect of any social media campaign is authenticity. The audience must believe that you have credibility. It must be clear that you know what you’re talking about, and people should listen to you specifically. 

Our job is to understand what our clients want to say, and then we need to work out how we can communicate their message on social media authentically. 

For Norwood it’s often about empowerment. We don’t want to talk for the people Norwood supports, we want to create a world where the people Norwood support are empowered and enabled to communicate on behalf of themselves. 

Learning Disability Week is a huge week for Norwood and all other organisations working in the field of learning disabilities and special needs. It’s a week where organisations can elevate the voices that need to be heard, show gratitude to the staff who make it all happen as well as advocate for the cause of the people they support. 

When I looked at my blank whiteboard to plan content for Learning Disability Week, or ‘LDW’ as it became known internally, I knew two things: 

1. Whatever we did had to be authentic. 
2. It wasn’t going to be easy to go in and get footage of the people Norwood supports due to Covid-19 restrictions and safety measures. 

So how do you make something authentic when you don’t have much access to the people you need to hear from? 

Well personally my favourite trick when a task has multiple challenges and obstacles is to set a goal with the assumption that those challenges and obstacles can be overcome. 

So, we came up with ‘Being Me’. A campaign that has an inherent need for authentic voices. A campaign that was not going to be easy to execute, but a campaign that matched perfectly with Norwood’s mission. 

‘Being Me’ is about creating content where the people Norwood supports can express themselves directly to Norwood’s audience of friends, family & supporters. 

As an agency, we rely on working with our client’s marketing team to achieve our goals, and Norwood’s team came through. With a little bit of creativity, we were able to put together a social media campaign that was and felt real to the everyday experiences of the people Norwood supports. 

Throughout the week the campaign generated just over 25,000 organic impressions across Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn & Twitter with an overall engagement rate of 5%. There were increases of 40%, 20% and 50% engagements on Facebook, Twitter & Instagram respectively. Though the purpose of the campaign was to express Norwood’s values, it’s important to measure the success of any campaign using effective analytics. 

At 8original we lean into the principle of ‘Nothing about us without us.’ That’s the idea that a charity should include its beneficiaries in the decision-making process, but it could be equally applied to the charity’s marketing. We shouldn’t be talking about our client’s beneficiaries without ensuring that we’re speaking with an authentic voice. 

That’s not always so simple as often our client’s beneficiaries are anonymous and there are safeguarding issues at play which we shouldn’t interfere with. So, we lean on the charity’s outstanding staff to represent the voices of the people they support to us when we set strategy and create content for campaigns.  

That’s how non-profit social media works. It’s a vibrant cocktail of people working together to communicate an authentic message to an audience that cares. It’s often a chaotic process, it’s often fraught with challenges and obstacles but it’s always rewarding. 

So, if you’re part of a team of people in a charity that is struggling to figure out what your message should be on social media, ask the people you support to answer the following question: What is it like being me? 

Then you take their answer and go from there. 

There are 4.2b social media users worldwide, out of which 4.1b will mainly access social media content via their mobile. Let’s learn about it, shall we?

In this guide, you’ll learn:

1. The 4 different areas of Social Media Content
2. Why leaving one out could be crippling to you business
3. A final nugget…

The 4 areas of Social Media Content

1️⃣ Content Strategy: Your content strategy will determine how you’re approaching your social media and what content is going to back your approach. If you are struggling to relay a certain message to your ideal target customer through social media, you need to figure out a game plan as to how you will be able to better communicate with your customer. Instead of putting stuff out and seeing what sticks, come up with a detailed strategy with an objective, a timeline, and some tangible content ideas which will fulfil your company’s objective. Ideally, your social media content strategy should be at least 8 weeks long in order to be able to see some results from what you’re doing. Once your audience catches on to your change in strategy, they will start reacting accordingly. One piece of content won’t do it, consistency is key.

Oh, and read all of this blog before you start. 😃

Our strategy with GIFT was impact, impact, impact. Read more about how it worked here.

2️⃣ Content Creation: The individual content pieces that you’ve thought about above will have to be created, designed and/or produced. Coming up with a strategy is all well and good, but until you action it with physical content, it’s just words on a piece of paper. As you come up with your social media strategy, make sure you understand how to create the content you’re aiming for. Find realistic examples of other content you have seen that resembles what you want to create and make sure you have the proper team around you which can make it happen. There’s nothing worse than thinking too far ahead and realising that you have no budget to realise your strategy. Be realistic and know your limitations. But don’t worry, as long as you have a smart phone you can create great content just like everybody else!

For the Jewish News, we still focus on content… And the best content wins. Click here to read all about this one.