Social Media for
Research Communication
Anand Sheombar
Lectoraat Process Innovation & Information Systems
@anandstweets

Contents
 What are Social media
 Social Media for Research Communication
 Academic Research Cycle
 Examples
 Managing your Digital Profile

Social Media’s Many Varieties

What are Social Media?
 The terms social media, social networks
(SNSs) and web 2.0 are often interchanged
(Parameswaran, 2007; Iriberri & Leroy, 2009).
 Definitions share characteristics: openness,
participation, connectedness and community
(Mayfield, 2008).
 Social media in the context of RESEARCH
also has these attributes:
 connecting;
 collaborating;
 creating and sharing;
 finding, using, organising and reusing.

Social Media Across The World

Social Media & The Netherlands
Source:Newcom Research & Consultancy

Benefits of Social Media for
Research Communication
• promote your research and
increase its visibility
• communicate directly and
quickly with others who
have an interest in your
research
• develop new relationships
and build networks
• reach new audiences, both
within and outside
academia
• seek and give advice and
feedback
• generate ideas
• share information and links,
e.g. journal articles and
news items
• keep up-to-date with the
latest news and
developments, and forward
it to others instantly
• follow and contribute to
discussions on events, e.g.
conferences that you can’t
get to in person
• express who you are as a
person.
Source: Economic and Social Research Council

Building a social media presence
 Building an online presence relevant and
interesting for fellow researchers and other
audiences
 Use your online presence to promote yourself
and your research
 Invest some time in building this presence,
particularly at the outset when you are trying
to build initial interest in your work
 Sustain your social media activity
Source: Economic and Social Research Council

Building Blocks of the
Networked Scholar
Source: Academics’ online presence

Which social media resources
should you use?
 Social media that work for you and that you
have time to devote to them
 Most common & effective: blogs & Twitter
 Other that are appropriate to your research,
e.g. YouTube channel for videos, or Flickr or
Pinterest for sharing image collections.
 Networking, career development e.g. LinkedIn
 Think of your goals and identify the social
media building blocks…
Source: Economic and Social Research Council

What social media tools do
academics use in their research?
CIBER, University College London report 2010

Academic Research Life Cycle
Source: Jisc

Suggestions for use of Social
Media in Research Life Cycle
Brainstorming
Find partners &
Collaboration
Reaching out
Crowd sourcing
Data collection
Preparing writing up
Disseminate published
Articles.
Find research papers

Assess your articles online
 Google Scholar
 Academia.edu
 ResearchGate.net
potential uses:
 Disseminate on the web your published
articles
 Find research papers
 Search for collaboration
 Share ideas

Online Referencing & Knowledge
Sharing on Literature
 Mendeley
 Zotero
 Refworks
 EndNote
potential uses:
 Disseminate on the web your published
articles
 Find research papers
 Search for collaboration

Using Twitter for research
projects
 Tweet about each new publication, website
update or new blog that the project completes
 Use hashtags (#) to make your materials
more visible
 Twitter provides many opportunities for
‘crowd sourcing’ research activities
 Reaching out to external audiences
 Showing the growth in your followers and the
number of people who read your research
blog can also be helpful for funding
applications. Source: Using Twitter in university research, teaching
and impact activities. Mollett et. al, 2011

Example: Social Media useful for
research discussions PhD
students
 Twitter #phdchat
 Promovendi Netwerk
facebook group
 YouTube

Me Using Social Media as a PhD student
 Curating [FB, Scoop.it; Pinterest]
 Networking (trust building)
[Twitter; facebook; Linkedin]
 Knowledge exchange [Facebook;
scoop.it;
 Research data collection [Twitter;
facebook; YouTube, etc.]

4-Step Approach
Academics’ online presence

Why manage your digital profile?
Goodier and Czerniewicz 2012
Wednesday, June 04, 2014 20

Academics’ online presence Goodier and Czerniewicz 2012

Useful Resources
 Goodier and Czerniewicz (2012) Academics’ Online
Presence: A four step guide to taking control of your
visibility, Open UCT Initiative, University of Capetown
http://openuct.uct.ac.za/sites/default/files/Online%20Visibility
%20Guidelines.pdf
 LSE blog on impact of social sciences (resources for social
media)
http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/resources/
 Mollet et. Al (2011) Using Twitter in university research,
teaching and impact activities
http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/files/2011/11/P
ublished-Twitter_Guide_Sept_2011.pdf
 Cann et. Al (2011) Social media: A guide for researchers
http://www.rin.ac.uk/our-work/communicating-and-
disseminating-research/social-media-guide-researchers

Anand Sheombar
@anandstweets
nl.linkedin.com/in/anandsheombar
www.facebook.com/groups/SoMe4D
anand.sheombar@hu.nl
mmu.academia.edu/AnandSheombar