Presented at the District 28 Toastmasters Conference on 11.4.2011. Why and How to promote Toastmaster clubs on Facebook, includes examples and resources
24. “ Get started” page is only available when page is brand new. Invite friends option always appears here, do it after page has some content Next: Edit Page
41. Click on Share Then drop down to select where to share it Add a personal note Invite your Facebook friends
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44. Removing Inappropriate Posts If you hover in the upper right corner you can will see an icon – click on it to hide, delete or report a post for abuse
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51. Change how you use Facebook Note changes in name and newsfeed
The link here takes you to a YouTube video sharing statistics about the growth and influence of social media. If you search for it, the title is “Social Media 2011:
The point is, people are spending a lot of time on Facebook. Even if you club has a website, having a Facebook presence means people can see your content and visit your page without leaving Facebook.
If you’ve been involved with your club’s website, you’ll realize that creating and uploading content to Facebook is much easier. Any fan can upload content, you do not need to wait for the webmaster to have time Facebook Pages are also designed to be searchable. If you click on the “search” link here, you can see that for Dearborn Dynamic, our Facebook pages take places 2-4 in a Google search on our club name,
Screen shot of Dearborn Dynamic search results
There are 3 types of Facebook presence you can create
I recommend pages – they are designed for organizations and are unlimited in the number of fans you can have
Page example
Groups are more private and are limited in number of members (1000) Members must be approved and you can set privacy so that only invited members of a group can see content. If you want a private area for club discussions, you can create a group, but I would recommend it in addition to a page, not in place of it.
Toastmasters International Group – they also have a Page. With their large membership, they get into some interesting discussions. I found one about the Interpretative Reading manual in this group that was very helpful when I was working on that manual.
Not recommended, violates FB terms of service
Pages are the recommended entity type
Before you start: Decide on a name, something descriptive Select administrators, need not be on Facebook already, but must have internet access and provide their own email and passrord, Appoint multiple administrators to make sure you maintain access in case someone becomes less active or leaves the club Have graphics ready – at minimum one for a profile picture, you can use a TM logo (from TI brand portal) or a photo that is unique to your club, like your banner or a meeting photo Meeting times and location, including the street address Be ready to write (or have ready to cut and paste) short descriptions of the club’s goals, welcome statements for visitors; Good examples available at www.toastmasters.org Have a plan for updating and posting Comment re: newsfeed vs. page visitation – people are more likely to see your posts in their newsfeed than go out of their way to visit your page
I covered this in the presentation live, this is a step by step demonstration of how to create a page. EVERY Facebook page has a link at the bottom that allows you to create a page
Follow the steps
Select a name and a category . If your name is taken, it will notify you. Select non-profit organization
This page will appear if you are not signed in or not a Facebook user. You do not need to have a personal profile to create a page, but you will need to create a user name and password.
This graphic will appear in the upper left corner of your page
Don’t invite people until the page has some content, skip this step
Input your website and a brief message you would like to apperon your club page here
This Get Started page only appears when you first create a page. Click on one of the “edit page” links at the top of the page.
Settings allow you to choose to post as either yourself or your page when posting to the page. You should also choose to get email notifications when people post so you can quickly respond to questions or remove questionable posts. The size of most Toastmaster page fan bases will not make getting these emails a lot of work.
Manage permissions to control who can visit your page and what they can post there
Basic Information is the area where you can add all the information you would ever want someone to know about the club.
Note at the bottom you can add an email or phone number . Make sure if you include this info, the person answering inquiries doesn’t mind – there are 700 million Facebook members!
You can change your profile picture at any time
Resources are mostly advanced topics, the Best Practice Guide is an excellent reference
Easy to add and remove admins
Apps are all useful, leave them activated
Before you start, assemble all the relevant info: Location, Time, URL link to flyers or more info Graphic: TM logo, club banner, club event, members Find clickable link Upload Graphic Fill in the blanks! Suggestion, leave flyer open & cut & paste info Invitations: Invite your friends, talk about the event. Use keywords! Toastmasters, speech contest, etc. whatever is appropriate
Just upload a graphic and fill in the blanks. Allow guests to see other attendees and write on the wall to encourage interactivity
Admins can easily invite their friends I would also recommend that you email your members and guests who leave email addresses and ask them to “like” the page Everyone who likes the page will see your content in their newsfeed, gives them more incentive to share content and visit the page Alaska KC had a campaign to get to 300 likes – it took them just a week to go from 200-300 fans
Alaska KC site (now well over 300)
Series of posts and announcements during “300 Likes” campaign
Two ways to share – Invite friends to the page OR share content (posts) with others on their pages, in a group, or by sending a private message
Facebook users spend more than a quarter of their time on the site consuming and interacting with the Facebook Newsfeed. The Newsfeed is also the primary location where branded content is consumed. In fact, users are 40-150 times more likely to consume branded content in the Newsfeed than to visit the Fan Page itself. (Source: comScore)
When you tag someone in a photo they get a notification and are likely to visit the photo, they may comment or tag someone else which can get other people engaged with the content. People can also remove their own tags, avoid posting and tagging photos or video of people who are extremely privacy conscious
Since anyone can be a fan of your page to get posting privileges, you may occasionally get spam like this get rich quick scheme. Hover in the upper right hand corner to see the link that lets you delete or report a post as abuse. People with too many abuse complaints will get banned.
Some good examples from Washtenaw County, MI, Cromwell, CT, and Dublin Ireland The Epicenter club in Florida did not attract much traffic or fans after their page initially launched.
Good variety of content, about meetings, members, photos and video
Focus on educational articles about public speaking. Nice graphic using TM Brand portal material
Lots of educational content re: social media. Gives previews and recaps of club activities
After a good start posting has slowed to a crawl. Time to assign some new admins or take the page down - if you edit the page deleting is possible in the permissions area
These topics are geared toward people who are comfortable operating in a digital environment. Time did not permit discussion in the 11.5.11 presentation
Admins can choose to post in the name of your page or in your own name. Be mindful of when you are speaking as your page to make sure you don’t say anything incongruous. You can always find out who you currently are by looking in the upper RH corner of the page
Getting to a minimum of 25 fans is a good goal; it allows you to have a much more user friendly page web address
Admins can set it up so they can send messages and photos via text message to their page
Although Free Toast Host pages do not allow you to use the like icon and code, you can create a link to your Facebook page in that interface. A traditional HTML or WordPress site will allow the familiar icon link
The insights area of Facebook allows you to monitor traffic and also see what content is being shared from your page. Note that the Dearborn Dynamic page sees a bump in traffic after each weeks’ meeting.
These hyperlinks take you to some valuable sources of more information Facebook’s help function is very good, and can be accessed through a link at the bottom of every page As mentioned earlier, the Best Practices document you can find on Resources in the edit page section is excellent Toastmasters International has a presence on the leading social media platforms, you can find the links on the Toastmasters.org site. The Facebook Page titled “Get Online! Attract a new generation of Toastmasters” has some excellent reference material, including links to webinars on using social media (not just Facebook) to promote clubs You can create a page without a personal Facebook profile, there is a YouTube video to tell you how. Please reach out if you’d like to learn more; I’d love to see more Toastmaster clubs active on Face book!