1. 1
Introduction to Social Media
for Centers for Independent Living
This work is adapted from the WeAreMedia curriculum at http://www.wearemedia.org/and is licensed under the
Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://
creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/us/
Adapted by Michele Martin
www.michelemmartin.com
Training Goals
This training will:
• Expose Centers for Independent Living staff to social media tools.
• Demystify social media tools and explore issues/concerns.
• Provide staff with tools and questions that you can use to develop your own social
media strategy.
• Help centers become more relevant and connected to younger constituencies
who are more comfortable with these tools.
• Help you explore how social media can support key activities and functions,
including:
• Marketing
• Fundraising
• Organizing and advocacy
• Community-building
• Internal productivity and communications
• Professional development
• Expose centers to some key accessibility and usability design principles.
Introduction to Social Media for CILs

2. Learning Objectives
After participation in this workshop, you will be able to:
• Identify social media tools, resources, and services, and determine when these
tools are appropriate to apply in your CIL.
• Address organizational culture issues and changes inherent with social media
adoption and your organization's readiness to implement.
• Develop a social media strategy and action plan for your CIL.
• Assess your organization’s website for functionality, usability, and accessibility.
These materials were adapted by Michele Martin from the WeAreMedia curriculum at wearemedia.org. and is
licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
All workshop materials and resources to support this workbook and support additional planning are online at:
http://cilnetsocialmedia.org/
Social media is using the Internet to instantly collaborate, share information, and have a
conversation about ideas, causes, and organizations we care about powered by technology.
What we do--collaborate, share information, have conversations--is powered by tools.
Although the tools are different, it is what we can do with them that is really transforming
things.
What is Social Media?
Why is social media important?

3. What can social media do for organizations?
Organizations are using social media to:
• Listen to and participate in online conversations.
• Tell their stories.
• Generate awareness and “buzz.”
• Build community.
• Raise money.
• Network with other organizations.
• Provide professional development and improve organizational productivity.
How is social media being used?
What are some examples of organizations using social media for
these different functions? Which of these seems most interesting to
me?

4. Like any culture, there are norms and etiquette that go with participating in the online
community.
Social media users can sniff out organizations that don’t “get it,” so understanding the rules of
social media is a critical piece of participating in the online community.
What are the “rules”?
What are the key “rules” of social media?

5. For people who are new to social media, there can be a lot of concerns and fears.
Use this page to record your own concerns as we go through the next 2.5 days. Hopefully
we’ll be able to address them as the workshop progresses.
What are my concerns?
My concerns about using social media are. . .
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Blogs
Blogs are frequently updated web sites that are organized in reverse chronological order and
allow readers to make comments. They are usually written by a sole author or group of
authors with a particular expertise for a topic.
Social Media Sandbox

6. Facts about the tool
How could CILs use this tool?
Excited about? Concerned about?

7. 13
Delicious
Social bookmarking is the practice of saving bookmarks to a public web site and describing
them with tags. Tags are labels or keywords that can be applied to just about anything on the
Internet. They keep things organized. Delicious is one of the most popular social bookmarking
services.
Social Media Sandbox
Facts about the tool
How could CILs use this tool?

8. Excited about? Concerned about?
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Facebook
Facebook is a social networking site. It allows users to create “profiles” that allow them to
easily connect to friends for online conversation and to share resources, links, photos and
videos.

9. Social Media Sandbox
Facts about the tool
How could CILs use this tool?
Excited about? Concerned about?

10. 13
Flickr
Flickr is a photo-sharing site. People and organizations can upload and organize their own
photos and create photo groups or find Creative Commons-licensed photos to use in their
own presentations and publications.
Social Media Sandbox
Facts about the tool
How could CILs use this tool?

11. Excited about? Concerned about?
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MySpace
MySpace is another example of a social networking site. Users can create their own profiles
and then share information, photos, video, etc. MySpace also allows lots of freedom to add
“bling”--images, music, games, etc.--more so than does Facebook.

12. Social Media Sandbox
Facts about the tool
How could CILs use this tool?
Excited about? Concerned about?

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Podcasting
A podcast is a series of audio or video digital-media files that can be distributed over the
Internet. People can subscribe to your podcasts through Web feeds and be automatically
notified when new content is available. Podcasts are also portable.
Social Media Sandbox
Facts about the tool
How could CILs use this tool?

14. Excited about? Concerned about?
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Twitter
Twitter allows users to send and receive "tweets" (140 character messages) in many different
ways--through the Twitter website, their cell phones, their Instant Message programs (like
AOL IM and G-Talk) or from other third party Twitter tools. Good for “real-time” info and
connections.

15. Social Media Sandbox
Facts about the tool
How could CILs use this tool?
Excited about? Concerned about?

16. 13
YouTube
YouTube is an example of a "video-sharing" site. Users can upload videos to YouTube for
others to see. People can also copy "embed code" from YouTube videos to put a video into
their blog, website, social network, wiki, etc. Nonprofits can create their own “channels.”
Social Media Sandbox
Facts about the tool
How could CILs use this tool?

17. Excited about? Concerned about?
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Wiki
A wiki is a Web site that allows users to add and update content on the site using their own
Web browser. This is made possible by Wiki software that runs on the Web server. Wikis end
up being created mainly by a collaborative effort of the site visitors.

18. Social Media Sandbox
Facts about the tool
How Could CILs use this tool?
Excited about? Concerned about?

19. 13
Listening is a core social media activity in which all organizations should be engaged.
Listening is important because it helps you...
• Understand the needs/issues/concerns of your consumers
• Address perceptions (positive and negative) about your organization.
• Understand how to best serve your various stakeholders (consumers, staff, funders, etc.)
• Stay on top of developments and news in your field and in your occupation (it's a GREAT
staff development tool).
Listening
Why are you listening?

20. What do you plan to do with the information?
How will you listen?

21. 17
These are the elements of a social media strategic map:
• Objectives
• Target Audience(s)
• Integration
• Culture Change
• Capacity
• Tools and Tactics
• Measurement
• Experiment(s)
Social Media Strategy Map
Key Concepts and Principles

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What do you want to accomplish?
• Research and learning?
• Increase in “brand” or issue awareness?
• Reputation management?
• Getting your fans to talk about you?
• Generating content and information?
• Increased relevant visitor traffic to your website?
• Getting a stakeholder group to take action?
• Fundraising?
• Other?
State your objectives as S.M.A.R.T. goals.
Objectives
What are your organizational objectives and S.M.A.R.T. goals?

23. How do these link to other organizational goals and objectives?
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• Who do you need to reach to meet your objectives? Why?
• What do they know or believe about your organization or issue? What will resonate with
them?
• What key points do you want to make?
• What social media tools are they currently using?
• Where are they “hanging out” online? What are they doing online?
Target Audience
Describe your target audience, responding to the questions on the
left.

24. What additional information/research do you need to learn more about your
target audience’s online behavior or understanding of your
issues/organization?

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• What is your current online strategy?
• What do you need to do with your website?
• How will your social media strategy support and enhance your existing Internet strategy?
• Is there an off-line component that you need to support?
Integration
What is your current Internet strategy? What online tools are you using?

26. How will you use social media to enhance your current strategy?
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• How will you get your organization to embrace social media?
• Who are the champions who could help drive it forward?
• What key fears/concerns do you think people will have? How can you address them?
• What is the rate of change your organization can tolerate?
Culture Change
What culture change issues do you anticipate?

27. How will you address them?

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• What tactics and tools best support your targeted audience?
• What tactics and tools do you have the capacity to implement?
• Are you prepared to allow additional time for researching new social media or changing
tools?
Tools and Tactics
What tactics and tools will help you meet your objectives?
Which of these do you have the capacity to do? If there’s something that’s
important to do, but you don’t have capacity, how will you get it?

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• What hard data points or metrics will you use to track your objectives?
• How often will you track?
• Do you have the systems and tools set up to track efficiently?
• What questions will you ask to generate insights?
• What qualitative data will you take into consideration to generate insights or help you
improve your social media strategy?
Measurement
What metrics will you use, including qualitative information?

30. How will you track your progress?
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• What small piece or idea can you implement first as a pilot?
• Aside from the metrics above, how will you track implementation so you can learn from it?

31. Questions to Ask Before Your First Experiment
• What do you plan to do?
• What do you think will be the result?
Questions to Ask After Your First Experiment
• What actually happened?
• How could your results have been improved?
• What did your audience think?
• What will you do differently in the next iteration?
Experiment
What experiments can you run?