Contact

Melody Curtis
Arkansas Extension Homemakers
Phone: 501-671-2012
Fax: 501-671-2323
Email: mcurtis@uada.edu

Office:
University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture
Cooperative Extension Service
2301 S. University Avenue
Little Rock, AR 72204

Using Social Media for Promotion

by Nancy Hightower - September 23, 2021

It's easy to overlook social media when promoting your organizations, clubs, and events. However, social media is one of the easiest ways to spread information about these things to a high number of people.

Extension Social Media Manager, Melissa Johnson, answers some questions about Facebook, how it works, and how important it is to engage in posts you want promoted.

How does Facebook work?

Facebook uses an algorithm to determine what posts or content people should see.

The "algorithm" is an extremely complex computer program that has been designed to filter content into users' newsfeeds. The algorithm uses a scoring system to determine which content you are most likely to enjoy seeing. Since posts don't typically show up in our newsfeeds in chronological order, the platforms use this scoring system to determine what content it shows to its users.

How is liking, commenting, and sharing posts helpful?

Liking, commenting, and sharing are ways you can engage with a post.

Engaging with a post boosts its score with the algorithm. Comments you make on a post will sometimes show up on your friends newsfeed and can encourage them to comment as well. Sharing a post will also help a post show up on your friends' newfeeds and on your profile page.

How can creators or page owners get their audiences' attention?

Create content that is easy to read, uses short descriptions, and gives your audience more than one way to absorb the information. You can use a picture or a graphic with important information along with the post so your audience is seeing the information in more than one way. It's good to repeat the information in the text of the post and on the post picture in this way so your audience can absorb it better.

It is important to be sure you are posting information that is interesting to your audience. They are only going to engage in posts they want to see and are interested in.

Other helpful tips and information about social media:

The more active you are on Facebook or other platforms, the more those platforms will tend to reward you. Being more active and posting regularly to a page will increase the likelyhood that it will be engaged with and seen by more people.

It is very important when making content on social media to think about how the user experiences the content. Think about things that engage you, things that pique your interest. Observe yourself while you use social media. Which content were you more likely to read? Click on? Comment on? Watch? Often, our audience is extremely similar to us. The things that tend to engage us will likely also engage our users.

Social media is one of the most helpful tools at hand to use for promotion, but you have to make sure to engage with posts you want to see and you want others to see. Liking, commenting, and sharing all only take a second but these actions can really make a difference in spreading the word about your interests, clubs, and events.