The pace of change in digital for non-profits is both exhilarating (I’m always learning! I’m never bored!) and scary (this channel just stopped working for us! everyone’s freaking out!).
This article from Montfort, a UK digital agency, provides some very strong, common-sense principles for dealing with unexpected changes in digital platforms:
What I really like about this, is that these are really strong and sensible principles that you should be applying anyway, even if Facebook and Google weren’t mercurial pests that constantly change things.
Read the full article for an explanation of each point; the details they provide about numbers 2, 3 and 5 in particular are really useful if you’re getting internal pressure to throw a lot of content at Facebook to see what sticks. (And numbers 1 and 2 are just generally good life advice for all situations!). They say:
“Many charities use social media and other digital channels as a dumping ground for content, even if that content is only going to appeal to a small portion of their overall fan base.
Social media managers need to be gatekeepers here and ensure that content being published is of interest to your community, not just used to appease internal stakeholders.
This is particularly important given Facebook’s recent Newsfeed changes. If content is not going to drive ‘meaningful engagement’, then it’s not worth posting as it will affect your Facebook Newsfeed.”
Read the full article on Montfort’s blog
Photo by Ross Findon on Unsplash