Social Media Case Study

When given the opportunity to take over Participate Learning's social media accounts as an intern, I jumped at it. Participate Learning had a good following and a steady content plan, but lacked the consistency and manpower to make social media marketing a conversation funnel rather than a one-way street of self promotion.

Some minor changes in mindset and practice yielded a 61.8 percent increase in Twitter followership and a 43.4 percent increase in engagement over one year. Here’s how.

Tone

One of the benefits of working at an education company is the audience: teachers. I learned educators are some of the most inspiring social media users out there. I was able to feed off of the energetic teachers to create a fun, inclusive company tone.

Messaging

Let’s be real. “Check it out” is an overused CTA that doesn’t yield sustaining results. I shifted messaging on Participate Learning’s accounts from a “view this” or “do this” to “explore how you can make an impact” or “see why ___ inspires us in their classroom.”

Some images in this post reflect the "Participate" Twitter account. At the time, I was working for Participate Learning before Participate spun out as its own organization and took the name.

Targeting

To broaden the reach of our content, I used Twitter lists and Facebook post targeting. I worked with a team to think through major subject areas and audiences, then created lists accordingly. In each tweet, I tagged specific users who interacted with that topic on a regular basis. For conferences and events, I used the same tactic and specific hashtags to target key users at those events and tweet at optimum times.

On Facebook, I targeted posts by country and age group to reach teachers applying to Participate Learning. Each piece of content was country-specific, addressing user needs and allowing users to relate to those pictured in the content.