 Heraclitus once said there's nothing permanent except change and certainly that is True for public relations and the work that we do and the tools that we use in public relations as it is anywhere else in life So with that in mind, we're going to take a look at today We're going to take a look at social media and emerging technology as it relates to public relations So first of all if we just take a look at social media I mean you can see the development of social media if we start with you know theoretically the The telegraph as the initial Way that people could connect via social media and have that immediate exchange All the way up through kind of today or at least in this in this graphic through 2017 We got up through tiktok. So you see that there's a lot that's happened But and even though if we and this is a little bit disproportionate So if we if we were to put this in proportion, it's gonna skew the graphic a little bit But you see that you know if we but over the time the development of things has as in has has progressed so quickly in Modern times that we were constantly changing these things and and the way that we reach people and the Channels that we have through which we can reach people. So for example the Pew Research Foundation did a Study in 2021 they do this regularly these results of 20 from 2021 the percentage of a US adults who say they ever use these types of Social media you see YouTube and Facebook are obviously at the top there But we've got Instagram Snapchat all these things that people are using and and so I mean there's there's a lot here There's so overall usage in general if we look at that You can see that a lot of people are using social media in different different forms If we look at the age breakdown the different brackets here We can see that YouTube and Facebook in the study the same study It's where this information comes from from Pew But the YouTube and Facebook tend to hit everyone they have a broad they hit lots of different age groups young and old and And so forth Snapchat and Instagram tend to skew younger They tend to have a younger audience and older folks tend not to use them as much and tiktok and Twitter are kind of a mixed bag Yeah, people of different age ranges tends to skew a little younger But but you still have you're picking up more older people than you would with with snapchat and Instagram But so we see the social media the different channels are all over the place too in terms of Who's using them how they're being used how much they're being used and so forth So there's a lot to take in just in that modern social media using technology and things like that. So Let's take a look at at some social network theory What we call social network theory. This is I mean which is not a new thing This was something that was developed by studies back in the 70s and it's just been kind of the Kind of refined as we've gotten into different what we call social network Applications through technology and things so but in social network theory we take a look at five different aspects of it So the first one is size which has to do with the quantity of connections in your network So basically how many friends do you have how many followers do you have how many subscribers? Do you have or how many people you follow and subscribe to so what's the size of your social network? And then also what's the quality though not just a quantity, but what's the quality? What's the meaningfulness of those connections? Do you actually know those people or do you just you know click the button so that you're following them and They're following you and or click the button your friends. You haven't talked to this person in 30 years But but your friends so to speak on Facebook or whatever So what's the quality though and the meaningfulness of those connections? We see this at work in social networks like Facebook, you know people tend to focus on how many friends Do you have what's the quality and the meaningfulness? How do you use that social media to enhance the meaningfulness of those connections or using it to stay connected or using it to reach out to people? Or is it just so you can kind of spy on people and see where they're going on vacation and what they're eating and things? So but what's the they both the quantity and the quality of your social network? And so we can see that at work in Facebook as much as anywhere We also look at things like social distance So people are more inclined to do favors for those with whom they have close connections So we can look at a network like indeed for example But we know that people are more inclined to do favors for those with whom they have close connections And even if you if it's sort of a thing where you know someone who knows someone right who knows So through indeed for example You can see do you have a connection with somebody via somebody else you may not know this person But but you may know someone who knows someone and can can you know? When that happens if somebody reaches out to you or you reach out somebody you're more inclined to do that Then you are for just a random stranger when you feel when you find that you have some connection to that person And especially the closer that connection the more likely you are to Help with that whatever issue they're working on but that social distance is important What's your connection? How many degrees of separation are there between you and that other person? And and that's going to impact how connected you are and how likely you are to System with different things so But anyway, so the social distance we can see that at work in social network theory as well Then finally the last two aspects are what we call diffusion and complexity, right? So diffusion has to do with how quickly a message spreads How quickly is this getting around right this information spreading and then complexity though Really says that the simpler the idea that faster and wider it will spread right so think about things So like when you would play tell a telephone you ever played a game of telephone It's get or had information that's gone from one person to the next and gone through that whole chain And by the time it gets to somebody else it's totally Distorted right it's not the same message. It doesn't have the same meaning So so we need to look at diffusion how quickly is that spread how complex is that message and how likely is it to get messed up This we look at things like Twitter, right? We look at Twitter as something that's first of all it really focuses on the simplest ideas, right? You can you can have a multiple Tweet chain or whatever you want to call it, but but the simpler the idea that's the whole Premise of Twitter the simply the simpler the idea and we see that at work there You're limited amount of characters right with Twitter So you have to get that message out in a condensed form and the simpler that idea is the faster and wider It spreads which is why information spreads like wildfire on Twitter because it's boiled down to basically its simplest form So so it's gonna it's gonna see that network diffusion It's gonna it's gonna be really fast to spread because the idea is Simpler and it's put in a very simple format in a condensed form. So Social network theory says that these are the aspects that they kind of govern Social media and social social network the way communication works and the way messages are spread So we need to keep that in mind as public relations professionals that these five elements are really important in using social media to the best of our ability So we can also then speaking of that think about what are some of the different uses for social media? Well, obviously media relations is one we have companies that put out and organizations that put out news releases and share information And and so they relate to the media they send it they connect with different media outlets through social media And and so we use social media for media relations to to get a story out there to shape a story to Connect with the gatekeepers and influencers, right? So media relations is an important aspect of social media as it relates to public relations Let's see is it for social influence. We know that people are Literally have influencers, right? So they're called influencers So but we can use this through for social influence if we can connect the right people Sometimes it's not about how many people you you get to buy into your story. It's having the right people do so, right? So we get the right people behind it We get the right people that we can connect with then they can connect with their audience and and have that network diffusion through through their Specific audience if that's who we're targeting that public is who we're targeting So we need to think about, you know, how can we maximize the social influence here? Social media is also helpful in crisis situations and risk management Not only can you get information out quickly and have it immediately accessible But you can kind of use it to shape a story and you can use it to connect directly with your audience and with your public so Having that in crisis situations and risk management can be really important for again that diffusion of information But also connecting with the right public and the right audience so We cannot season for corporate social responsibility to further Just causes right and things that are that are going to have a positive impact on the world around us We can use it to enhance our corporate social responsibility and also let people know about it, right? So so there's lots of things we can use social media for it can be a really Important element for public relations and efforts for any organization So then it all comes back to how do we measure the impact of this? I when you know, what's the most appropriate way to measure the effectiveness of social media as part of this campaign? Well one Way to measure is mentions again It's sort of like impressions when we talk about news media we talk about impressions How many people are seeing this how many people are talking about is this something that's Getting retweeted and getting reposted and getting mentioned on on different areas Are we getting a lot of mentions out of this? So that's one way we can measure just straight up quantitatively looking at the mentions that you get We can also look at it in terms of public sentiment Are we having an impact on on public sentiment? Are we changing the tone of the conversation? Are we controlling the narrative? Are we really, you know, influencing that that sentiment around our organization or around this cause or whatever it is Are we are we having an impact there and how can we measure that sentiment? We can we can measure reach Again, kind of you know, sort of the same as mentions, but how far is this message getting? How broadly are we able to spread this message and and what's our reach? What what parts of the culture are we really connecting to with this message and are receiving this message? We can look at exposure, you know, all publicity is good publicity, right as to paraphrase pt Barnum, right? So there's no such thing as bad press, right? So are we getting exposure for our cause? Are we getting again coming down to mentions, but but also Are people becoming more aware and informed about this topic and about, you know, what we want them Influencing them toward our goal really and then engagement Some organizations do this really well. They really engage well with their public and and have the ability to connect with people through social media not just to share message but understand that it's a two-way process social media is a two-way medium, right? It's a it's a way to for us to not only Send messages to our public but also receive them and engage with them so we can measure the impact of that through our our people engaging with this are they responding are they Recommenting on our on our posts. Are they? You know really asking questions and engaging with us through this form of social media Are they just You know taking it in and it goes in one ear not the other so to speak but So we can measure that through engagement and how how much our audience is responding and the kind of response that we're getting from them A few guidelines to keep in mind as we're working with social media. First of all, social media is there Is really useful toward telling a story and building a brand. We ought to have some specific idea of how we're going to use this social media Are we going to be the organization? That's really fun and snarky and and has commentary on things and has a sense of humor Or we're going to be more straight up about it. We're going to be with a straight man in terms of Just sharing information or we get you so so how are we going to use this platform to build our brand? And how does that tie in to our overall kind of ethos as an organization? We can also remember that we need to use the the guideline of matching a need and a goal with the platform Right. So as we talked about before not everybody's on different platforms some skew younger some skew older But also in different demographics. We can see this in the different in the peer research We go back to that peer research that we looked at before we can look at social media use in 2021 And it tells us some interesting a demographic information for example Instagram is more likely to be used in hispanic And african american populations you see 52 of people who use social media 52 of hispanics use instagram Americans is 49 percent. So it's really high to Caucasians drop down to 35 percent So white people use instagram as much as some other groups do I'm the same as very much true with with whatsapp right the hispanic use of of whatsapp is 46 percent As opposed to african american and Caucasian which are 23 and 16 percent respectively. So So again keeping in mind if you're trying to reach Hispanic population with your message Then you know instagram and whatsapp are going to be really effective for you or more effective than they are if you're trying to reach Caucasians or white people who don't use those apps as much So you need to find a different way to reach out to those people in the same way we look at indeed Now we see that indeed users 51 percent have a bachelor's degree or an advanced degree 28 percent have some college only 10 percent have a high school diploma and that's it or less right so So trying to reach people with a high school diploma or with who don't even have that level of education Using Indeed is not going to be Effective or sorry not indeed. I keep linked in sorry You know the app linked in not indeed. So linked in these are the stats we see that so if you're using You know linked in you want to be sure that you're using the for the appropriate audience Pinterest same idea women use it way more than men Pinterest is you know 46 percent of women say they use Pinterest only 16 percent of men And next door for example for trying to reach an urban or suburban or rural Urban and suburban much higher than rural So we just need to know who we're trying to reach and then match the platform with that Well, I need to focus on conversations again as I mentioned Social media is a two-way medium So we need to focus on conversations not just about what information we want to get out there It's about the conversations that we're having with people around that information And so we need to be prepared to engage with our audience Effectively and have a system in place to do that Well, so I need to do our research You need to get your facts straight and and need to know who's using what and so we need to do our research And make sure that we're on top of things when it comes to social media And then finally we need to work the system We need to remember that again research is part of this So we do our research that we make a plan that we should have a plan for how we're going to use social media And then we implement that plan we evaluate how it went when we go back to the research We we go back to this rpi e model right for the same is true for social media that we ought to You know be be engaging in every aspect of this process and work the system Work that rpi system. Don't just jump in and start using social media and see what happens Right, we ought to have a plan We ought to be doing some research how to plan we ought to then implement and then evaluate and start it all over again So remember this rpi model is cyclical It feeds back into itself. So how to be constantly updating and adjusting our our social media Plan as we as we proceed through time Remember that again, we go back to that that opening line from heraclitus that that you know, the only thing permanent in life is change So we ought to be prepared. We know that social media changes on almost daily basis and we need to adapt and change with it If you have questions about social media and how how it's Used in public relations how we can best use it and how it functions in public relations Please feel free to email me. I'd love to hear from you there in the meantime I hope that you will can begin to think about social media and its use in public relations especially in terms of that plan And and having that plan knowing that we need to have that plan From the outset and not just jump in Headfirst and not have any idea what what's coming at us So have a plan for social media understand its role and its function in overall success of a public relations campaign in modern times