social media

Instructors: Dale Blasingame and Jon Zmikly

Week of March 18

Description
This week, we’ll talk about the top social media platforms and how to use them in the classroom. In addition, we’ll cover the relationship between social media analytics and strategy – and how to convey that lesson to students.

Objectives

  • Understand the differences between Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Snapchat
  • Describe content strategies on social media platforms
  • Get an introduction to social media analytics and Insights
  • Break down the terminology and options available to teach analytics and build reports

Instructor Videos
The following videos cover both social media content and analytics.

Note: This video was published as part of last year’s PhDigital program.

Read and Watch

The State of Digital Marketing in Academia: An Examination of Marketing Curriculum’s Response to Digital Disruption, Journal of Marketing Education
10 Facts About Americans and Facebook, Pew Research Center
Facebook Blueprint Trainings, Facebook
Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook, Gary Vaynerchuk
12 Social Marketing Trends to Follow in 2019, The Startup
7 of the Best Brands on Instagram Stories, Hootsuite
How to Create a Social Media and Analytics Class, MediaShift
Developing a Digital Core in Mass Communication Curriculum, MediaShift
The 7 Undeniable Benefits of Social Media Monitoring for Brands, Sprout Social
Your Guide to Digital and Social Certifications, MediaShift – links to new social training and certifications also found on Resources page.

Discussion
Hopefully these videos and articles have you thinking about the relationship between social media content, engagement, data and strategy. So let’s first take a look at your personal social media habits in the #socialmedia Slack channel.

  1. What is your favorite social network and which social network should you spend more time on? Why?
  2. Provide a link to one or more social media research project(s) (either one of your own or someone else’s) and give a brief summary of the method and results (granted these links may be behind subscription walls). We’ll discuss digital research in more detail in a later module.
  3. How does the engagement potential of social media affect its professional usage and strategy development. How does it make studying social media different than traditional media research?