Transcript Social web: solving problems for your institution

Social web case study:
solving problems for your institution
Jo Alcock
Evidence Base
Birmingham City University
Introduction
Personal use of social web
• Blog at Joeyanne Libraryanne
• Tweet as @joeyanne
Institutional use of social web
• Keen to introduce social web in workplace
• Implemented social web at current and previous
workplaces (University libraries)
About solutions, not tools
Social web shouldn’t be used simply because a
tool is available; it should only be used if it meets
a need.
Each of my examples follow the same structure:
Problem
Need
Solution
Benefit
Engagement
Engaging with users
Presence where our users are
Facebook page and Twitter account
Engage in online conversation with users
Facebook
Facebook page engage in discussions. deliver news and updates
about the service, and details of events.
Twitter
Twitter account to engage in conversation, share updates, and
pass on useful information (through retweeting)
Updates
Communicating news/updates to users
Avenue to communicate efficiently
Blog/RSS feed
Users can choose to subscribe to updates
Blogs
Blog used to deliver updates about the collection or service. Easy
way to keep content fresh and deliver news conveniently to end
users.
Event promotion
Low awareness of events
Central place with details of all events
Google calendar embedded into website
Website always up-to-date, easy for staff
to update, users can subscribe
Google Calendar
Embedded into website – easy to use (similar to Outlook for adding
events), ability for people to subscribe or add events to their
calendar.
The best bit?
Many of these solutions can work together
Engagement
e.g. FB/Twitter
Website
Communication
e.g. Blog/RSS
Event promotion
e.g. Google Calendar
Internal communication
Communication between staff is ad hoc
Collaborative working space
Internal wiki/intranet (e.g. Sharepoint)
Well informed staff able to work as a team
Sharepoint
Collaborative working area – shared documents (with version
control), calendar, links, announcements and discussions.
Gathering feedback
Would like feedback from users
Monitor reputation
RSS and alerting services
Know what people are saying, giving
valuable feedback
Monitoring services
Set up searches to receive alerts when certain keywords are
mentioned (such as your organisation).
Thank you for listening
Jo Alcock
http://www.joeyanne.co.uk
@joeyanne
Presentation: http://slideshare.net/joeyanne
Images from Iconfinder