Reaching the Outside World

UNDP and Social Media

Communities have the power to make the world a better place. We know this, because we see it happen every day through the work of volunteers, contractors and staff throughout the United Nations system.

The United Nations Development Programme embraces the fact that today’s communities do not only exist in the physical world, but also online. UNDP leadership recognizes the wide reach that communication in online communities can have - both positively and negatively.

Social media is the term for internet-based tools used for publishing, sharing and discussing information, and includes blogs, wikis and social networking sites such as Facebook or LinkedIn.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact the communications unit in New York (oc-webteam@undp.org).

Before you start a social media campaign, we’d ask that you ask the following questions, then contact the UNDP web team:

- What are we trying to accomplish? Are you looking for greater awareness of our development efforts or engagement with donors – or the public? Understanding what you're trying to actually do with your social media presence should be the first step in developing a social media strategy.

- Why social media? Is your audience there? Do you want to build stronger relationships with donors, the media and the public? Tap into online word-of-mouth channels? Be cool because everybody else is doing it?

- What kind of social media will help us best achieve our goals? Do you need to use social networking sites (Facebook), real-time updates (Twitter), blogs, social news sites, media-sharing sites or display ads on social media sites. Examine the type of social media you want to have a presence on and how those characteristics fit what you're trying to accomplish.

- Are we prepared to let go of control of our brand, at least a little? You can't participate in social media without being...well...social. And that means engaging in a conversation with the public. Once you engage in a conversation, you have to give up control. Are you ready for that?

- What will we do to encourage participation? There's nothing more embarrassing than going to a corporate YouTube channel and seeing that the viral video it spent tons of money making has just 95 views. Ditto for going to a organization's Twitter feed and seeing that it has all of 11 followers. What are you planning to do to drive people to your social media presence? And do you have the money to do it?

- Who will maintain our social media presence? Participating in social media takes a lot of work. You must have something to say and you must have someone (or a team of people) to say it on a regular basis. It won't happen unless it becomes part of someone's job. Do you have someone ready to commit time to maintaining your social media presence?

- Do we have the resources to keep this up? People will expect you to keep it up. Have you budgeted the resources to continue your social media presence beyond the fiscal year?

- How does engaging users via social media integrate into our overall communications strategy? None of this stuff exists in a vacuum. It has to be part of a larger marketing/communications strategy. How does social media fit into what you're elsewhere?

- How do we measure success? What constitutes failure? Are you measuring views, followers, comments, or subscribers? What's the threshold for your success metrics that takes them into success territory? What happens if you don't get there?

- What will we do less of if we're spending resources on social media? Chances are you have limited dollars. If you spend more money on social media, you have to spend less on something else. How will your overall goals be impacted by taking money away from other forms of advertising/marketing and moving it into social media?
(credit: Sean Carter, idfive)

In any case, if you wish to start a Facebook page, a Twitter account or a similar initiative, please contact oc-webteam@undp.org in advance with the following information:

Intended audience;
Purpose for page or feed;
Name(s) and e-mail addresses of persons updating these feeds.

This information will help us to determine whether your efforts suit your proposed platform, or if updates should be done through our existing HQ feeds, or should be used for another system altogether such as Teamworks.

If you have already launched a social media initiative, please send this same information to oc-webteam@undp.org with URLs as we are in the process of compiling a master list so we can better share best practices. Here are some tips for you:

Tips and tricks for using social media

Content

Content you share on social media platforms should be helpful, useful, informative, entertaining, actionable and practical for your social media audience. If possible, your status updates should feature all of these elements.
If you have a story to share that is globally relevant, please forwad it to us (oc-webteam@undp.org) for consideration in our global Twitter and Facebook feeds.
To keep our audience interested and engaged it is crucial to post stories about all the different areas and regions of UNDP’s work. We should try to avoid just placing links to items in our newsroom. Think about posting information about contests, surveys, calls to action, engaging questions (that you would actually like to have answered by the audience), videos and other engaging material from Country Offices and UN agencies - fresh content is key.

Facebook

Use a human photo for your Facebook profile attached to the UNDP logo and indicate your geographical or topical affiliation.
If you link to videos, pictures, websites etc. on Facebook please use the “attach” tool at the bottom of the blurb space and don’t post the URL directly into the blank space. Even if you do not include a blurb in your update the “attach tool” will in most cases create a thumbnail and headline, which looks nicer than just placing a link.
Please don't use hashtags (#) in your status updates, this Twitter function does not work in Facebook yet. However, you can use the "@" to link to other Facebook pages.

Twitter

Naming your account: Choose a name that clearly indicates your topical or local affiliation. Keep it as short as possible so your name can be re-tweeted more easily. Try to use the name on all social media platforms to make it easier for your audience to find you.
Design: Use a compelling background picture showcasing the area of work of your organizational unit. Good sources for photos are our Flickr stream and the UN Photo archive.
Don’t use up all 140 characters for a tweet so users can retweet the message (leave space for e.g. “RT @UNDP” – 8 characters)
Use http://bit.ly to shorten your URL, then copy and paste this link to your tweet. With bit.ly you can get also detailed user statistics later on.
# ("hashtag") = convention for creating common category of information, like a "tag" (examples: #poverty; #undp; #mdg, #gender). If you click on tagged items, you will be able see all related tweets.
@ symbol = convention for public reply to another Twitterer, or attribution/reference to another Twitterer.
RT ("retweet") = convention for forwarding someone else's tweet to your own followers; SYNTAX: FT followed by @ symbol name, so RT @ WeCanEndPoverty MESSAGE. Can also use "via" when not a direct retweet (i.e. via @ @ WeCanEndPoverty).
d = direct message. Your message can only be seen by the addressee. EX: d WeCanEndPoverty. You cannot send a direct message to a user who is not following you.
More Information: Sree Sreenivasan's Twitter Guide; Twitter Fan Wiki / Hashtags;

Flickr

Flickr is a great platform for showcasing UNDP’s work and to increase visibility. To make the best use of it, make sure that you only upload photos with high quality. Flickr users in general are either passionate about photography or people looking for free stock photos. Before uploading a photo ask yourself if it could make it to the first page of a national newspaper. Avoid posting photos of meetings, handshakes and conferences.
Upload maximal 5 photos at once - that is the maximum amount of photos shown in your flickr profile's photo stream.
Frequency: To keep traffic steady, it takes four or five uploads a week.
You can promote your pictures by joining groups and re-posting them there. Please make sure that respective group content does not contradict UN's fundamental principles.

Language and Content

Negative and anxiety related content as well as numbers are not being shared too often. Plus, fans can only “like” and not dislike your status updates.
In your status updates, give UNDP a human voice – use “we” instead of “UNDP”, use “Helen Clark” or “our chief” instead of “UNDP Administrator Helen Clark”.
People like to focus their energy on something active and constructive such as work- and learning-related content (help, find out, learn, create, build, connect, support). Calls to action (please share, please help, pls RT (retweet)) in general are more likely to be shared than other updates. The same applies to status updates mentioning the word “you” (more personal).
Tell your audiene how they can support UNDP's cause.
Other words that get shared a lot are: most, best, why, how, world, big, says, video, media, top, first.
Use nouns, proper nouns and 3rd-person verbs as well as punctuation (colons, periods and exclamation points but not semicolons).
Avoid abstract thought and sensation-based words as well as abbreviations, emoticons, slang conversation and simplicity.
For more information, please read The Science of ReTweets, 7 Scientifically Proven Ways to Get "Shared" on Facebook

Frequency

Your office should try to interact with your social media audience frequently, e.g. post at least three status updates/tweets per day, react to comments regularly, etc. If a social media account is not being updated regularly, it is in general better to close it than to disappoint your audience.
That being sad, if you update your profile very often, please keep in mind that your audience needs some time to comment on the last update.

Interaction

Social media is about having a human dialog with your audience.We therefore strongly encourage you to reply to any questions that our audience post, as well as thank them for their comments and interest in UNDP. However, please be careful about e.g. which groups you join and check if they do not contradict UN's fundamental principles.
If you see comments and postings on any of UNDP's social media accounts that do not align with UN values, are commercial, redundant, irrelevant, posted more than once or link to external websites that contradict UN values please delete them or inform the webmaster of the site.

Useful resources

Facebook

Twitter

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Social Media Focal Points
The social media focal points at UNDP Headquarters are as follows:

Social Media Focal Point: (Ms.) Silke von Brockhausen, silke.von.brockhausen@undp.org

Chief, Web & Multimedia: (Mr.) Mark Cardwell, mark.cardwell@undp.org

Please feel free to contact the above UNDP communications focal points (or write to oc-webteam@undp.org) if you have any queries related to the development of your social media initiatives.

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In this section...

Reaching the Outside World

UNDP and Social Media

Tips and tricks for using social media

Resources for...