Social Media
Reaching Farther, working better

Presenters and Writers
Justice Ender, Communications Associate
Rayna Sage, PhD, Research Associate
Megan Miller, Student Researcher
Kerry Morse, Communications Associate
•	RTC: Rural conducts research on disability as part of the Rural Institute for Inclusive Communities at the University of Montana 
•	RTC: Rural is funded by the National Institute on Disability, Independent Living and Rehabilitation Research (NIDILRR) to improve the ability of people with disabilities to engage in rural community living

Why Use Social Media?
Connect with consumers directly
•	Upcoming Events and Classes
•	Disability News
•	Advocacy Efforts
•	Community Activities
•	Peer Groups

Indirectly benefit
•	Raise Community Presence
•	Low Cost
•	Allows Indirect Networking

Facebook Inventories

What is something You do or could do with a social media platform?

Social media as a bridge
Connecting Main and Branch Offices

Separate Accounts
•	Plus:
•	Staff in branch office know more information
•	Consumers may only be interested in regional activities
•	Added flexibility in number of staff
•	Minus:
•	More staff need to be trained on social media
•	May have to double-post items of larger relevance
•	More burdensome
•	Small branches may not have staff confident in social media

Single Account
Other things to think about
•	Have a social media policy
•	Make sure branches do not claim business pages
•	Make sure core staff are admins, can monitor posts

Would your center benefit from having several pages specific to branch offices?

Reaching Rural Communities
One-on-one Interviews

Why Do rural consumers use social media?
•	Consuming and producing
•	Interacting
•	Advocacy
•	Community building
•	Events
…not for everyone

Community events

Facebook options
Boosts and Scheduled Posts

Scheduled Posts
•	Future posts
•	Advantages
•	Consistency
•	Efficiency
•	Edit
•	Disadvantages
•	Disengagement

Boosts
•	Few people who follow your page see posts in timeline for any single post
•	Boosts can show posts to more followers and people who do not even follow you
•	Shares are another way your information can reach more people
•	Unlike shares, boosts cost $

Healthy Community Living Project
•	Healthy Community Living is one project run by RTC: Rural
•	Being developed in partnership with
CILs from across country
•	Has separate social media platforms
•	Part of project is collecting pictures
and video from CILs and individuals
through asks
•	Also builds community/network

Describe project
•	Megan Miller, undergraduate student researcher
•	Tracked HCL Facebook page for seven months
•	Main focus on how boosts impacted page followers
and reactions
•	Boosted posts were on Wednesdays through March and April and included photos, similar content
•	Variables:
•	$20 or $50 per boost
•	People who Like Page and Friends or All of United States
•	1-Day Boost or 7-Day Boost

Analysis of Factors Contributing to a facebook presence
•	Increase in followers:
•	Month after 2016 APRIL Conference
•	After larger $ boosts
•	After boosts with direct invitations to like the page

Analysis of Factors Contributing to a facebook presence
•	Total reactions had a more dramatic spike
•	Did not use the same picture or request each boosted post
•	Some variance might be due to how much people liked certain content
•	Single-day boosts did better than week-long boosts for same amount of $

Ultimate Findings
•	Facebook can be used as a tool for spreading information and creating a community who can share with each other
•	Active Facebook monitoring is important
•	Directly inviting people to like your page is key if a goal is to increase followers and reach
•	Posts with a picture are key

Changes since study
•	Facebook encourages targeting people based on demographics, interests, or behaviors
•	This might help target, but not all relevant parties might use terms like ‘disability’ or ‘wheelchair’ so that could lead to missed consumers
•	Cannot invite people twice if boosting several times

Is there a key item that your Organization could boost or make multiple posts about?
Group or page?

And other Facebook Features

Business Page
•	Voice of authority
•	Share recognized resources 
and trusted content
•	Interaction is limited to:
•	Posts
•	Comments under posts
•	Direct messages from followers to
page
•	Low number of views compared to likes

Groups
•	Democratic
•	Everyone has a voice and can start ideas or comment
•	Information is not validated
•	High number of views and notifications
•	Can still have staff be key administrators or moderators
•	Facilitating vs. Telling

Do you run any Peer Activities or projects that deserve their own page or group?

Could your CIL keep a resource list of groups consumers could benefit from joining?

Other Social Applications
Specific Purpose Networks and Inter-office Communication 

Linked In
•	For individuals
•	Networking and job searching
•	For organizations
•	Attract talent
•	Research government players

Twitter
•	Organizational brand building
•	Networking between allies
Hootsuite
•	Social media manager
•	Allows comprehensive tools
for Twitter, Facebook, Linked In,
and other social media
•	Allows looking at postings for
pages you follow, scheduled
posting

Buffer
•	Social media manager
•	Allows comprehensive tools
for Twitter, Facebook, Linked In,
and other social media
•	Slimmed down, 1-directional
•	Free version
•	Pay features allow added FB 
and Twitter accounts
•	Higher levels allow more detailed analysis

Tweetdeck
•	Similar to Hootsuite but only for Twitter
•	Schedule
•	Follow feeds
•	Notifications
•	Direct message
•	Upcoming posts

Flickr
•	Viewing, storing, sharing 
pictures and video
•	Preserves image quality
•	Can have public groups
•	Private accounts for storage
•	HCL Flickr - www.flickr.com/groups/healthycommunityliving

Slack
•	Team communication
•	Features of social media, email, file sharing, web-teleconference
•	Other functions
•	HCL and RTC used internally and with community partners

Whova
•	Conference organizing
•	Share agenda
•	See attendees with information
•	Post notices / bulletins at 
conference
•	Photos – people can share 
•	Vendors

Final Tips
Anyone want to share something they learned or do at their center?

Thank you
Thank you for attending our presentation!

Healthy Community Living is a project of RTC: Rural in the Rural Institute at the University of Montana

RTC: Rural is funded by National Institute on Disability, Independent Living and Rehabilitation Research (90RT5025).

Healthy Community Living is funded by National Institute on Disability, Independent Living and Rehabilitation Research (90DP0073).