Colleges and Universities are scrambling to assemble a cohesive Facebook strategy. Universities' customers interact more on Facebook than perhaps any other medium, so school decision makers know they have to do something, but just what is unclear. With so little history, fast-changing platforms, and fickle users, it is no surprise that most universities have no cohesive strategy for marketing through social networks like Facebook.
Guess what - a university's social networking strategy can be simple. A successful strategy makes the university accessible, provides useful content, and encourages your community to interact.
Be accessible. Be easy to find. When your school's name is searched, there should be just one primary group or fan page that visitors should want to access. Most schools have multiple groups, so visitors have to guess which one they should join. Avoid this problem by consolidating groups as much as possible.
Provide useful content. Students need to know the school schedule and emergency notifications, so definitely provide those. Prospective students want to see that the school has an inviting culture, so promote positive comments by current students and alumni. Avoid sending multiple unimportant messages to everyone on the fanpage or in the group; this strategy will backfire when your users decide to "hide" messages from your group.
Let your community interact. Comments on your fanpage are not enough. Facebook is a powerful platform for sharing pictures and videos, so take advantage of it. Most schools have a wealth of beautiful, professionally-shot images from campus and in classrooms. Post those images on your pages and encourage fans and group members to tag themselves whenever they appear in an image. Give the kids what they want - more high-quality images and videos of themselves.
Facebook and other networks are changing quickly, so the ways you achieve these goals will change over time. However, the goals of being accessible, useful, and interactive will not change.
