I just got off of a phone call with Steve, a superintendent for a school of about 1,000 students. His school has a Facebook page, but it just isn’t where it needs to be to truly engage the community. They post one to two times per week.

I want to help them. The team at #SocialSchool4EDU can completely serve their social media management needs, providing graphic support, 365 days/year monitoring, and proven techniques to get their stories out to the community. All of this for just $7,000 per year.

But Steve doesn’t have enough support on his school board to go forward with the proposal. Even though he believes in it, he just has too big of a hill to climb to convince them that an investment like this is worth it.

Now, you and I both know that social media is an incredible way to engage parents with the great things happening at your school. We know it can be done in a completely safe way with amazing results. We know the stories can be told to truly meet your community where they are at – online!

But how can we help Steve illustrate the importance of social media for schools to his school board?

Data.

Pew Research just came out with some data in January of 2017. My friend and school communications pro Dane Dallenbach put together these powerful infographics to help explain the impact.

This data helps answer some of the top myths about social media:

1. Our community is rural, most parents don’t have internet at their homes.
• 90% of adults own cell phones. This means that it doesn’t matter if they have internet at home or not. They have a cell phone that they can use to access social media along with other internet sites – and it’s all in the palm of their hands. That is 9 out of 10 parents. Even if your community is slightly less than the average, the majority of parents do have access!
2. Social media isn’t that widely used by adults.
• Just ten years ago, only 13% of adults had at least one social media profile. My, how times have changed. Now, 84% of adults have at least one social media page, while the average number of accounts per person is actually 5.54. Channels that are most popular include Facebook (68%), Instagram (28%), Pinterest (26%), LinkedIn (25%) and Twitter (21%).
3. Social media isn’t a trusted source of news
• 62% of adults get their news via social media. This could be from a variety of sites – so why not make your school be one of those sources??
4. Social media users are only looking for friends, not schools or business information
• 68% of users interact with a brand at least once a day. That means that the content these brands, businesses, non-profits and other organizations are sharing is getting noticed. Why not your school? Your community needs more good news to fill up their news feeds. Your school is bursting with great stories from your students and staff. If you are not telling your story, then someone else is.

Let’s face it – with cell phone users checking their phones an average of 85 times per day, we need to meet them where they are at. Social media makes sense!

I hope this data can help provide real proof that social media strategy with your school is not a want, it is a need. #SocialSchool4EDU is here to help. We serve districts across the country and it only takes 30 minutes to grab all of the information on our proven system. It’s fast and easy.

Contact me today at andrea@socialschool4edu.com or call me at 715-205-0429. We may or may not be the right fit for your school, but you can find out why 28 other schools have trusted us with their social media efforts!