Embracing social media or just bad manners – mini survey findings
Howard Lake | 9 April 2009 | Blogs
Thanks to those who completed the recent survey. As promised, this blog highlights some of the core findings and a few extra thoughts the results catalysed in my mind. You may or may not agree; either way, do let me know what you think.
There is too much for a readable blog so I’ve posted a pdf under the same name on my workspace the which contains more detail and some points for discussion!
The basic premise was to find out what people really think about new social media technologies within the context of:
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- Awareness and usage
- How our usage is linked to end audiences
- The pace of change in such tools
- What we think about the increasing trend of social networking tools being used during presentations, conferences and events (hence the bad manners part)
Key findings – general social media usage
The most recognised social media platforms were: You Tube, MySpace, twitter, Facebook, Flickr, MSN Messenger, Wikipedia, blogs and websites.
Whilst most of the media were used in both professional and personal life, Friends Reunited, MSN Messenger and Wikipedia were used much more heavily for personal interaction.
More than 25% of respondents felt they should be using more of these social media professionally as well
Conversely, platforms such as non-networking websites and Squidoo (even though they market themselves as having useful resources for charitable giving) were used predominantly for professional means.
There are probably multiple reasons for this but it made me consider whether we have a need to compartmentalise our social networking to a certain extent? Perhaps just to cope with the volume?
The ubiquitous RSS feeds were only mentioned by 1 respondent which surprised me as I see that orange logo all over the place.
Knowing your audience
71% of respondents believe they have some understanding of how their target audiences use this technology but only 42% actually ask them about their communications preferences and habits.
Let’s take the example of recent data which shows that people between 45 and 54 are now 36% more likely than the average to visit twitter. This older group is likely to represent a large proportion of post-recession donors but how many of you have twitter as part of your integrated fundraising plans for them?
Should we be worrying at this point that our traditional segmentation and targeting assumptions need a review?
I think we will need to rely less on proven data and try to predict or even start a few trends ourselves if we are to try and get our messages out to where the target audiences are. Check out the work being done by Dogs Trust on Facebook as an example of ‘building it and they will come’…
Views on social media in general
60% of respondents felt that they didn’t have enough time to implement changes in line with audience preferences before the next technology development came along and 50% also felt that social media technologies per se were introduced too quickly.
Perhaps it is us who need to speed up if we are to take advantage of the most appropriate opportunities for fundraising and communicating with our audiences. We need to think about doing things differently, including re-evaluating our attitude to risk. Less concrete proof of past success and more innovation if we aren’t to miss the boat.
75% stated they felt some or lots of pressure to be part of social media initiatives professionally but this fell to only 42% in their personal lives. Perhaps this is due to work pressures or other control issues and I would be interested in your views.
Presentations and People Skills
The fun section. 50% of respondents believed that social media technologies do not destroy people skills so perhaps some commentators were worried unduly? That said, a degree of ‘social standards’ do still seem to be in evidence.
54% of respondents believed it would be bad manners for members of the audience to be using laptops or mobile devices to engage in social networking during a presentation. A further 21% believed it was not ideal but acceptable another 21% believed it was perfectly acceptable.
We asked people to think about how their parents would react and the results were markedly different with 71% thinking their parents would consider this behaviour bad manners. If we add this finding to the twitter data above, it suggests that older audiences (ie; core individual givers) aren’t necessarily out of touch in terms of using social media, just that they may be more choosy about engaging with it on their own terms.
When we put the shoe on the other foot and asked how respondents would feel if they were the presenter in front of an audience full of ‘social media networking’ individuals. The responses were clearly divided.
67% didn’t like the idea at all, 25% would welcome the interaction and 8% would be happy if agreed and expected in advance.
Words like “crummy”, “irritated”, “not happy” and “disengaged” were used to describe how the larger group would feel. More positive quotes included “It’s just today’s way of taking notes”, “At least they’re not asleep” and “happy as long as I was able to view the backchannelling to get feedback on what I had got right or wrong.”
This suggests that we may be happier to be in the audience than having to engage the audience when it comes to using social media! What it also suggests is that a new range of skills is required to be able to present in this new environment where some people will actively listen and some will interact with you and other members of the audience simultaneously.
If you want to discuss any of the results or the ideas raised, just get in touch.
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.