Social media for advocacy
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About This Document
Can social media help you change policy outcomes? Channels like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram definitely offer unique potential to engage more people with policy issues — especially when people share content that matters to them, so it reaches wider and wider circles. Social media also offers us more channels for communicating with our elected officials. Here are some ideas and tips to explore when utilizing social media for advocacy.
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Grow public awareness
Circulate advocacy campaigns. If you’re using action alerts or petitions to send message to elected officials, social media is a great platform for circulating them. You can reach your own network and connect with more people who care.
Encourage conversation. Much of the value of social media is getting people to think and talk about your issues. Think about posting articles, photos, videos and updates that spark engagement and lead to political change.
Share stories of real world activism. Real world actions are inspiring. Whatever people are doing to promote your cause in real life — things like volunteering, demonstrating or meeting with their elected officials — makes great content for social media. And when you post photos of activists, those people often share them on their own social media channels.
Show who you are. Like all your social media activity, your advocacy outreach can help to grow your audience. It also shows potential supporters what you do and what you care about, so they can decide whether to invest their time and money.
Connect with elected officials
Stay in touch. Politicians have social media for the same reason they have phone numbers and email. They want to hear from their constituents. So, take advantage of these convenient ways to contact them.
Communicate with respect. Whether you’re sending individual messages or using social media as a public forum, be professional and polite. When you show respect, you get respect.
Follow up in real life. You might or might not get a response when you comment on a politician’s post or reply to their tweets — but your message still gets through. Eventually, if you meet your elected official in person, let them know that you’ve been interacting with them on social media. When they can connect the messages with the people sending them, they pay more attention.
The more messengers, the better: The more voices that carry your message, the stronger it gets across. Especially for important issues, recruit your members to send messages to elected officials close to the same time that you do.
