Engagement Success

Yeah it stung a bit when a consultant said, well, your main page at Northwestern State lacks an engaging tone.  What he really meant to say was you don't get a lot of comments -- which granted for a lot of the link-based media release stories, frankly, we don't.

In support of my own Facebook Five agenda and urging to have less story links and more live content, I made a stab at a little fun P.O.V. and make the best of a slow weekend by talking about the weather.  And by slow, in there's either a NSU event or tourism something Natchitoches, we literally had nothing going on for Saturday, June 14.

I'm walking downtown and whip out the iPhone for this one. It's a line as old as rainy seasons -- hey, that isn't a UFO in the sky, it's the sun.  But I tweaked it a bit into this:

For those here in Natchitoches, there is no need to be alarmed. We have confirmed with members of the College of Science, Technology and Business that the bright object in the sky today is called the Sun. Hope you can take advantage of our first rain-free (so far) day in well over a week.

About five minutes after I posted it, I homered (head slap-D'Oh!).  Why did I mess up a really nice pithy line by not putting up a picture of a sunny sky on campus?  Idiot; blown the visual.  I'd gotten great results from a simple shot of the wildflowers that sprung up in front of one of our icons the previous day.  Oh well, too late.

What happens next shows that sometimes, it really is right time, right message.  The update took off -- 61 likes and a couple of shares in a little over an hour -- and one person saying -- tongue in cheek -- that's not funny right now because it's really hot and I have to mow the yard.

Hearing that "you've not been engaging voice in my head", I waded in.  And over the course of the next two hours, we had some light banter -- adding that the College of Nursing and Allied Health approved of his move to get into the AC and beverages rather than staying in the sun.

Then, my (so far) caveat came true.  It did rain for what was our ninth straight day late, and of course, that provide some more fodder.

By the time it was said and done, this simple whimsy became the top post all-time on viewed and shared, plus we added 10-15 likes to the overall total.

I'm pointing this out not as much to brag about brilliance but to emphasize ANYONE can do this and be successful if you are trying to be yourself, engage your audience and provide them unique content.

The previous record Facebook update?  That was from the start of the week when we picked up a photo from one of our students as one of our Greek organizations picked up two national awards.  And during the week, our library scored high points -- and a ton of sharing -- by remembering that Saturday was Bastille Day, no small issue in Francophile Louisiana.

All three of those -- the pick up of the cell phone picture of a priceless moment, a pithy comment to start the day and a well placed share -- are what define your Facebook personna.

But I'm still mad -- how much further would the right picture have taken that Sun post . . . .

Here's graphic capture of the whole exchange (you can see the Bastille Day also):