Harness the power of social networks. In this course, with the support of an outstanding faculty, you’ll learn how to develop an innovative social media strategy and craft effective digital content to spread information relevant to your UN work and increase your influence on social media platforms.

Introduction

Social media has been rapidly gaining prominence in recent years, transforming into a crucial communication platform for organizations and individuals. Facebook, YouTube, Instagram and X (previous known as Twitter) have more than 4 billion monthly users, and the number of social media users across the globe is set to grow exponentially. Capitalizing on, and effectively navigating the social media landscape is essential to communication success for UN agencies, funds, missions and organizations.

This programme is designed to meet the needs of UN staff working with social media. It will give you an overview of the pros and cons of social networks and fundamental concepts including branding, networking and influencing. Sign up for the programme to master social media skills which will enable you to boost visibility across social media platforms, interact effectively with an engaged audience, build cost-effective and targeted campaigns. The goal is to help you create a social media strategy in line with the wider communication objectives of your organization. Social media monitoring and analysis will also be a significant component of the programme.

Objectives

• Select the right mix of social media tools and platforms, depending on goals and priorities and, at the same time, recognize the most effective social media platform to achieve high levels of visibility
• Overcome budgetary constraints or managerial scepticism vis-à-vis these tools
• Identify the most successful practices in social media for headquarters and country teams
• Create effective strategies to deal with online criticism and minimize the reputational damage of any attack
• Use social media analytics tools in an effective manner
• Discover how to develop video-related content that is appealing and innovative

Course methodology

This course is delivered entirely online. It is a self-paced course that participants can start at any time and complete activities at their own pace. Once started, from the date of receiving the login details, the participant is required to complete all activities within four months. Once completed, they will be required to complete the end-of-course questionnaire and get a certificate. There is no weekly webinar in this course.

Course contents

Lesson 1: Leveraging Social Media to Tell the UN’s Story

• The UN and its social media accounts;
• Reasons the UN should use social media;
• Best practices and tools used within the UN on various social media platforms;
• Showing the lighter side.

Lesson 2: Developing a Social Media Strategy & Essential Social Media Skills

• Identifying your communication goals and needs;
• Best tools to achieve fixed goals;
• Choosing the most effective and useful social media platform, based on your strategy and needs;
• Changing and adapting the language;
• Criteria for an effective post.

Lesson 3: Campaigning on Social Media:

• Short and long-term campaigns;
• Means of engagement and identification of targeted audiences;
• Social media vs social networking;
• Social media marketing features;
• Organic vs paid campaigns;
• CRM strategy with social media.

Lesson 4: Creating Effective Campaigns and Engaging Videos

• Ecology of platforms and tools available and how to decide on the right mix for what you want to achieve;
• Good and practices of UN agencies on social media;
• How to manage and implement a social media strategy with limited resources;
• How to support country offices’ efforts on social media;
• Video-first world and other innovative social media tools and apps.

Lesson 5: Shareability is Key

• Creating shareable, attractive and inspiring content online that responds to the basic question of “will you share this?”;
• Key performance indicators for social media;
• Managing social media platforms with resources and support from management.

Target audience

This course is aimed at UN Communication Officers, Project Managers, and other UN staff involved with or interested in leveraging social media to achieve team and organizational goals.