WILFRID LAURIER UNIVERSITY SOCIAL MEDIA GUIDELINES

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1 WILFRID LAURIER UNIVERSITY SOCIAL MEDIA GUIDELINES Social media is an exciting opportunity to engage directly with Laurier s audiences developing relationships one meaningful conversation at a time! As part of its mandate to enhance and protect the reputation of Wilfrid Laurier University, the Office of Communications, Public Affairs and Marketing (CPAM) plays an oversight role in social media. These social media guidelines, prepared by CPAM in consultation with the campus community and reviewed by Laurier s legal counsel, provide parameters to enhance your department s success and manage Laurier s reputation in the social media sphere. CPAM is available to the university community as a resource for social media questions and welcomes discussions and ideas. These guidelines relate to the activities of Laurier employees who contribute to official Laurier social networks, blogs, YouTube or wikis on behalf of the university including, but not limited to: Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Tumblr and Google+. The guidelines do not apply to the use of social media for teaching or research. Steps at a glance Sign the social media guidelines (required for all new and existing accounts) 1. Review the enclosed social media guidelines. 2. Ensure that you and anyone else who has access to post to your site signs the social media guidelines (Section M). Have your manager review and sign the guidelines. Complete a strategy form to set up a new account 1. Develop your social media strategy and complete your strategy form for any new social media sites, or any existing sites that do not have strategy forms. Have your manager review and sign your strategy form. 2. Submit the signed strategy form and signed guidelines to CPAM (socialmedia@wlu.ca) for review and approval before you start to use your account. 3. To add approved graphics and policy wording to your site, visit Join SMAG. Yes, it s an ugly acronym, but Laurier s Social Media Administrators Group is a dynamic group that meets quarterly to share ideas and best practices and learn from each other s social media success and challenges. Contact socialmedia@wlu.ca to join. What you will find in these guidelines Steps to set up a social media presence...sections A, B Guidelines for logos, titles and descriptions...section C Guidelines for content and behaviour... Sections D, E, F, G,H Keeping your site active... Section I Monitoring and measuring... Section J,L Making people aware of your site... Section K Facebook Comments Policy... Appendix A 1

2 What you will find at Social media strategy form... YouTube video submission form... Photo/video release form (students)... Photo/video release form (faculty/staff/other)... Laurier social media directory... Request to promote event through Laurier s main social media sites... A. Before establishing a social media presence Think about your strategy. The first step is to clearly define what you hope to achieve through your social media presence this will help to focus your activities and ensure successful engagement with your audience. Think about your audience, what social media platform they use, your key messages, the type of content that your audience will be interested in, and how you will create the content and manage the site. Complete the strategy form. Please complete the social media strategy form to help you organize your plan, have it reviewed and approved by your manager, then submit it to CPAM (socialmedia@wlu.ca) along with your signed social media guidelines. Once your form is approved by CPAM, you can set up your social media site and contact us with any questions you have. B. Do I need permission to set up a Laurier social media site? Yes. Laurier s strength is its community, and our social media community is no different. By understanding which areas of the university are active in social media and how we can support each other, we strengthen our community. Approval. Complete your social media strategy form and ensure that everyone who has access to post to your site has reviewed and signed the social media guidelines (Section M). Have your department manager approve and sign your form and deliver or it to CPAM (socialmedia@wlu.ca), and retain your passwords. CPAM will review your strategy form, and contact you with any questions or suggestions before giving final signoff. Once you have approval, you can set up your social media site and CPAM will add you to Laurier s social media directory on the website and follow/like you from Laurier s institutional accounts. Passwords. In the strategy form, you will be asked to provide CPAM with the login and password for each social media site and for dashboard social media management sites such as Hootsuite. For Facebook pages, please add Associate Director: Communications & Public Affairs, Lori Chalmers Morrison as an administrator on your Facebook page with full administrator rights (search by lorichalmersmorrison@yahoo.com). CPAM will only use password information if necessary, and in accordance with the situations outlined below. The login information/administrator rights can be used by CPAM to post a message across all university social media platforms during a crisis situation if you cannot be reached or are not available (for example, in a lockdown scenario). In the rare event that the social media guidelines and/or associated university policies are breached, CPAM reserves the right to use the password information/administrator rights to remove a posting or video, suspend a site or change the site s password. 2

3 Securing Passwords after employee transitions. To protect the long-term security of Laurier s social media sites, please remove Facebook administrators from your site (including students), once they leave your department, and change the passwords on other social media sites and dashboard social media management sites such Hootsuite (please supply to your manager and CPAM to keep on file). Please ensure that each new member of your team (including students) with social media access reviews, signs and submits the social media guidelines. YouTube video approval. With the exception of a few pre-existing YouTube channels (such as Laurier Athletics), Laurier maintains one main YouTube channel to enhance the variety of content and exposure to various areas of the university for its viewers. To have a video posted to Laurier s YouTube channel, please fill out a YouTube submission form and socialmedia@wlu.ca for instructions on how to submit your video. Videos will be approved for the YouTube channel provided: they are in line with Laurier s vision, mission and values; meet Laurier s social media and brand guidelines; YouTube s community guidelines for content and copyright; that you have obtained permission to use all graphic, music and photographic content included in the video and that video participants have signed and submitted a photo/video release form. If you are including music in your video, it should be copyright-free stock music to protect the liability of the university. Note that to comply with accessibility legislation, all videos posted to Laurier s YouTube channel must be accompanied by a transcript. Details will be provided as they become available. Videos posted to existing Laurier YouTube channels such as Laurier Athletics should meet the above requirements, but can be approved by the channel s administrator rather than CPAM. As videos take time to download, review, edit (if required) and upload, please provide the video to CPAM at least one week in advance of the desired posting date so we can meet your deadlines. C. What should a Laurier social media site look like? Laurier. Laurier social media site names should always include Laurier where possible to optimize searches and for brand reinforcement. ( Laurier is preferable as a short form over WLU unless there are special circumstances that are clearly addressed in your strategy.) Official. All sites should include a statement indicating that this is an official Wilfrid Laurier University site and which university office/department administers the site. CPAM administers Laurier s institutional social media sites: and Laurier branding. Laurier aims to have a consistent look and feel across all social media platforms. Sites do not need to look exactly the same, but the Laurier elements of each site should be similar to help our audience recognize official sites, and increase brand recognition. Each site should use one of the three purple, gold or red leaves for the thumbnail/profile picture. If using a leaf for a header image, then the leaf must be the same colour as the thumbnail/profile picture, according to Laurier s brand standards. Each Laurier video should end with an approved Laurier logo. Please visit to access logos approved for use on Laurier social media sites. Please note that the Wilfrid Laurier University crest is not approved for use as a social media thumbnail. Multi-campus. Please keep all of our Laurier locations (Waterloo, Brantford, Toronto and Kitchener) in mind as you develop your site. We encourage you to link to other campuses and include relevant content from other campuses where possible/appropriate. Hashtags. The #Laurier hashtag is preferable over #wlu. Laurier also uses #LaurierLove. Some departments such as Athletics have standard hashtags of their own (e.g. #WeAreHAWKS). Please let us know if you have a hashtag you d like us to list beside your site on Laurier s social media directory. 3

4 Show your links! Please link back to the Laurier website and to as many other Laurier social media sites as possible from your site to increase audience reach and search engine optimization. For a list of Laurier s approved social media sites, please visit D. What kinds of things should I post or tweet about? (The do s & don ts) It s a conversation! Social media is an online conversation it is less about selling or promoting and more about engaging people in conversations related to the Laurier experience. Think of it more like a telephone than a billboard. Keep the conversation going. To engage your audience in discussion and develop a sense of community, ask open-ended questions and respond to comments. Think outside the box for ways to convey Laurier s sense of community and culture of leadership and purpose. Have a look at hashtag trends and influencers that relate to your activities and think of ways to connect your content. Pay attention to what your audience responds to, and give them the type of content they like. Feel free to contact CPAM for assistance with key messaging or ideas. What s in it for me? Post things that add value to the conversation and that will be of interest or helpful to those following you. Post more positive and productive comments and links than selfpromoting statements. It s about knowing your audience provide people with useful information. Picture this. Photos are a vital part of a successful, engaging social media post. With photos, however, comes responsibility. If photos, videos or images are posted without obtaining the proper consent, it places Wilfrid Laurier University in a position of liability. Before posting a photo, please obtain consent from all people appearing in the photo to use it on social media. Photo/video permission forms for students and staff/faculty/other are on the social media website. If you are sharing a photo that someone else has posted on Instagram, please obtain permission from them to share the photo, and confirmation that they had permission to post the photo in the first place. If you are sharing a photo posted by another Laurier social media site, be courteous and give the department a photo credit! If someone asks you to remove a photo of themselves from your site, please remove it immediately. Contests. If you plan to run a social media contest, please contact Laurier s legal team (srowe@wlu.ca) in the Secretariat s Office to ensure that the contest rules and regulations you have included incorporate the appropriate provisions. Common sense. As a Laurier employee, you are wearing a Laurier name badge, meaning you are representing the university and are responsible for what you post on behalf of the university. Use judgment and only post things that would be appropriate for your department to present publicly. Do not post content that is hostile, threatening, abusive, contains commercial solicitations, is erroneous/ libelous, sexist, racist, homophobic or is for any reason deemed to be not in the university s best interest. Never post confidential or proprietary information about Laurier (or its students, faculty, staff or alumni). Never comment on legal matters related to the university. Anything you post as a department/unit will be perceived as representing the views of the university; therefore, refrain from posting or sharing information related to areas handled by university administration such as labour negotiations, university policies, real estate, budgets, etc. Refrain from posting opinion on political matters as the university takes a nonpartisan stance. Media relations are handled by CPAM, so please cpam@wlu.ca if you would like to suggest a story to the media or if you are asked for a comment by a reporter. Always respect Canadian copyright law, the content guidelines for each social media platform and the following university policies: 4

5 Privacy Policy 10.1 and Prevention of Harassment and Discrimination Policy Workplace Violence Prevention Policy Use of University Name/Marks Policy Policy Governing the use of Information Technology What if there is a crisis or emergency? In the case of a university crisis such as a lockdown or a fire, university communications will be centralized through CPAM and facebook.com/wilfridlaurieruniversity. Please do not comment about the crisis except to direct people to the main accounts as they will be the source for the most current, accurate information. CPAM will contact you if necessary with messages to help disseminate information. Measure twice, cut once. All information you post must be true and accurate. Make sure you check all of the facts before you post information and cite sources with reliable links when possible. Mistakes do happen! If you make a mistake, simply acknowledge it, correct it as quickly as possible and let people know it has been corrected. Dot your i s and cross your t s. It s always important, but because we are representing an educational institution, it s essential: spell check and grammar check everything before posting. E. Under what circumstances should I contact CPAM? Please contact CPAM at cpam@wlu.ca or socialmedia@wlu.ca if: you are contacted directly by any member of the news media you come across any contentious, threatening, offensive, slanderous or libelous posts on your social media channels you have any questions about the social media guidelines or situations where you are uncertain F. How should I behave online? You re wearing a Laurier name badge. You are representing Laurier and you are responsible for what you post on behalf of the university. Before posting, ask yourself, Would I say the same thing to a room full of (students/community members/media/donors) if I were standing on stage wearing an official Laurier name badge? Could this post be misinterpreted or offend anyone? If in question, then don t post it. (See common sense in section D.) Respect. The language in the social media world is more conversational and less institutional. However, posting on behalf of the university requires professional conduct: respecting the opinions and ideas of others, never criticizing other institutions and not engaging in destructive discussions. Avoid potentially controversial topics, personal attacks and aggressive communications that could escalate a discussion to an argument. 5

6 Choose your friends wisely. Be careful who you follow. Look before following if the person s posts are questionable or inappropriate, or if they represent an organization or viewpoint that may not be aligned with Laurier s values and vision, do not follow them. Count to 10. If you find yourself in a situation where you have strong opinions or feel angry about an item someone has posted, wait before posting a response until you are calm, or better yet seek the opinion of a colleague or a resource in CPAM. G. Separate the professional and the personal It is not always obvious where the professional ends and the personal begins. A. If you post to a university social media account on behalf of Laurier, you are posting as the university, not as yourself, and every post should support the objectives outlined in your department s approved social media strategy, be relevant to the focus of your Laurier department, and should never be used for commercial solicitations or personal gain of any kind. B. If you have an individual social media account that is used for university purposes (for example, Dean of Students), you are posting as yourself, but in your Laurier capacity. In this case, your posts should be roughly 80 per cent business/laurier related, and 20 per cent other content. Posts must follow these guidelines and a strategy form should be submitted for the account. C. If you have a personal social media account, but are closely identified with Laurier (by virtue of your position at Laurier, or if you re active in social media and people associate you with Laurier), post a disclaimer on your personal site: Opinions are my own and do not necessarily represent Laurier or Opinions are my own. Note that readers will still associate you with the university, so good judgment is key. Social media handles on business cards should be those of your department, unless you have an individual business social media account (as in B. above), in which case, the individual handle can be used. H. What if people posting to our site behave inappropriately? Post content guidelines. Because a key feature of social media is its social and conversational nature, there will be posts and comments from followers on your sites. Please post content guidelines to your Facebook site that include examples of situations where posts/comments would be removed. See Appendix A for suggested wording. Negative comments. As in any discussion, people will post opinions contrary to yours. In many cases, other followers will respond to these posts and generate a more in-depth discussion. In some cases, these posts will give you the opportunity to respond with a positive message or explanation about Laurier or a place where they can find further information. In other cases, the comments are best left alone (in Twitter) or in rare cases, removed (in Facebook or other forums if they violate the content policy). If you are unsure how to handle a negative comment, please contact socialmedia@wlu.ca. Pick your battles. Allow comments that are positive or negative and in context to the conversation, even if they express a negative viewpoint about Laurier. However, if the comment is demeaning, offensive and out of context then it can be removed (from Facebook, for example, or not approved for a blog or ignored in Twitter). 6

7 I. How do I keep the site active? Site administrator. As part of your social media strategy, assign a site administrator to post to your site and monitor your site on a regular basis. This role should be integrated with the administrator s daily duties. Check your sites at least once a day to see new posts and to ensure you re responding to requests in a timely manner. Post often. For blogs, Facebook, Instagram and other social media sites, post at least once a week but not more than a few times a day. For active forums such as Twitter, you can post more frequently throughout the day. Respond to any questions you receive as quickly as possible within 24 hours at the longest. Schedule. Use a social media dashboard tool such as Hootsuite to schedule your posts in advance. Make sure to check your scheduled posts to make sure they re still relevant (e.g. if an event has been cancelled, remove the scheduled tweet that thanks people for attending!) and not inappropriate in light of any current events that may have emerged since it was scheduled. J. What kinds of posts should I be looking for when I monitor my sites? There are many different kinds of conversations in social media. Here are a few types of conversations that can provide you with valuable information to engage your audience as you monitor your sites: Complaints. If someone complains about Laurier, it provides you with an opportunity to show you re listening. You can provide them with a link to resources, or if appropriate, let them know you ve listened and will look into the issue and respond. Compliments. Thank people for their compliments, share them on social media, and link to their quotes as testimonials in different media. Questions. If people ask questions, answer them or link to a place with further information. It shows you re listening, and they are usually questions people wouldn t bother to or phone about. Don t forget to ask questions of your own! Needs. If you see the same issue or topic coming up continually, there may be a need that can be addressed for example, a change in process or information provided. Think about posting an FAQ document to your website that you can link to from your social media account. Problems and crises. Monitor issues that go beyond complaints and seem to be the beginning of a problem. These provide an opportunity to respond before the issues escalate into a crisis. Social media also enables the university to send out messages during a crisis. Please contact your supervisor or cpam@wlu.ca if a serious issue arises, as CPAM handles issues management and media requests for the university. K. Awareness: how will people find my site? To engage your social media audience, first you need to make people aware that you re there! Cross-promotion. Cross-promote your site by linking to and from your website and all of Laurier s other social media sites. These links will increase awareness and also increase your search engine optimization. Follow other Laurier Facebook pages from your page to promote 7

8 them, post links to YouTube videos from your other social media channels, follow all of the Laurier Twitter and Instagram accounts, re-tweet when appropriate and share posts that will be of interest to your audiences from these sites. Include links to your social media sites in your signature and in all of your promotional materials. Think of creative ways to promote your department! Once you have signed the guidelines and had your site approved, it will be listed in the social media directory on Laurier s website. L. How do I measure social media success? There are many different metrics you can use to measure the return on your social media investment. You can track engagement by measuring new followers, lost followers, likes/comments, photo/video views and comments, overall traffic, retweets and mentions. Measurement helps you to see what type of content is resonating with your audience and helps to guide your future social media activity. Measurement also helps to demonstrate the value of social media to your managers. There are many tools to measure social media engagement. Please contact socialmedia@wlu.ca for guidance! M. Sign-Off I have read and understood Wilfrid Laurier University s social media guidelines and agree to follow these guidelines when engaging in social media activities on behalf of Wilfrid Laurier University. Print name and sign (designated social media contributor) Date Print name and sign (department manager) Date 8

9 APPENDIX A The following Comments Policy is to be posted to your social media site (Facebook used as an example): Wilfrid Laurier University (Laurier) values our community and welcomes comments to its Facebook page to engage discussion. Posts and content added by Laurier Facebook site administrators represent the official content of the Wilfrid Laurier University department. Opinions posted by other Facebook users are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of the university. Laurier values free speech and freedom of expression and does not prescreen comments. However, we do not permit content that is hostile, threatening, abusive, contains profanity, commercial solicitations, is erroneous/libelous, sexist, racist, homophobic or is for any reason deemed to be not in the university s best interest. All content and posts are bound by: Facebook s Terms and Policies Wilfrid Laurier University privacy policies Wilfrid Laurier University Prevention of Harassment and Discrimination Policy 6.1 Workplace Violence Prevention Policy 7.18 Use of University Name/Marks Policy 13.1 We reserve the right to remove content at any time without prior notice. We ask that you help to protect the Laurier online community. Facebook encourages users to report any abusive content by clicking the report link at the bottom of comments. A note about photos: Photos add to the vibrancy of an online community experience. Wilfrid Laurier University is responsible for the photos posted by administrators to the site. Photos posted by users are the sole responsibility of the user and not the university. Note that the owner of a photo determines the privacy of the photo. Therefore, before posting a photo, it is the user s responsibility to gain consent from all those appearing in a photo before posting. Photo subject matter should abide by the codes of conduct listed above. Wilfrid Laurier University reserves the right to remove photos at any time without prior notice. If you appear in a photo that is posted to this site and would like to have it removed, please socialmedia@wlu.ca and we will remove it as soon as possible. 9