Social Media for Social Change

Transcription

1 Socia Media for Socia Change Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance ACTION RESEARCH REPORT Hannah Tayor

2 This report outines the findings of an action research project carried out by the Institute for Strategic Diaogue (ISD) and funded by the Open Society Foundations (OSF). It describes the resuts of a piot socia media campaign, which was deivered in partnership with ISD s Phoenix Group; draws concusions about the infuence of socia media on attitudes; and makes recommendations for poicy makers, poiticians and civi society organisations on the ways in which these technoogies can be used to tacke intoerance. About the author Hannah Tayor is a Projects Coordinator at the Institute for Strategic Diaogue (ISD). She eads ISD s work on socia media and coordinates the Phoenix Group, which brings together activists, opinion formers and community eaders to sketch out an aternative narrative reating to diversity and socia cohesion. She has experience working on equaity and diversity issues within the pubic, vountary and community sectors, and is currenty a trustee at Consortium, a nationa membership organisation focusing on the deveopment and support of LGB&T groups. Previousy, she worked as Community Deveopment Officer at Kirkees Faiths Forum, an organisation which works to buid positive community reations in Kirkees, West Yorkshire. She has a BA (Hons) (Internationa) in Phiosophy and Reigious Studies from Leeds University. Acknowedgements The Institute for Strategic Diaogue (ISD) is gratefu to Manifest London for its support throughout the project. The author woud ike to thank the Phoenix Group, especiay Aex Godberg ( Jewish Chapain at University of Surrey), Stephen Shashoua (Director of 3FF), and Diwar Hussain (Senior Programme Advisor at ISD), for their hep in deivering the Nothing Hoy About Hatred campaign, as we as a of those who supported it, especiay David Brown (Socia Action Coordinator at JHub). At ISD, I woud ike to thank Rache Briggs and Aex Gennie for their editoria input on this report, and Aex Strugne for his support throughout the project. Institute for Strategic Diaogue, 2012 This materia is offered free of charge for persona and non-commercia use, provided the source is acknowedged. For commercia or any other use, prior written permission must be obtained from the Institute for Strategic Diaogue. In no case may this materia be atered, sod or rented. The Institute for Strategic Diaogue does not generay take positions on poicy issues. The views expressed in this pubication are those of the authors and do not necessariy refect the views of the organisation. For privacy reasons we have not incuded names, tweets or photos of any individuas uness cosey associated with ISD.

3 Socia Media for Socia Change Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance Hannah Tayor

4 TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction 1 Chapter One: What is Socia Media? 3 Chapter Two: Choosing the Campaign 7 Chapter Three: The Nothing Hoy About Hatred (NHAH) Campaign 12 Chapter Four: Campaign Resuts 20 Chapter Five: Lessons Learned 32 Concusions and Recommendations 34

5 INTRODUCTION Socia media now permeates amost every aspect of our ives, from how we manage reationships to the way we shop and work. It is not surprising, then, that the private sector has ong recognised its potentia as a route for infuencing consumers. Campaigners, too, are beginning to recognise its power as an advocacy too. Socia media offers much more than traditiona media; it is free, aows campaigners and marketers to reach far more peope and gives a voice to those that otherwise might not have one. In addition, patforms such as Twitter enabe direct engagement with individuas and groups who have the power to effect change. Despite these advantages, the third sector has been sow to harness the fu potentia of socia media. For many this is due to a ack of knowedge, perhaps even a fear, about socia media toos. Furthermore, many sma organisations simpy haven t had the time or resources to deveop these skis. In response to this reaity, this report offers an account of socia media and its potentia use by campaigners: socia media for socia good. It contains the resuts of background research, findings from a series of expert workshops and the tria of an experimenta socia media campaign aimed at tacking homophobia, which acted as a piece of action research to estabish the potentia of socia media and the most effective ways to put it to use to tacke intoerance. Chapter One expains what socia media is and cataogues the main websites, patforms and technoogies that it encompasses. It examines barriers to use, the reationship between socia media and persona identity and the potentia appication of socia media in infuencing attitudes, affecting behaviour and creating change. Chapter Two outines the process by which the action research socia media campaign was chosen, incuding the resuts of an exercise which invoved istening to what peope were saying onine, how, where and when in reation to three topic areas. This generated information vita to shaping the campaign s strategy, incuding frequency, timing and voume of discussions; where discussions were taking pace across the Internet and socia media patforms; whether content was positive, negative or neutra; who the main infuencers, content creators and contributors were; and which were the most mentioned key words and phrases. Chapter Three outines the strategy and tactics of the Nothing Hoy About Hatred campaign, covering five key eements: campaign panning; estabishing an onine presence; creating opportunities for onine community engagement; proactivey targeting key individuas and organisations; and offine activities. Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance 1

6 Chapter Four outines the resuts of the campaign, covering mentions by voume, content and author; Facebook, Twitter and bog anaytics; and infuence. Chapter Five describes the main essons earned from running the Nothing Hoy About Hatred socia media campaign: Campaign panning and management It is important to isten first to estabish what is being said, where, how and by whom Detaied panning is essentia in producing focused aims and cear messages It is vita to research and produce content and schedue reguar updates. Buiding an onine presence It is crucia to estabish a professiona onine presence, through which a socia media patforms can connect In terms of choice of socia media patforms, it is important to start where peope aready are, based on what is earned through the istening exercise. Whie it is necessary to prioritise the patforms that are most centra in the chosen campaign area, it is vauabe to work across a wide range, as this can impact positivey on search engine rankings. Campaigns need to be fexibe and ready to adapt, in part as a response to audience engagement. The best campaigns respond to events as they happen Activities are most effective when they are persona and give an opinion Different content works better on different patforms; for exampe, in this campaign, photos were more popuar on Facebook, whie quotes, facts and figures generated more response on Twitter Content is key; what is posted is more important than when it is posted. Inspiring action Twitter offers invauabe opportunities to connect directy with key infuencers around a campaign s focus, in a way that has never previousy been possibe Requests to foowers need to be sma enough to aow them to take part without a major effort. It can, however, then be difficut to transate sma actions into more significant commitments. Engagement, content and tone of voice Socia media needs to be treated as an interactive forum: engaging with foowers generates visibiity through their networks. This might incude repying to foower comments, posing and answering questions and re-tweeting and posting foowers input 2 Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance

7 CHAPTER ONE: WHAT IS SOCIAL MEDIA? Socia media has changed the Internet from a argey static space concerned with the transmission or broadcasting of information to one where users can generate their own content, from short fims on YouTube and Facebook status updates to re-posting inks on Twitter or signposting to content via toos ike Digg. In short, socia media is a group of Internet-based appications that aow the creation and exchange of user-generated content. It is a broad category that incudes the foowing: 1. Socia networks estabish socia ties onine, often drawing on pre-existing offine reationships. Exampes incude Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and MySpace. 2. Content-sharing sites aow users to share, rate and discuss professiona and amateur content. Exampes incude YouTube and Fickr. 3. Content-ranking toos aow individuas to signpost content to other users of the patform. Exampes incude Digg, which creates profies based on what an individua Diggs, but aso aggregates the data to create a sense of the web according to Digg users. 4. Geo-ocation toos give users the opportunity to share their physica ocation with other users, often with a view to potentiay meeting up in person. Exampes incude Foursquare. These four categories are not exhaustive, and new toos and patforms are being created that do not fit neaty within this schema. The existing toos are aso adapting. For exampe, Facebook increasingy concentrates on making non-facebook content easy to share within the patform, rather than requiring users to eave the site. Twitter may have been conceived as a conversation between peope with reativey oose ties, but is now being increasingy used as a way for peope to converse with friends. And even static news sites now incorporate functionaity for readers to comment on their stories and add their photos. As the use of mobie Internet grows, more innovations are ikey to foow. Socia networks: who uses what, and how? Socia media reaches more peope than news media, and in the UK more peope check their Facebook account in one day than the cumuative weeky readership of every nationa newspaper. It is more popuar than emai; among active Internet users, 65 per cent reguary manage at east one socia media profie, and 38 per cent have joined an interest group or supported a cause onine in the ast 12 months. Peope trust persona comments (such as those found on socia networking sites) 38 per cent more than advertising. 1 Facebook is the 1. Manifest Communications, Socia media vs. intoerance. Presentation to the Institute for Strategic Diaogue, 11 Apri Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance 3

8 most popuar socia network site across most of Europe. Twitter varies in popuarity across Europe, but usage continues to grow rapidy, incuding 151 per cent in Spain in Like Facebook, it has become a popuar too for socia networking and content sharing, and is used by peope from a wide range of demographic and professiona backgrounds. The site has aso been highighted for its roe in various socia movements, such as the Arab Spring, Occupy Wa Street and the cean-up after the riots in London in Barriers to engagement with socia media Despite this growth and success, there are barriers to engagement with socia media, which tend to be simiar to obstaces to using the Internet more generay. Understanding and confidence in using technoogy, access to technoogy and attitudes to earning a have impications for the degree to which peope use socia media. In the UK, 19 miion househods had access to the Internet in 2011 about 77 per cent of the popuation. Those that didn t have access cited a number of reasons, incuding the cost of equipment (19 per cent) and a ack of skis (21 per cent). 3 Language can aso impact on Internet usage, but especiay on the use of socia media, where users are required to not just access information but add content themseves. Socia networking and identity Given the opportunities created by socia media to aow users to create a new persona, it is remarkabe how itte deception peope attempt on socia media patforms. Apart from a itte embeishment on dating websites, most peope are sti reativey cautious about presenting a fase image of themseves, and most use socia media simpy as an onine extension of their offine seves. 4 In fact, socia media offers a mechanism for consoidating different networks at a time when peope s ives are becoming more fragmented, heping to maintain and re-estabish connections between peope from a stages of their ives. It aso aows individuas to connect with a wider range of peope, thus exposing them to a broader range of ideas and infuences. How does socia media shape our attitudes? There is a weath of research about the ways in which print and broadcast media shape attitudes. Mass media can infuence an individua s opinions about other groups, especiay minorities and particuary where there is itte or no offine contact between groups. 5 Comparisons between onine and offine media have aways been chaenging, but are becoming more so with the advent of socia media. Whie editors, journaists and teevision and radio commissioners decide what makes it into the pubic ream via traditiona media, socia media chaenges these hierarchies, aowing ordinary citizens to create and post content. These patforms aso tend to take a much more hands-off approach to reguation, with the exception of interventions in reation to crimina activity (e.g. phishing scams) or extreme cases of hate speech, buying and impersonation. As a resut, much of the theory about attitude formation and infuence through mass media is of imited reevance to socia media. 2. Edeman Digita/ComScore, Twitter Growth Surge in EMEA (edemandigita.com, 2011) 3. Office of Nationa Statistics, Internet Access Househods and Individuas, 2011 (ONS, 2011) 4. Back, M. D., Stopfer, J. M., Vazire, S., Gaddis, S., Schmuke, S. C., Egoff, B., and Gosing, S. D. (2010). Facebook profies refect actua personaity, not sef-ideaization, Psychoogica Science, 21, Appeius, Stefanie. (2009) Typicay Turkish: A study of the current state of research into the media representation, use and perception of Turkish migrants in Germany (Conference Papers: European Media and Cutura Studies, Potsdam, May 2009) and Cotte, Simon, Ethnic Minorities and the Media: Changing Cutura Boundaries (Open University Press, 2000) 4 Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance

9 There are some areas of overap, however. The psychoogica research that underpins advertising and marketing offers insights into human behaviour onine, as we as offine. Among the most powerfu of these is socia proof: the idea that peope are much more ikey to take a course of action if others before them have done so, even if those peope are not known to them. Saespeope and marketers know that if many others have purchased a particuar product, it wi become more attractive to new customers. It is this pattern of behaviour which can make socia media so infuentia. Amongst other things, socia networks such as Twitter and Facebook, as we as ranking sites ike Digg, act as giant aggregators of socia proof: evidence of the choices that peope that you know are making, about everything, a the time. The fact that the marketing word has embraced socia media is proof of its potentia; most companies now have a presence on a range of socia media patforms, and many new organisations have sprung up to advise companies on how to take advantage of these opportunities. It is not just the commercia ream that has benefitted from socia media marketing. One of the best-known exampes of the way in which socia media can be used to infuence attitudes and behaviour is provided by the 2008 US presidentia eection. The Obama campaign made skifu use of video content, emai and socia networking patforms and, in doing so, converted an outsider candidate into the President of the United States of America. There is aso evidence that socia media can hep to estabish ties between traditionay opposing groups. For exampe, Facebook s Peace on Facebook project 6 counts new friendships between peope from groups with a history of confict, such as Israeis and Paestinians, across reigious divides or across opposing poitica movements. These connections are not in themseves proof of positive or meaningfu reationships that wi convert into rea ife, but they do hint at the way that socia media can hep to buid and maintain reationships onine that may prove difficut in person because of wider socia censure or poitica and ogistica constraints. Socia media aso heps individuas to maintain weaker ties the od friend whose profie they rarey visit, or the former coeague they rarey see in person which increases the ikeihood of them coming into contact with peope and views outside their norma frame of reference. These connections are potentiay more ikey to be a source of fresh ideas and aternative views than those individuas choose to surround themseves with in their offine ives. 7 Using socia media to create change Socia media can be used to effect change in a variety of different ways, from shifting consumer behaviour to increasing an individua s commitment to voting. Organisations such as Change.org, 38 Degrees and Avaaz, 8 which use the Internet to mobiise peope on socia justice causes, have integrated socia media into their campaign strategies, and a growing number of civi society organisations are using socia media to ampify their message. For exampe, Hope Not Hate 9 - an anti-racism group has garnered over 50, Manjoo, Farhad, The End of the Echo Chamber (Sate.com, accessed 17 January 2012) as_we_thought_.htm 8. See and for more information. 9. Hope Not Hate is a campaign which aims to mobiise those opposed to the British Nationa Party s (BNP) and Engish Defence League s (EDL) poitics of hate. It was formed in 2005 as a positive antidote to the BNP and has the support of the Daiy Mirror, trade unions, ceebrities and community groups across the UK. More information about the campaign can be found at Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance 5

10 Facebook fans and has used its page to do everything from sharing music videos to offering ive reports from far right demonstrations. In doing so, they have created an onine community of supporters who reguary interact with, and promote, the campaign to others. They are aso encouraged to become invoved offine. 6 Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance

11 CHAPTER TWO: CHOOSING THE CAMPAIGN This project aimed to understand whether and how socia media coud be used for socia good to infuence attitudes, inspire action and create change, whether through promoting positive messages or taking on negative ones, and specificay in tacking different forms of intoerance. Given that this fied of work is in its infancy and the technoogy is changing constanty, there is a ack of expert knowedge about how socia media works and, by extension, how it coud be used by campaigners. Where this knowedge is advancing, it is mosty hed within the private sector or specia interest groups, and academic research is acking and woefuy out of date. As a resut, the project adopted an action research methodoogy, earning through the running of a socia media campaign. Listening exercise to determine the focus of the socia media campaign In the first instance, ISD commissioned a istening exercise 10 over an eight-day period around three potentia areas of focus: homophobia and faith, Isamophobia and the Engish Defence League (EDL), and intergenerationa and cass issues. This shortist of issues was prepared in consutation with the Phoenix Group, 11 based on an assessment of interest areas, timeiness and opportunities for pubic intervention. The exercise used a bespoke appication that browses the Internet and socia media patforms to coect onine mentions in websites, news artices, bogs, tweets or other pubicy-avaiabe onine content within parameters set by the user. It uses sentiment anaysis to categorise meaning as positive, negative or neutra and coates a range of statistics that inform campaign choice and strategy: Frequency, timing and voume of discussions Where discussions are taking pace across the Internet and socia media patforms Whether content is positive, negative or neutra Who are the main infuencers, content creators and contributors Which are the most mentioned key words and phrases. On the basis of the resuts of the istening exercise, further consutation with Phoenix Group members, and an assessment of the UK poitica context, it was decided to focus the socia media campaign on tacking homophobia. This istening exercise focused on conversations about the UK government s consutation on extending civi marriage aws to incude same-sex coupes 12 (referred to as equa 10. The istening exercise was conducted with media monitoring too The Loop, from Manifest London. More information can be found at Phoenix brings together boggers, activists, opinion formers and community eaders to sketch out an aternative narrative reating to diversity, socia cohesion, and vaues and norms, and to chaenge those poarising narratives prevaent within pubic discourse today. The group works together to achieve these aims. Through this new conversation the group is starting to seed coective socia action initiatives and deveop aternative poicy approaches. More information can be found at This consutation took pace from 15 March-14 June 2012, and set out the government's proposas to enabe same-sex coupes to have a civi marriage. More information can be found at Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance 7

12 marriage ), searching specificay for the reference terms Christian, Musim, Jewish, Hindu, Sikh and Buddhist. It was conducted using the foowing Booean search: especiay among those who use socia media perhaps through or whie at work. This suggested that our campaign shoud share its content during the week, but be ready to compete with a high eve of noise. ("gay marriage" OR "same sex marriage" OR "same-sex marriage" OR "homosexua marriage") AND (faith OR reigion OR Christian OR Cathoic OR reigious OR Musim OR Isam OR Isamic OR Jew OR Jewish OR Judaism OR Hindu OR Hinduism OR Buddhism OR Buddhist OR Sikh OR Sikhism) AND ocation: UK Resuts of the istening campaign on homophobia and faith Of the three themes monitored, homophobia and faith received the most mentions, with 763 onine mentions over the eight days (see Figure 1, beow). Most conversations took pace during the week, with over 100 mentions per day from Tuesday to Friday, dropping to about haf this amount over the weekend. This contrasted with conversations around the EDL and Isamophobia, where peaks occurred during the weekend and around key events, such as street marches and raies. This impied that faith and gay rights was a consistenty popuar issue onine, Faith communities were particuary voca in the bogosphere (see Figure 2), with amost two-thirds of the mentions occurring on bogs, suggesting a wiingness and desire to engage in engthier debate. The key bogs used incuded mainstream sites ike the Student Room and TES for teachers, and faith-based bogs, such as Angican Mainstream, Premiere Community (Christian radio) and Atheist Forums (see Figure 3). Figure 2: Media by voume, iustrating the categories of Internet sites on which onine mentions of the search topic were more or ess common during the istening exercise News Bog Forum Video Twitter Genera Voume Figure 1: Voume of onine mentions of the homophobia and faith reated search during the eight-day istening exercise, anaysed over time Mar 28 Mar 29 Mar 30 Mar 31 Apr 1 Apr 2 Apr 3 Apr 4 Positive Negative Neutra Tota 8 Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance

13 Figure 3: Top sites showing the websites with the argest voume of mentions during the istening exercise twitter.com 18% atheistforums.org 5% 16% poforumbogro.bogspot.co.uk 6% 7% 13% uncycopedia.wikia.com 7% community.tes.co.uk 8% 11% patrickarrard.bogspot.co.uk 9% Figure 4: Top authors by number of posts per individua reating to the search topic during the istening exercise 15 Voume Ji Xamraco reverendjeremian -Sunkis:- guardian Jester94 PaiRichard prog2djent Quiet_Man -Jake Sherman, Anna Fame- The exercise aso highighted a number of authors who were particuary voca in this debate, and who were therefore potentia starting points for engagement on the campaign (Figure 4). There was a significant amount of news content concerning the government s consutation (neary 100 mentions), incuding some criticism of reigious responses to it within gay press sites such as Pink News. There were ony a sma number of mentions found on Twitter, suggesting a simiar amount on Facebook, 13 and there was no new video content on YouTube. This suggested that bog activity shoud be centra to the campaign, that there was the potentia to buid new audiences through socia media patforms ike Twitter and Facebook, and that the campaign shoud seek out a sma number of key infuencers. Each onine mention was anaysed first by software and then manuay according to its sentiment; i.e. whether it was expressed in a positive (friendy, agreeabe or happy), negative (hatefu, aggressive or angry), or neutra (informative or factua) tone. The 13. Facebook profies tend to be private, making them harder to research. But it is widey considered that Twitter content is indicative of Facebook content, so can often be used as a proxy. Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance 9

14 sentiment of conversations on homophobia and faith was mosty neutra (Figure 5), which refected the fact that a arge proportion of mentions were on news or bog sites, where comment tends to be more measured and nuanced (Figure 6). In contrast, Twitter tends to produce persona opinions using emotive anguage, something that was evident in the istening exercise on Isamophobia, where most conversation took pace on Twitter. Interestingy, faith-based bogs presented their anti-equa marriage arguments in a neutra tone of voice, whereas gay-rights campaigners in support of equa marriage were often more combative towards the attitudes of the faith communities with Figure 5: Sentiment by voume for a mentions of the topic over the course of the istening exercise Neutra 69% Positive 4% Negative 26% which they disagreed. Ony a sma number of mentions demonstrated a positive midde ground on the subject of faith and sexua orientation. There was a poarised debate, with most reigious commentary being anti-equa marriage, and most equa marriage supporters being critica of reigious responses. This suggested that the campaign shoud create and disseminate a midde-ground narrative promoting positive messages on reconciing the issues around faith and sexua orientation. There was aso very itte content from or about any reigions other than Christianity, which suggested that the campaign shoud seek to provide an opportunity for other faiths to share their views on gay rights. A word coud (Figure 7) was generated to depict the most common topics and phrases used, with the size of the word representing the frequency of mentions. Certain terms and themes dominated: Barack Obama, Supreme Court and Rick Santorum: athough the search was imited to the UK, it generated references to the US inked to the 2012 presidentia race. This highighted that events outside the UK woud be of interest to the campaign s audience Figure 6: Sentiment by media type, indicating amount of positive, negative and neutra mentions found on various categories of website News Bog Forum Video Twitter Genera Positive Neutra Negative 10 Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance

15 Christian vaues and reigious iberty, pushing gay marriage and force churches: there were recurring concerns about civi marriage for same-sex coupes being in opposition to Christianity, and the worry that churches woud be forced to conduct such marriages. This suggested that the campaign shoud highight the fact that faith communities can support gay rights without endangering reigious iberty Gays and backs, human rights and civi rights: the arguments for equa marriage centred on equa civi and human rights, which suggested that the campaign shoud take a human and civi rights focused approach. Figure 7: Word coud showing topics by frequency wedge between gays Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance 11

16 CHAPTER THREE: THE NOTHING HOLY ABOUT HATRED (NHAH) CAMPAIGN In order to test a range of socia media patforms and onine campaign tactics, and earn about what works when using socia media to tacke intoerance, ISD worked with the Phoenix Group to run a campaign to bring together peope of a faiths, denominations and non-reigious beiefs to speak out against homophobia. This chapter expains how the campaign was devised, structured and deivered between May and August 2012, through five core areas of activity: Campaign panning Estabishing an onine presence Creating opportunities for onine community engagement Proactive targeting of key individuas and organisations Offine activities. Campaign panning The campaign s aims and objectives were deveoped in cose consutation with the Phoenix Group and a number of other key stakehoders. The campaign s purpose was to engage as broad a range as possibe of peope of faith, incuding more conservative eements, and provide them with a patform to speak out against homophobia. By highighting the harm caused by homophobia (buying and vioence against LGBT peope, increased menta heath issues, discrimination, etc.) and the duty of care and compassion which is important within a faith communities, the campaign aimed to provide a space where a peope of faith coud engage, share their thoughts and speak out against homophobia. It was hoped this woud inspire a broader conversation about positive actions to tacke homophobia within supporters own communities. The campaign s aims were to: Form a coaition of members from many different faiths, denominations and non-reigious beiefs, aong with LGBT groups and other aies, who woud a support the campaign s message against homophobia Highight the very rea and painfu consequences of homophobia, and promote the idea that faith communities and eaders have a duty of care towards those affected by it, and a wider pastora roe to fufi to LGBT members of their communities and their famiies Raise the profie of the issue and provide a patform for members of different communities and faith eaders to show opposition to vioence and hate crime and other consequences of hatred and homophobia Promote an aternative midde ground narrative to the wider community regarding the issue of faith and sexua orientation. The campaign action pan (Figure 8) was constructed in consutation with Phoenix Group members before the campaign went ive, aowing a risk assessment to be conducted and draft responses put in pace. As the 12 Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance

17 Figure 8: Campaign action pan May June Juy August Activity 1 Key stakehoders to agree campaign aims and objectives. Decide on campaign name. Launch campaign onine! Prioritise buiding foowers on Facebook and Twitter through aready estabished networks via ISD, Phoenix and others Continue to keep Facebook and Twitter updated with reevant news and information, and to reach out for new foowers Continue to keep Facebook and Twitter updated with reevant news and information, and to reach out for new foowers Keep Twitter and Facebook feeds updated with reevant news and by sharing other mutimedia content Activity 2 Create content for onine sites: draft about us, biography, aims and objectives, mission statement, ogo for website and press reease. Signed off by key stakehoders. Sub campaign activity:ask supporters to contribute ogo designs; contact design agencies and universities through Twitter. Run a competition if possibe Pubish bog posts by Phoenix members and supporters: one a week to be pushed out via socia media sites. Ask campaign supporters to join in by submitting their own stories Pubish bog posts by partners, members and supporters: one a week to be pushed out via socia media sites Activity 3 Set up search terms on the Loop and set up other free internet monitoring Engage with key infuencers: reach out to key infuencers in faith and LGBT sectors for support via Twitter Sub campaign idea: ask peope to write Nothing Hoy About Hatred in unusua paces, photograph it and send it to us; share via Facebook and Twitter Sub campaign idea: produce videos of persona testimonies, messages of support from faith eaders. Push out via Twitter and Facebook Activity 4 Draft a ist of key infuencers to engage with both on and offine about the campaign, as estabished through istening exercises Conduct pos through questions function on Facebook to encourage engagement and increase reach Sub campaign idea: Virtua Pride marches - ask foowers to add a Twibbon and tweet #PrideNotPrejudice on Pride days Virtua Prides to continue Activity 5 Sign up to key sites and patforms, as estabished through istening exercise. Such as Gmai, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Wordpress Line up number of bog posts ready to send out over foowing two months Weeky Facebook questions to continue Weeky Facebook questions to continue Externa reevant events Campaign panning meetings Key stakehoders to sign off on campaign pans Diamond Jubiee on 5 June June campaign manager on hoiday Equa marriage consutation ends 14 June Various Pride events Campaign steering group meeting 11 Juy Oympics starts 27 Juy Ramadan starts 20 Juy Various Pride events Campaign ends 31 Aug Oympics ends 12 Aug Ramadan ends 18 Aug Various Pride events campaign progressed, techniques were adapted based on what had worked or faied, and panned activities were dropped where it was deemed they woud not be successfu. Panning ahead proved usefu, but it was vita to maintain the fexibiity to adapt as the situation deveoped. Socia media aows foowers to comment on, infuence and even hijack campaigns. As such, foowers did not aways do what they were asked to do; they sometimes misinterpreted comments or diverted messages to their own causes. The best campaigns respond to events as they happen. Estabishing an onine presence The istening exercise demonstrated that conversations about homophobia and faith were common on bogs, so a wordpress.com bog was estabished (Figure 9). This was the most technicay chaenging eement of the campaign, and took time to popuate with content, but it proved to be an essentia campaigning too. The strength of the onine campaign presence was increased by buying the domain name (thus becoming nothinghoyabouthatred.org rather than nothinghoy Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance 13

18 abouthatred.wordpress.com), which gave the bog a professiona fee. As its onine presence grew, the NHAH site moved up the Googe search rankings. The campaign aso estabished a presence on most of the main socia media patforms incuding Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Googe+, Digg, Reddit and Storify. Eary on, the campaign pubished community guideines on the website to dea with negative or abusive comments, athough, as it happened, the campaign received very few. A good dea of time was spent popuating the bog with content before the campaign went ive, so that new foowers woud have something to engage with from day one. Creating opportunities for onine community engagement The NHAH campaign started to buid its audience through engaging friends, famiy and members of the Phoenix Group. They were asked to promote it within their networks, principay by re-tweeting campaign messages or sharing them on Facebook (Figure 10). This activity continued throughout the course of the campaign, but over time the campaign attracted new supporters who came through other routes. Engagement is core to campaigning via socia media, because it not ony encourages foowers to move from support to action, but an individua s invovement is visibe on their socia network profies and on the feeds of their connections, which enhances the reach of the campaign. The campaign tested a number of activities and tactics to promote engagement. Sharing content: The campaign asked foowers to share reevant information, news stories, images, videos and inks to websites. It created and aunched a Twibbon that appears on a Twitter profie photo Figure 9: Campaign bog at wordpress.com 14 Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance

19 to iustrate a commitment to the campaign. 14 On Facebook, the greatest success came when images were used. Foowers were invited to share an image on their timeine that woud point an arrow at their profie picture with the message that this person beieves there s Nothing Hoy About Hatred (Figure 11). This image generated a high number of shares, thus increasing the campaign s overa reach (Figure 12), which encouraged arge numbers of new Facebook ikes and drove traffic to the bog (Figure 13). Nothing Hoy About Hatred Pedge: Campaign supporters and prominent figures within faith communities were invited to take a pedge against homophobia, and to ask their own networks to do the same (Figure 14). Both Facebook and Twitter Figure 10: Phoenix supporters, coeagues and friends asked their networks to support the campaign Figure 11: Campaign image shared on Facebook that generated 69 shares in under a week 14. A Twibbon is ike a bumper pate sticker for a Twitter avatar. It is used to promote a cause on Twitter by overaying an image on a profie picture to show aegiance to a Twibbon cause. ( Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance 15

20 Figure 12: An increase in engagement and reach on Facebook foowed the posting of this image on 8 August Figure 13: Number of referras to the campaign bog from Facebook and Twitter during the week the campaign image was posted Figure 14: 'Take the Pedge' page on the NHAH campaign bog 16 Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance

21 were successfu forums in inspiring supporters to take the pedge. The pedge activity, aunched hafway through the campaign, gave foowers a ca to action, buit a sense of community and heped simpify and iustrate the aim of the campaign. Posting quotes from the pedges on Twitter enabed quick dissemination of the core ideas of the campaign, as we as demonstrating the wide range of support the campaign had won across different interest groups. Onine Pride marches: Foowers were invited to join virtua Pride parades coinciding with rea word marches by tweeting with the hashtag #PrideNotPrejudice. This was tweeted and others active on this topic (Figure 15), exposing a new audience to the campaign s message. It aso generated attention in the traditiona press when the campaign was contacted by a Manchester-based onine newspaper in the eadup to Manchester Pride. Use of the Facebook Questions feature: Facebook reposts questions to a user s friends newsfeed when they answer a po. Athough the questions were not particuary popuar, their vira reach was disproportionatey arge (Figure 16). Figure 15: #PrideNotPrejudice tweet Proactive audience targeting Socia media patforms aow campaigners to proactivey target individuas and organisations they want to reach in a more direct and accessibe way than is normay possibe through traditiona media. The campaign achieved this through a number of methods. Contacting campaign organisations and prominent individuas: The NHAH campaign contacted organisations and individuas working in reevant fieds. Simpy foowing users on Twitter aerted them to the campaign s existence and generated foow-backs, whie prominent gay rights campaigners and faith eaders were tweeted with a request to foow the campaign and retweet to Figure 16: Reach of a 'question' post on Facebook Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance 17

22 Figure 17: Using Twitter to contact potentia supporters Manchester foowed by a tweet by the organisation gave NHAH ten new Twitter foowers in haf an hour. extend the message to their own networks (Figure 17). Combined with offine engagement, this sort of activity generated spikes in new campaign supporters; for exampe, a phone ca to a prominent LGBT organisation in Mentioning peope or thanking them for their support: Reach can be extended by strategicay mentioning peope whose networks a campaign wishes to reach. Each time an artice or bog entry was shared, the author s Twitter hande was incuded, which often ed to them re-tweeting the item to their foowers. Simiary, incuding the usernames of those who signed the campaign pedge encouraged them to re-tweet. Thanking peope for their support via Facebook and Twitter aso encouraged re-tweets, ikes, shares and cickthroughs from other supporters (Figure 18). Figure 18: Sharing pedges from supporters via socia media encouraged interaction on both Facebook and Twitter, and promoted the pedge and the campaign in genera 18 Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance

23 Asking boggers to write about the campaign: Getting boggers and the traditiona press to write about the campaign proved to be usefu. A popuar and we-read bog, Libera Conspiracy, wrote an artice about the campaign 15 as the resut of a press reease being tweeted to them, which took the message to an entirey new audience, as did a piece about the campaign in a oca paper in Manchester 16 in connection with the #PrideNotPrejudice hashtag. Offine activities The campaign was aunched with an assumption that onine activities woud need to be inked to offine events, and our experience proved this to be true. For exampe, a campaign meeting in Juy caused a brief spike in socia media activity, as attendees were gavanised by what was discussed. There was aso increased traffic to the campaign s patforms after the issuing of a press reease. Rea word events aso impacted on interest in the campaign; for exampe, when restaurant chain Chick Fi-A caused a stir in the US over its comments against equa marriage, 17 the campaign saw a growth in interest from US supporters. On the other hand, engagement dipped as the word focused on the London 2012 Oympic Games. 15. Newswire, Anti-homophobia campaign goes to faith eaders (LiberaConspiracy.org, accessed 13 November 2012) Parry, Oivia, 'Nothing Hoy About Hatred' campaign against homophobia gets support in Manchester Pride's Big Weekend (MancunianMatters.co.uk, accessed 13 November 2012) More information can be found at Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance 19

24 CHAPTER FOUR: CAMPAIGN RESULTS The Nothing Hoy About Hatred campaign ran from 1 June to 31 August A number of measurement and anaytic toos were used to both chart the progress of the campaign overa and capture insights into the effectiveness of individua campaign tactics. Web mentions of the campaign Who s taking? The author chart (Figure 19) documents the commentators most frequenty invoved in the campaign: The campaign itsef was (unsurprisingy) the most voca commenter, sending a tota of 632 tweets. Other authors incude those invoved in the campaign itsef, and a number of campaign supporters The data shows a steady increase in the voume of tweets sent by the campaign per month as it grew. In June the campaign sent 108 tweets, which increased to 226 in Juy, and to 285 in August a Jewish LGBT forum, showed tremendous support with interaction and retweets mentioning the campaign a tota of 30 times to its 135 foowers The Three Faiths Forum (@threefaiths) has 1,566 foowers on Twitter and aso showed support with 18 mentions of the campaign. Where are they taking? The predominant means of communication was Twitter and Facebook, which proved very effective in not ony disseminating information about the campaign, but aso in finding ike-minded institutions and individuas (Figure 20). The peaks in ate Juy/eary August correate with the introduction of the NHAH anti-homophobia pedge. A peak of 220 mentions in the week of 3 August fe a itte the next week with 186 mentions in the week of 10 August, and then to 160 the foowing week. Figure 19: Author chart by number of contributions per author to the NHAH campaign Voume 10 0 rachebriggsuk iveinthegrey KeshetUK Stephen3FF hannah658 Institute4SD threefaiths HausOfJovan TefordChapain 20 Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance

25 Figure 20: Page type by week by voume of mentions found on various categories of website over the course of the campaign Voume Jun 8-14 Jun Jun Jun 29 Jun - 5 Ju 6-12 Ju Ju Ju 27 Ju- 2 Aug 3-9 Aug Aug Aug Aug Twitter Genera Bog Forum Video News Figure 21: Sentiment over time showing the amount of positive, negative and neutra commentary about the NHAH campaign from June-August Voume Jun 8-14 Jun Jun Jun 29 Jun - 5 Ju 6-12 Ju Ju Ju 27 Ju- 2 Aug 3-9 Aug Aug Aug Aug Positive Neutra Negative What are they saying? Figure 21 demonstrates that most conversation around the NHAH campaign was positive. A supportive mentions of the campaign were tagged as positive, and one can see an increase in positive mentions of the campaign as it progressed. The voume of conversations around NHAH aso increased graduay over the course of the campaign. The increasing voume of positive sentiment refects an increase in the voume of support and positivity generated by the campaign s own content. The word coud (Figure 22) iustrates that a vast majority of onine conversation mentioning the phrase nothing hoy about hatred was reated directy to the campaign. In fact, of the 31 most popuar topics and phrases mentioned, ony HausOf Jovan and HausOfHoudini are unreated to the campaign (they are reated to Lady Gaga who tweeted the phrase there is nothing hoy about hatred previousy), which is an exceent resut. Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance 21

26 Figure 22: Word coud showing most-mentioned topics stonewauk SchooReport HausOfHoudini faith eaders LeedsPride hatred and homophobia NothingHoyAboutHatred young peope gay peope LGBT peope gay peope LeicsSikhAian TafordChapain NHAH Stephen3FF London PrideNotPrejudice Rabbi Check press reease faith based homophobic buying Figure 23: Mentions over time for a onine content reating to the NHAH campaign from June-August Figure 24: Facebook ikes over time Figure 25: Facebook ikes and unikes per day 22 Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance

27 The most common terms and themes mirror the content of the campaign, incuding faith reated terms (faith based, faith eaders, Rabbi and others) and homophobia or LGBT reated themes (LGBT, gay peope, homophobic buying and others.) Tota voume of conversation Figure 23 demonstrates the gradua rise in the voume of conversation throughout the course of the campaign. Most conversation took pace during the working week, with spikes on Thursdays and Fridays. The peaks in conversation correate to increased speciaised campaign activity. For exampe, the peaks in eary August correate to the aunch of the NHAH pedge. On Friday 3 August a peak in mentions occurred when a Twibbon was reeased and the campaign was pushing for foowers to add it to their Twitter pictures. The peak recorded in the next week correates with the pubication of a press reease and the ensuing Twitter push for coverage. Facebook ikes (the peope who cicked to ike the campaign Facebook page, or fans ) The number of ikes for the page rose steadiy throughout the campaign, reaching a tota of 355 fans by the end of the three-month period (see Figure 24). There were peaks in new page ikes on certain days (see Figure 25), usuay thanks to key infuencers sharing the page within their own networks, or due to engaging campaign content such as a shared image. Figure 26 shows that NHAH supporters were mainy UK-based, as expected, with many ocated in London, the campaign s headquarters. Thanks to the power of socia media aone, however, there was aso a strong US contingent of supporters. The campaign was supported by a sight majority of femaes, with ages from teen to 65+, athough the most represented demographic was within the age group. Figure 26: Facebook s Peope who ike your page (demographics and ocation) Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance 23

28 Figure 27: Facebook reach (demographics and ocation) Reach (the peope who have been exposed to the campaign s content) The reach of the campaign Facebook page refers to those who have been exposed to the campaign messages and content, incuding through the activity of the campaign s fans. Interestingy, Figure 27 shows that the majority of those reached by the campaign were actuay in the US, which impies that the campaign s US fans shared content more than those in the UK. The demographics of those reached (gender and age) were simiar to those who ike the campaign s page, with sighty more femaes than maes and a wide age range. Figure 28 demonstrates that the arge reach of the campaign was achieved through vira content; posts, photos, videos and inks that are shared by those who ike the page, thus exposing it to their wider networks. Figure 28: Facebook reach by organic, vira and tota reach. Most reach was achieved viray, as campaign supporters engaged with and shared Facebook content with their extended networks 24 Socia Media for Socia Change: Using the Internet to Tacke Intoerance