The Case

An urban arts charter school contacted me to lead a social media campaign for their spring student production, which is always a highlight of the year for students and a major fundraiser for the school.

They also want to reach more civic organizations and businesses to nurture as potential donors and sources of promotion and publicity. They know social media could play a bigger part in exciting the community about the school, but they’d never systemized that.

My Approach

They wanted to attract more community support, both on social media and in the city, and raise their visibility. They have an impressive roster of alums that they knew was an excellent opportunity.

The school had created lots of graphic assets for the show, such as posters and some professional photographs from the previous year’s show, that we could use. But that’s what they’d done a lot before, and I know from experience that graphics don’t do best on social; there’s a tested hierarchy, and that’s near the bottom.

I challenged them to get behind-the-scenes-type videos of rehearsals and such, but they didn’t have anyone on staff who already did that, and I don’t live close enough.

The biggest challenge was the timeline; they first reached out in March and the show was at the end of April. I’d generally prefer 3 months to settle technical issues and arrange to collect content from staff before launching a strong, high-volume campaign for an event like this.

One of their parent volunteers assisted in selecting a scheduling platform and creating an asset library so we could all access photos and videos in a way that they could use them in the future.  

I wrote the content with the audience in mind, especially focusing on grabbing people’s attention so they don’t scroll past. I helped them set a schedule for posts at the best time for their audience and use appropriate and useful hashtags for both Facebook and Instagram (not the same!)

I monitored all our posts, responding to comments, answering questions and providing links to buy show tickets when asked.

The Results

During the month of the show, our Instagram posts reached 417% more people than in the prior month. On Facebook, reach almost doubled.

Imagery that I suggested — including rehearsal of one of the musical numbers and photos of students modeling some of the fashions created — received the most engagement. That was a key goal of the campaign and the long-term goal of the school.

On Instagram, likes increased by 850% and comments increased by 370%. And staff members recognized it wasn’t just parents, although parents were great about sharing posts regarding their students’ contributions.

On Facebook, engagement jumped 338%.

The school staff was thrilled with the results ­– how it elevated the school’s image, showed off their exceptional students, and helped make the production a success.

We drove ticket sales, contributed to the school and impacted the summer fundraising campaign, the school’s finance director said.

Want great results like that for your organization? Let’s talk!