You are proposing a strategic brief for a local nonprofit client. A strategic brief is a “clear and concise document that outlines crucial information gathered during discovery and lays the foundation for the rest of the project.” You give a client a brief before creating a full social media campaign.
Through the brief, you present your client with a report on how best to use social media to tell their story. Think of this project as the type of report created by a social media consultancy firm. It should be highly professional and polished.
Some ideas for how to use social media strategically for a brand would be by using Instagram Stories, promotional videos, contests or sweepstakes, paid social advertising, behind-the-scenes footage, unveilings of new products/campaigns, exclusive content from events, and introduction to team members/VIPs.
You will also complete exercises about your client on the discussion board and you may refer back to those when completing your project. Refer back to Chapter 6 for help with this assignment.
Final Social Media Strategic Brief Components
Your final strategic social media plan must contain the elements below:
Overview of your client: Develop a 1-2 paragraph overview of the organization. Using a bulleted list, link to all your client’s social media accounts and record the number of followers for each.
Situational analysis: The situational analysis will help you organize all the data you have collected so far, setting up the overall picture of what is going on with your client. In 1-2 paragraphs, define the core problem OR core opportunity for your client’s social media strategy. Next, conduct a SWOT analysis on the client’s current social media strategy. Finally, identify the strategic implication, the “so what?” factor of your research. Read the How to Conduct a Social Media SWOT AnalysisDownload How to Conduct a Social Media SWOT Analysis for more info.
Key audience: Who are you targeting? Identify a primary audience and a secondary audience (if desired). Demographic and psychographic insights are key to point out here for this particular audience who is not only using your selected social media platforms but would be relevant to this particular initiative.
Strategic mindset: What is the story you want to communicate and share with this audience? What is the call to action you want the audience to take after this campaign? This section should be 1-2 paragraphs long.
Objective statement: What is the overall objective to accomplish this narrative? An objective is a specific statement about a planned social media activity in terms of what that activity intends to accomplish. Your objectives should be written in the SMART format (Chapter 6). An example objective statement is simply: “To increase Clemson University’s social media followers by 10% by July 1.”
Content ideas: How are we going to accomplish the objectives? With what resources and communication tools/tactics? Table 9.2 in Chapter 9 is a great starting point. In 3 paragraphs or more, detail 3 different content ideas you want to create with social media (i.e., create a branded hashtag, host a Facebook Live Q&A, create a series of promotional videos, create Instagram Stories highlighting volunteers, or develop an influencer ambassador program).
Best practices: Include 3 best practices for using social media strategically. Your client is retaining you for your knowledge and they may not know this information. These must be sourced from a reputable publication to back up your expertise. You may use any of the supplemental articles in the readings pages of each module or conduct your own research.
Evaluation: How will you assess whether your campaign was effective? Include a description of the evaluation and measurement techniques you plan to use. With this section, I’m really looking to see if you have connected your evaluation techniques back to the objectives you have created.
Creative: You will use Adobe Creative Cloud Express (https://www.adobe.com/express/) or other graphic design software to create at least two sample posts in support of your brief, based on your content ideas section. Make sure you are considering best practices and proper etiquette when doing these for the assignment. Insert the graphics directly into your document.
Resources to help you complete this assignment:
Revisit the foundations of strategic planning that are outlined in Chapter 6
Watch the video for an overview of the project
Project checklistDownload Project checklist (I’ll also use this for grading)
Strategic brief templateDownload Strategic brief template (optional)
Citation guide (https://research.moreheadstate.edu/c.php?g=610039&p=4234963) for your Works Cited page and in-text citations
Sample plans:
A professional planDownload professional plan for ideas on how to incorporate the logo, brand colors, and headings throughout your brief
Samples of past student briefs (note: only select text and pages are available; some content is hidden for academic integrity)
YouthBaseDownload YouthBase (traditional essay-style example)
Dress Up GreenvilleDownload Dress Up Greenville (visual-style example)
Mohawk Coffee HouseDownload Mohawk Coffee House (visual-style example)
Formatting:
The Social Media Strategic Brief must be submitted in the following format:
Format your document using MLA Style 8 Guidelines (margins, double-spaced, 12-point font, etc.)
If creating a more visual style document, you may omit the margins and double-spacing requirements of MLA Style 8
Should be around 7-10 pages in length
You need a Works Cited page with at least three sources (in addition to the client’s website and social media)
