World Wildlife Fund Social Media Research Report
World Wildlife Fun Social Media Research Report
Executive Summary:
The World Wildlife Fund is an internationally recognized NGO that works to promote the conservation of our planet and its resources. They have a large online following and online presence; however, they could utilize their online platforms to have greater global reach. By engaging with their audience, varying their content from one platform to another and actively promoting their social channels, they could take their already good use of online platforms to the next level.
Introduction:
- The World Wildlife Fund (herein referred to as the WWF) is the world’s leading conservation organization. Their mission is to conserve nature and reduce the most pressing threats to the diversity of life on earth. WWF works in 100 countries and has millions of members around the globe. The WWF has six main focuses; forests, oceans, fresh water, wildlife, food, and climate. Their unique way of working combines a foundation of science and their global reach. (Endangered Species Conservation) Miles Dorman and Emily Walker have been hired by the WWF senior management team to help them increase their global reach via their online and social media presence.
- Miles and Emily have researched the best ways to create engaging content online and how to improve their global reach.
Literature review:
- For social media to have the best reach and to be engaging a company must ensure they are following a few key steps. The first thing they must do is identify the audience. To know how to talk to your audience, you must first understand who your audience is. (Redish, 2014) Once you have identified this, you can ask yourselves the questions; what do you want to achieve through your content and what does your audience want from you.
- With multiple social media outlets, it is important to vary your content. Different social media platforms have different nuances and userbases, so posts should suit the nature of the individual platform. (Cyca, 2018)
- In addition to knowing your audience and varying your content, it is crucial to make sure that your content is engaging. You want your audience to respond to your content, and it is best to give direct responses to their comments. (Rose, 2017) Address your audience personally and ask questions to keep the conversation going. Sharing their content is another great way for your audience to feel engaged and to ensure they are sharing your message.
- By taking the time to ensure their content is interesting, engaging and aimed at their audience, the WWF can be sure they are utilizing social media to the best of their ability while achieving their goals.
Methodology/Results:
- After doing a thorough review of the WWF online presence it was discovered that they are active on social media, they are on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube and they have a reasonable following as you will see in chart 1.0.
- The WWF posts relatively frequently on their social channels. They tend to post in clusters, where they will post multiple times in a few days and then their channels will be silent for a while. For example, on Twitter, they tweeted on March 3 and then did not tweet again until March 25. Social Media channels move fast, so it is important to post frequently to ensure your users see the content you are posting and feel that they are up-to-date and in the know about your organization. (Rose 2017)
- WWF takes advantages of significant events to increase social media activity. During the lead up to ‘Earth Hour,’ they posted over 50 times (includes retweets/shares)
- Research shows that images and videos are great additions to social media posts. Visuals make a post more appealing, as well it caters to the user who might be more interested in scrolling through photos versus reading plain text. (Rose, 2017) (See image 1.1) WWF post very inspiring pictures that captivate their existing audience as well could entice new followers to visit and follow their pages.
1.0 WWF Social media following:
1.1 WWF Average social media engagement:
Discussion/Recommendations:
- WWF has done a great job of defining itself as a brand, and they have global recognition. The next step for them is to broaden that reach further and to better engage with their audience. Doing this will allow them to have a more significant impact and to drive their mission forward around the world.
Where there is room for improvement:
1. Follower/Community engagement:
o The WWF has a rather low engagement rate with their followers. The WWF’s follower will feel like they have more of a voice in environmentalism and conservation if WWF starts responding to comments. Responding to followers comments is a great way to make your online community feel valued and therefore likely to keep engaging.
o The organization’s Twitter account is following 3,065 accounts, but they are all environmental organizations and pro-environment public figures. The organization’s Instagram account is only following 22 accounts. By following more accounts the WWF can improve their follower engagement, an excellent way to ‘build community’ (Hou, 2018).
o Another great way to engage with your community is through online surveys. Surveys allow followers to engage with the organization and your content. (“5 Steps to Engage Your Audience on Social Media”) The surveys can benefit you by helping you to find out what your audience wants and can be a way to find out more about who your audience is. See the example by Women’s Health on Twitter (Images 2.0 and 2.1) You can see that a simple survey question generated 67 comments and 80 likes compared to their typical tweet which gets about one or two comments and ten likes. Instagram will also allow you to survey your audience while using the “story” function. It works best with ‘either-or’ questions which are a great way to gauge your audiences knowledge or directly ask the style of content they want to see.
2.0 Woman’s Health Twitter survey question:
2.1 Women’s Health Twitter Survey responses:
2. Vary content on channels:
o Every time the WWF posts content they put it on all their social media platforms. To have a dynamic social media engagement, you must vary your content. Changing your content from one platform to the next encourages your audience to follow you on more than one platform. It makes sense to post an organization's most pressing message to all platforms, so it gets the most reach; however additional content between the platforms is key to sparking interest and reaching more of your audience.
o For example, short video clips work well on Instagram and Facebook where people are looking for visual stimulation, statistics and facts go far on twitter.
3. Alter your approach when communication statistics.
o Environmentalism relies on stats, and WWF’s followers will want to know these stats, such as how much plastic is in the ocean and would like to have a way to put that into context. Rather than listing these statistics using text, infographics provide an engaging way for the audience to view the content as well as share it with their community. Infographics are 30 times more likely to be viewed than text content. (Long, 2016) See image 2.2 and 2.3
2.2 WWF unengaging way to share a statistic:
2.3 World Health Organization uses an infographic to engage with readers on statistics:
4. Make social media channels present on your website:
o Most of your audience will visit your website as the first point of contact. Because of this, you want to have social channels very accessible when a visitor first lands on your page. By having your social icons at the top of the page, viewers who are familiar with the platforms are more like to go to them to engage with your organization, resulting in more likes and follows increasing reach.
o In image 2.4 you can see that the WWF currently has their social icons at the bottom of the page. By locating them here, visitors are unlikely to see them.
2.4 Bottom of the WWF Website:
Conclusion:
The World Wildlife Fund has an extensive reach, to capitalize on this reach, the organization should work to further engage with their audience in a personalized way. The WWF could utilize their audience, engaged group looking to spread the WWF's message. If the WWF starts to engage with their audience by responding to comments, offering opportunities for feedback, and providing shareable content, they could increase their reach while further speeding their mission on a global scale.
Bibliography:
1. “5 Steps to Engage Your Audience on Social Media.” Business.com, www.business.com/articles/5-steps-to-engage-your-audience-on-social-media/.
2. “Endangered Species Conservation.” WWF, World Wildlife Fund, www.worldwildlife.org/.
3. Cyca, Michelle. “Stop Posting the Same Message on Social Media (And Do This Instead).” Hootsuite Social Media Management, 1 May 2018, blog.hootsuite.com/cross-promote-social-media/.
4. Hou, Youyang, and Cliff Lampe. “Social Media Effectiveness for Public Engagement: An Example of Small Nonprofits.”Non-Profit News | Nonprofit Quarterly, 15 Oct. 2018, nonprofitquarterly.org/2018/01/26/social-media-effectiveness-for-public-engagement-an-example-of-small-nonprofits/.
5 Long, Jonathan. “The Power of Visual Content [Infographic].”Online Marketing Consulting Agency, 14 Jan. 2016,www.marketdominationmedia.com/power-visual-content-infographic/
6. Redish, Janice. Letting Go of the Words. Morgan Kaufmann, 2014.
7. Rose, Katie. “10 Tips For Increasing Your Social Media Engagement.” Social Media Week, 27 Oct. 2017, socialmediaweek.org/blog/2017/10/10-tips-increasing-social-media-engagement/. Below you will find my final report for the WWF.