Click. Delete. Repeat.
Your student email inbox is full of generic campus messages. Most are probably deleted before being read. Some linger in the inbox for months, unopened and disregarded. So how is a student group to get out its message?
The answer is social media, said senior Nathan Brand, the social media coordinator for the campus chapter of Young America’s Foundation. YAF’s videos have garnered national attention in the past, its Facebook events are well-attended, and its Twitter account has more than 300 followers.
“We’re Hillsdale College,” Brand said, “We’re conservative. There are people in the Facebook and Twitter-spheres who love both of those.”
Brand’s social media efforts are largely campus-specific, using Hillsdale’s tightly-knit community to his advantage online. Event-oriented photo albums on Facebook allow him to tag members of YAF from all over campus and reach greater audiences.
“If you’re able to tap into the different friend groups, you’ll tap into most of campus,” Brand said,
Sam Holdeman, president of the Hillsdale College Republicans, has a different outlook. The group has recently added an Instagram account to its social media roster, to complement Facebook and Twitter. He views social media as a more personal, more convenient way of communication than email.
“I’d like to use social media as a secondary way of contacting people,” Holdeman said. “[Followers] just happen across a reminder that the College Republicans are doing something. We hope to help get them involved.”
But social media has its limitations. After all, emails are guaranteed to arrive in their respective inboxes. Social media’s algorithms make it less sure.
“Social media is kind of hit or miss,” Holdeman said. “I think the emails are more effective.”
Jack Butler, president of the Gadfly Group, sees social media as a necessary evil. The group has a Facebook page, a YouTube account, and a blog.
“What the group is doing in real life is the important thing,” Butler said.
The group’s Facebook page, run primarily by Butler, shares articles, campus events, and YouTube videos of its own events. The blog has proven a bit more difficult to operate successfully.
“It’s easy, with social media, to communicate small, digestible pieces of information,” Butler said. “But a blog is a venue for extended mental perambulation.”
Whether contending with a deluge of emails or a dearth of time, social media helps campus groups connect with the student body in an immediate way. Involvement is the end game, not ‘likes’ or ‘shares.’
“The goal of social media,” Butler said, “is to get people off social media.”
