Tag: oregon state

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Social Media Tips and Tutorials

Best practices: Graphics for promoting events on social

Let’s talk about the best ways to do event promotion on social media. Yes, this means how to create eye-catchy graphics. As we dive deeper into this topic, I’ll break down ideas by each platform.

Facebook

Here are image specs that you need to keep in mind when promoting your event on Facebook.

  • Facebook Event image specs: 1200 x 628
  • Native feed image specs: 1080 x 1080 (1:1 ratio)

Facebook Events:

Let’s start with creating a Facebook Event. When designing a graphic to be used in the event, you should keep in mind that you don’t have much space to cram every detail into the graphic. The event page itself can do that for you.

The best graphic you create is an eye-catchy image. Try a headshot of your speaker, a research photo, or a campus beauty picture. Add the title of the lecture or event to the graphic and that’s it. Images that are flooded with info and text will not help draw attention to the event.

Now when you go through the rest of the Facebook event setup, you can add more details including date, time, description of the event and how to register (if needed).

For example, this Facebook event cover isn’t too text-heavy but still has the title of the event.

Facebook timeline:

Just like Facebook Events, the best way to grab the attention of your audience is with a simple graphic. You can use the same image as you did in your event graphic. In this case, it is okay to add the date and time for your event. This graphic can also be used again if you wish to promote it on Twitter.

This example below is of how you can change up your Facebook event cover to be catered towards Facebook or Twitter.

Twitter

Twitter is just like Facebook. You shouldn’t overpower your image with text. You have 280 characters that can help.

Here are image specs that you need to keep in mind.

  • Native feed image specs: 16×9 or 1080 x 1080 (1:1 ratio)

Instagram

Event promotion on Instagram is good for engaging students. It’s better to use Instagram Stories rather than your native feed because Instagram is a photo and video sharing platform. People will not engage with text-heavy posts.

Here are image specs for Instagram:

  • Instagram Stories: 9×16
  • Native Feed: 4×5 (preferred since it takes up more of the screen) or 1080x 1080

Instagram Stories:

Using Instagram Stories to do event promotion is great. You are able to tweak your graphics to be the right specs and either use the “swipe up” feature if you have that or “Link in Bio” for any registration or more info you wish to provide.

Another way to use Instagram Stories is to have multiple cards/slides to deliver information about the event. Have a slide with the title and date and then another with time and location. This helps get all the info across without overcrowding one simple slide.

In the example below, the original image was tweaked to fit IG Stories and still has the most important info.

Instagram Feed:

The feed is not best for text graphics because Instagram is a photo and video sharing platform. People are less likely to engage with something too text-heavy. Try using Instagram Stories instead to help reach your audience. If you do want to post to your feed we suggest using a really high-quality photo– a headshot or campus beauty. In the copy, you can add all the details to the event and you can send people to “Link in Bio” if you need more space. If you have a link in your bio make sure it stays up for the duration of your event promotion.

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Social Media Tips and Tutorials

Social Media Video Specs

A helpful guide of video specs for each social media platform to help everyone create great content.

Facebook

Twitter

Instagram

TikTok

YouTube

  • Aspect ratio: 16:9 
  • File size: 128GB or 12 hours (whichever is less)
  • Length: 
    • Technical: 12 hours
    • Preferred: 1-10 min
  • Captions: CC on all videos unless they are integrated into the video already
  • Example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iky7Rq8DJ0c
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Social Media Tips and Tutorials

Holidays we cover

There are many opportunities to celebrate holidays. We have broken it down to the ones we will cover on the institutional Twitter and Facebook accounts.

Awareness and Appreciation Months

This list incorporates existing traditions and activities that are hosted by other units and programs.

  • Black History Month
  • Women’s History Month
  • Asian Pacific American Heritage Month
  • Mental Health Awareness Month
  • Pride Month
  • LatinX Heritage Month
  • Native American cultural event
  • ECC Festival

Non Denominational U.S. Holidays

There are a small number of national holidays that we participate in. Our activity will be driven by the quality of content that is developed. These are subject to change.

  • Veterans Day
  • Memorial Day
  • MLK Day
  • Halloween

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Social Media Tips and Tutorials

Diving into Instagram Stories and Going Live

Let’s talk Instagram Stories:

When Instagram rolled out this feature, no one really knew how to use it. But they are getting popular with lots of fun features. They’re a great way boost your Instagram game. We’ve been using it more frequently and have seen great progress.

Stories are a great way to grab followers’ attention for a short period of time. Want to get more likes on one of your posts? Want to share a post you like? Post quick updates? Share a cool video? This is where you can do that.

Highlights are a great opportunity to archive your stories. When we post to our Story, we think about which highlight bucket the content will ultimately be saved under. That way we aren’t just posting a story that doesn’t connect with our followers. At the institutional level, our goal is to showcase the Oregon State experience, and Stories do that.

We have found success in using Stories for event or gameday coverage. These truly capture what it’s like to be part of #BeaverNation. We have also seen people engage with our fall, winter and spring highlights. By simply grabbing boomerangs, photos and videos you can produce a great Story.

Additionally, the perfect length is about 4-8 slides because people will just skip past you if the story is too long. You want to make sure to have a good hook at the beginning and your followers will love it! Check out Sprout Social’s Instagram Best Practices if you still want to learn more.

Next up, going Live:

The key is to have a goal in mind. Are you going to answer follower questions? Or are you going to showcase an event or are you going to go live with someone? Once you have that figured out, you can execute a plan of how your live will go.

The feature is pretty easy to use and here are some tips we’ve learned:

  • Post an Instagram story a couple days and hours before you go live —this way your followers know it’s happening.
  • Save your live after it’s done. It will stay on your profile for 24 hours and people can revisit it.
  • Instagram live will cut you off after one hour. So make sure you keep track of the time.
  • Make sure you have a tripod or a secure place to put your phone when you go live. You don’t want to move your phone too much or it doesn’t make for a fun live.
  • Better lighting always helps.
  • Make sure the phone is charged.
  • If you want to do a Q&A, check out these helpful tips. This feature is engaging and allows you to connect with your audience. You’re able to pick questions you want to answer and won’t have to read the comments as they roll in.
  • Check out how to go live with another Instagram user here. If you have a student or researcher, this might be a fun way to interact.

Both these Instagram features are a great way to connect with your followers. These are becoming more popular among brands and helps up your Instagram game. Go have some fun!

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Social Media Tips and Tutorials

Tips for a great Instagram

Instagram is the most popular with students and prospective students. This is where Oregon State can share campus beauty/ life photos and videos.

The first thing to think of is a goal. Ours was more followers and engagement, so this is how we started to up our game in the Instagram world.

We learned that you need to be consistent in posting. Basically, look at your metrics to see when followers are online and post then. Make sure you have diversity in your posts (this doesn’t just go for people). Don’t just post buildings or event info. Show your students or professors in their environment or go to an event and share photos from it. Put yourself in the shoes of your followers to know what they want to see.

Break up your feeds! Pictures are great, but Instagram is also a video sharing platform. Post videos spotlighting professors, students and your department or a fun lighthearted video (time-lapse of campus). This helps your feed look more pleasing. It’s important to make sure videos are formatted correctly and don’t cut anything off — that leads to less engagement.

IGTV is becoming more popular to use within the Instagram app. It’s a great place to post videos longer than 1:00, and you can share those as posts as well to boost viewership and reach. This is something the institutional account has started to do with event coverage.

Be active. Don’t just leave a post after it’s been posted. Look at comments, give them a like or answer any questions. Look at your feed and engage with other posts from accounts you follow. Also keep up with those DMs. All these are ways for followers to form a connection your account.

Since adapting to these best practices, Oregon State’s account hit 50K in December 2019 and continues to grow. It’s important to be able to adapt to the changes Instagram makes as you continue to grow your own accounts. The only way is up!

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Social Media Tips and Tutorials

We joined TikTok. Here’s what we’ve learned

TikTok is becoming more popular among 16-24 year olds. During fall term 2019, Oregon State launched its TikTok account with the goal to connect with prospective and current students by producing timely, authentic and relevant content that showcases the university and its community.

The most important part of this social media platform is to stay on top of trends (including music) and hashtags by spending time on the app. We have found it helpful to follow other university accounts and see what they are doing.

These are the topics or trends the OSU account will create videos from:

  • College related trends
  • Trendy hashtags/music
  • Dance and Cheer team
  • Student clubs

We’ve had success on TikTok so far with collaborating with departments, clubs and student organizations across campus. We were lucky to create a video with the OSU Dance and Cheer Team, and it’s one of our best videos since launching the account. Success will come when you collaborate creatively. We’ve also seen success when sharing our exported TikToks on Instagram Stories. This connects your followers with another channel and can help with growth. A little call to action never hurts.

While we are still learning this new platform, we need to remember that the audience we are trying to reach is not only current students but prospective students. We need to create videos that showcase campus in a positive way but also builds on nationwide trends. Sure, there’ll be some things that you cannot do because they aren’t university appropriate, but there’s always a trend/style/music track to explore. You need to put your creative hat on and be willing to put yourself in the shoes of Generation Z knowing no idea is a bad one. Go out there and get your TikToks started!

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Social Media Tips and Tutorials

Event Coverage for Social Media

Getting out and covering events across campus is a fun way to engage your social media audience. They are always wanting to learn more about the Oregon State experience.

Part of the strategy for Oregon State’s institutional accounts is to attend events to help bring awareness of the culture on campus. Our goal is to reach students and prospective students by posting stories and photos to Instagram.

With this in mind let’s talk about our coverage of the 2020 Women’s Basketball Civil War. Planning is everything! You need to have a game plan and different scenarios.

Our game plan was simple. We designated jobs to certain people. Someone would be on Instagram stories, someone taking photos, and someone ready to push a tweet out if we won. Secondly, we made sure we had a plan if we did win. That was to test out going live from Instagram. The goal of that was to reach a bigger audience and celebrate a big win.

Here’s a breakdown of each job:

  • Instagram Stories– To get photos/video/boomerangs of the team, fans, cheer and Benny. With the key thing in mind: to show what it’s like to be at a game even if you aren’t there. (Make sure you have a beginning and end)
  • Photos– capturing game action, cheer, Benny, fans (before, during, and after the game)
  • Twitter– on call for if we win with great copy and a fun photo

With all of that planned out before the game we all felt prepared. Just to be clear things change all the time and you need to make adjustments. We made sure to go to the game early and feel conformable in a new environment. Sometimes that can be the challenging part but, if the crowds having fun then you will probably feed off of that energy.

Looking back at the game we didn’t win, but we put up a good fight. If you make sure to have a solid game plan heading into an event and people know what they are suppose to do you will have great content. Our Instagram stories and photos turned out fabulous and our followers enjoyed them. Our goal is to continue to share more events on our Instagram feed as time continues.

Cheers to the next events!

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Social Media Tips and Tutorials

How to crosspost videos in Twitter Media Studio

Make sure you are logged in and viewing Studio.twitter.com or log in by going to Twitter Ads → Creatives tab → select Media.

Click the Upload button at the top-right of the page and select the video you want.

Give your video a name. For example, Benny learns how to cook | #GoBeavs

Select the best thumbnail. These should be catchy and draw in the viewers.

Next, click the sharing tab.

You can type the handle of the accounts you want to share with.
Example: @OregonState

Once completing the steps above, your video will be crossposted. However, it does not send a notification to the other account. It’s helpful to give them a heads up that you added it to their library.

How to know if a video has been crossposted to you:

In the upper left-hand corner where it says Library there is a dropdown menu. Click Shared Media to be able to view any content that has been crossposted to your account.

Once you are in the shared media section you can see everything that has been shared with you. To post, click the tweet button and add in your copy or other components. Then you can send it out directly or schedule for later! 

Crossposting will help us share content easily and collaborate more. If you have a big announcement or project coming up it doesn’t hurt to give people a heads up. Slack is a great tool for letting people know a video was crossposted.

We will not be able to share all content that is crossposted with us on the institutional level account (@oregonstate) but please don’t hesitate to share. We will do our best to integrate it into our schedule.

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Brand Guidelines

Beaver Orange – A User Guide

One of our greatest assets at Oregon State is our primary color. Beaver Orange is vibrant, distinct and provides a solid base for the larger color palette. Through the years we have worked to present a consistent color no matter the channel or medium you are working with. In conjunction with the Oregon State logo, this is the best way to present a unified visual identity to the marketplace.

To do this we provide different color builds for various uses.

  • Pantone 1665 for print jobs here on campus, through Printing and Mailing Services.
  • CMYK for off-set print jobs done through an outside vendor (bid through Printing and Mailing Services).
  • RGB for digital signage, presentations and as a fall back for less advanced design software (word, powerpoint, etc…)
  • Hex is used only for websites, applications and mobile applications.

This guide applies to our entire color palette. If you ever have a question don’t be afraid to toss it out to the OSU Communicators slack community or email University Marketing directly.

You can find our color palette in the OSU Brand Guide.

Update to RGB and Hex

Since the launch of our updated color palette, in April of 2017, we have lived with a very narrow scope for how we are able to use Beaver Orange on websites. Because we strive (and are required) to meet WCAG AA guidelines for accessibility we were unable to use orange and white together for text/background colors.

This greatly limited our creative and design staff across the university. To address this we made a very slight tweak to the Hex of Beaver Orange. Visually the change is nearly imperceptible but provides enough contrast to use orange, white and black combinations. For centrally administered web properties (through Web and Mobile Services) the colors have been updated automatically. We have been working with our decentralized partners to make sure they have anything needed to adjust to this change. If you need assistance or have questions please connect with Kegan Sims on Slack or by contacting University Marketing via email.

As a result of the update to the Hex, it made sense to update RGB as well. RGB is primarily used for material displayed digitally (signboards, email, presentations, etc..) but also in print if you are using basic programs such as Microsoft Word or Powerpoint for design. On rare occasions, graphics made using RGB colors end up on websites. In order to maintain as much consistency as possible, both the Hex and RGB were tweaked together. These changes are subtle and we don’t expect you to rush out and update your materials. As you update content or create new versions of your digital collateral that is a good time to make a change.