#BUSCVNGR

Michael DeFillippis (COM’13) came to the meeting to speak on behalf of his teammates (Alex Shuck and Rachel Sprung) and their experience with the SCVNGR Beantown Challenge. From February 7th through the 14th, the Boston University community was invited to participate in various challenges at campus locations (the GSU, Warren Towers, SMG) for points and prizes. For the campaign, they:

• Created a Facebook event page
• Enlisted the help of 17 “student ambassadors” from the Dean of Students office, who helped to spread the word
• Launched a fan page for Dean Elmore
• Created an initial batch of 15 challenges
• Used #BUSCVNGR to spread the word on Twitter

During the campaign:

• 113 participants played (this number does not include the team or ambassadors)
• An average of 22 challenges were completed per person
• New challenges were rolled out to keep up with the demand of new games

Some limitations of the tool include: iPhone and Android support only (if the challenges are connected into treks, SMS-capable phones can play, too). Limited backend functionality, including analytics (exportable views of participants, freeform text entries for challenges). There was also some confusion on challenge resets, which allow participants to do the same challenge for more points after an hour has passed.

To learn more about their campaign, visit the Beantown Challenge SCVNGR page, as well as coverage from the BU Quad.

BU Culture Shock

Raul Fernandez of the Howard Thurman Center presented on the efforts of the BU Culture Shock blog, a student-run operation with roughly 30 staff members (contributors and four editorial). The blog recently celebrated its first birthday, and has seen tremendous growth — in strategy, traffic and working knowledge. Some brief highlights:

• Currently netting roughly 4,400 hits/month on a custom-built WordPress frame
• About 20% of reader base are “frequent fliers” — considered heavy repeat visitors
• Emphasis on “street cred”/authenticity of voice. Allow writers ample freedom to say things in their own way
• Give student writers & editors opportunity to self-edit and self-police with occasional spot-checking from the staff
• Be Younonymous: Compelling content from anonymous guest contributors
• Releasing content at an average rate of 20 posts per week
• Recruiting new writers through current writers
• Using Google Analytics to benchmark against past performance

We asked Raul if he would be willing to share more about the inner workings of making BU Culture Shock run smoothly, and he has kindly provided us with the presentation he delivered during the meeting. Social Media Communicators members can access it on the SMC Google Group.

Facebook Pages

Jenny Mackintosh of Public Relations updated the Communicators on recent changes made to Facebook Page functionality. Facebook Pages now act more similarly to Profiles, including the ability to “Use Facebook as Your Page.” This includes updates & notifications (new fans and wall posts), the ability to view the News Feed as the Page, and the ability to write on other Pages’ walls. Some possible trouble spots included:

• Pages’ walls no longer in complete timeline order (help for admins: Admin View)
• Confusion about switching between “Use Facebook as Your Page” and “Use Facebook as Yourself” — could lead to erroneous posts from the wrong author.
• Facebook no longer automatically delivering news feed updates to fans who haven’t visited your Page recently (read more about this on All Facebook)

Upcoming Events

Our last item on the agenda was to go over upcoming events for cross promotion and introduce new members. We have posted the Upcoming Events to the Google Group, which can be accessed by all Social Media Communicators. If you can’t see the group, simply request an invite on the page.

Questions? Comments? Leave them below!

Foursquare and geolocation services

Mary Tunney and Jenny Mackintosh of Public Relations introduced their plan to roll out Foursquare campus-wide in the next few weeks. In their own words:

Foursquare is a mobile application that makes cities easier to use and more interesting to explore. It is a friend-finder, a social city guide and a game that challenges users to experience new things, and rewards them for doing so. Foursquare lets users “check in” to a place when they’re there, tell friends where they are and track the history of where they’ve been and who they’ve been there with.

They have been working to compile a list of venues related to Boston University in preparation for Foursquare to launch a Boston University Foursquare page (similar to the Syracuse University Foursquare page, for example). Currently, BU has a profile page, which will be converted into the newer university landing page in the next week or so. Once BU “owns” those venues on Foursquare, we will be able to access analytics on who is visiting, as well as manage specials and discounts at particular locations around campus.

Leo Pare of Athletics asked about the accuracy of checking in to locations close to each other, for example, Nickerson Field and Agganis Arena. We clarified that Foursquare’s check-in system is not automatic; it can use geolocation services on your phone to suggest nearby locations, but ultimately, it is up to the user to check in. Susan Lebovits of Sustainability asked if Foursquare could be used to mark “green” landmarks around campus as part of a promotion, since the actual Sustainability office is not likely to be visited by the general population. We suggested that she send a list of venues she might be interested in promoting so that we can include them in a second round of requests. We also discussed SCVNGR as another tool that might allow her to create a challenge on her own.  Raul Fernandez of the Howard Thurman Center also underlined a few of the key differences between Foursquare and SCVNGR, describing SCVNGR as “more flexible and customizable” with the addition of challenges and “treks.”

BU Today’s new editor, John O’Rourke

John O’Rourke came by the Social Media Communicators meeting to introduce himself and to give some insights on what BU Today is looking to cover in the upcoming academic year. They are looking for feedback on the site — the good, the bad, and any suggestions on how to make BU Today a more effective news source for the campus community. They will put a stronger emphasis on student stories this year in the hopes of boosting student readership. They are also looking to expand beyond their core set of campus experts and to talk with a broader range of professors. Any information or suggestions can be directed either to today@bu.edu, or to John O’Rourke directly.

Kim Cornuelle, BU Today’s production manager, also went over some tips for coverage. The front page has three headlines and one feature per day during the regular academic year. If you have an event coming up, make sure to put it into the BU Calendar, as they populate their BU Today calendar (both on the site and in the daily e-mail) from those events. They also suggested keeping BU Today in the loop for social media-related cross-promotional opportunities — any official event hashtags on Twitter, links and other information can be included in the bottoms of stories to help promote use.

Upcoming Events

Sustainability, SPH, DAR, FitRec and CFA all had events to promote this month, which we will list in the “Communicators” section shortly. If you do not have access to this section, please send an e-mail to jemack@bu.edu to request.

Update 4:22 pm: The event listing is now live & available to the SMC group.