Course objectives

What you'll learn

  • An introduction to social media

    Get an overview of appropriate social media platforms that can be used to communicate research to stakeholders and collaborators. Start to think about what social media you can use on your research project.

  • Basics of engaging in humanitarian social media

    An introduction to humanitarian audiences on social media and what to consider in your engagement.

  • Put together a campaign

    Gain an understanding of how social media campaigns can amplify and broaden the reach of research communication campaigns.

  • Create better social media communications

    Learn the importance of eye-catching social media research communications and learn how to use free web-based tools to create images and short videos.

  • Improve your social media use

    Make informed decisions where to invest limited time in using the appropriate platforms to undertake timely communication activities, and understand how to manage your online reputation.

  • Assess the impact of your research on social media

    Learn how tools such as altmetrics and social media metrics can help evaluate and increase impact of online research communications campaigns

Course curriculum

    1. Before taking this course

    1. A note on using the course

    2. Introduction to the social networks and social media course

    3. Using social media professionally for the first time

    4. A brief guide to Twitter in a professional setting

    5. Other social media platforms to consider

    6. Writing impactful, eye-catching social media posts

    7. The importance of using groups and pages on social media

    8. Assess your own social media platforms and engagement. SWOT Analysis

    9. Social media checklist

    10. Next steps and actions

    11. Introduction to the social networks and social media course quiz

    1. Humanitarian research and social media communications

    2. Engaging effectively on humanitarian social media

    3. Notable humanitarian accounts and hashtags on Twitter

    1. Introduction to the importance of creating and using visual content to support research communications

    2. Canva tutorial

    3. Lumen5 tutorial

    4. Canva and Lumen5 tutorial downloads

    5. Using Creative commons images as part of your humanitarian research communications.

    6. Using Emoji icons and Gifs as part of your social media communications

    7. How to use your new visual content as part of your social media communications

    8. The importance of showing the data in your social media communications

    9. Creating videos using your phone for social media communications

    10. 10 Tips to enhance your research communications using visual content

    11. Useful links

    12. Next steps and actions

    1. Introduction to creating short research Campaigns

    2. Planning and measuring the impact of your research campaign

    3. How to turn research findings into campaigns on social media

    4. Creating content when you do not have the bandwidth

    5. Notable international public health and humanitarian awareness days

    6. Useful links

    7. Next steps and actions

    1. Introduction to making better use of social media to communicate your research

    2. How to use Twitter's Advanced Search, Lists and Scheduling tools

    3. Dealing with disinformation on social media

    4. 10 Tips to enhance your research communications using social media

    5. Communicating your research in a different language

    6. Managing your reputation online

    7. Making better use of social media to communicate your research quiz

    8. Next steps and actions

About the course

Instructor(s)

Social media and research communications expert Andy Tattersall

Andy is an information professional by trade with a background in journalism and delivers teaching and training within academia, healthcare and the information and library field for nearly two decades. He teaches, writes and gives talks on research communications, digital academia, information literacy, social media, altmetrics, technology, open research and information science. Find out more about Andy at https://www.andytattersall.com/