In the past week, an as-yet-unidentified man has been entering unlocked homes in Chapel Hill and stroking the legs of women while they sleep. This is of course unwelcome and jarring news, particularly for those in the quiet college town that surrounds UNC, where three years ago this week the student body president was kidnapped and brutally killed (her door was also unlocked). The Daily Tar Heel has been on the story since the first incident last Friday, and since then I’ve mulled how I could use our social media accounts to make students aware of the potential threat.

I wanted to raise awareness without being alarmist, preach safety tips without being smarmy (or reminding students of their parents) and reach as many people as possible. Wednesday, day 6, I started brainstorming hashtags with other editors. The incidents have reminded folks of Antoine Dodson and his infamous “hide your wife, hide your kids” interview. We somewhat seriously considered making reference to that, in part to build off of what students were already tweeting and in part because we felt the viral video’s fame could help grab students’ attention to this issue. At the same time, we didn’t want to make light of the very real threat the victims had faced. We settled on #lockthedoor, snappy yet relevant, given that the intruder entered through unlocked doors each time. I’ve curated Tweets using Storify to show how I used the account throughout the day:

I typically use the @dailytarheel account to share links and respond to individuals. Rarely is it used to Tweet frequently on a single topic in a single day, but I decided this issue was important enough to dominate the feed for most of the day. But because of that, I tried to take a joke, hoping students would appreciate it and perhaps tuck away some of the useful advice as well. Any complaints about the hashtag so far are about equal to the amount of complaints we might generally get about anything. I’m not too worried that we’re offending followers, but it’s something I’ll be watching.

The intruder is still at-large, but I like to think that this campaign helped raise awareness at least a little bit today. From our analytics I know Twitter was a top referrer to our stories online, and the hashtag was trending in Chapel Hill at one point. I plan to continue with it until they catch someone, or until the incidents stop. Ideally, we’ll hear good news soon. What do you think? I would love to hear suggestions for ways we could make this reach and resonate with more students.

Today when I went to update The Daily Tar Heel’s Facebook page I was prompted to upgrade the page to access new features. I was initially wary. When are changes to Facebook ever good?

But unlike past changes, the pages upgrades make sense and solve previous problems. It’s much easier to manage a page now and there are completely new ways for page owners to interact with their fans and spread their message. Here are the top three things I love about the changes:

1. Greater page autonomy. Previously, your page was tied to each admin’s personal account. Now, I can switch between my personal account and each page I manage. I can “like” other pages as the page and not as myself, which is helpful because I don’t care to see updates from 100+ UNC pages in my own wall. On the DTH’s news feed though, this is great.
   



2. Better tracking. When I’m logged in as the page, I get notifications any time someone likes the page or a post or comments. I could see all of this information in aggregate before, using Insights, but the notification makes it easier to tell on a daily basis how fans are reacting to the page.
   



3. Easier sharing. Before, if I wanted to share another page’s post on the DTH page, I had to get the URL of that post and post it to the DTH page as a link (whereas if I wanted to share on my on wall, all I had to do was press “share” and add a comment to post). Now, I can “share” and post to the DTH wall. Because it’s easier, I can see myself sharing others’ posts much more frequently and similar to how I retweet from @dailytarheel.
   

Other things I like: The ability to RSVP to events as the DTH, handy for keeping track of things happening later on I might want to share with readers; the ability to change our category (was previously Brands & Products and is now Media/News/Publishing); and the ability to show who is managing the page (a feature I haven’t turned on yet, but am interested in). I also like that I can post on other pages as the DTH, which I’ve already done to share a link to one of our stories. I can see this feature helping us connect with a new audience.

Dislikes: I wish the page showed thumbnail photos of our fans instead of just a number, and I wish I had greater control over the photos that line the top of the profile page (for instance, the ability to pick an album to draw those photos from). Otherwise, I’m really excited to see how this will make page management easier.

Are there any new features I’ve overlooked that I should take advantage of here?

I’m always looking for new and improved ways to interact with readers on The Daily Tar Heel‘s Facebook page. Jarrard Cole pointed out how the Wall Street Journal has started giving readers more instructions with certain posts – asking them to “like” the post if they agree with a statement or comment on why they disagree. It’s an idea they got from ESPN, @wsj Outreach Editor Zach Seward says.

I tried it yesterday on the DTH page and was quite pleased by the results. The post had more impressions and higher engagement than our wall posts generally attract. The comments were more thoughtful than usual, too.

One wall post doesn’t say much about the tactic’s overall effectiveness, but it’s definitely something I’m going to continue trying.

I’m giving a talk to DTH editors this week about ways they can use Twitter better and came up with these tips on what to do and what not to do. Anything else I should include?

Daily Tar Heel reporters and editors are now taking questions via Formspring.

Answering reader questions isn’t a new idea, but we’re excited about trying that with this new platform. This isn’t a tool that was created with a journalistic purpose in mind, but neither was Twitter or Facebook – two tools that have we now recognize have immense value for journalists.

Creating a forum where readers could easily ask questions of DTH staff has been on our radar for awhile, but we’ve been limited by time and ability. Formspring might not be the most nuanced way for us to accomplish this goal (I imagine the ratio of spam to legitimate questions will be high), but I’m happy we’re trying something new. I think this is a really good lesson for other college newspapers: Make the most with what you have, and stop waiting for something better that might never come.

For several weeks now I’ve been posting on The Daily Tar Heel’s new Tumblr blog. The idea was borne out of my experience with my personal Tumblr and through this Q&A with the man behind the Newsweek Tumblr.

So far I’ve used the blog to share DTH cartoons, photos of weird goings-on in the Quad, reader comments and national stories about higher education trends. It veers more towards the light-hearted, although I have used to to respond to complaints about our coverage I saw raised in other Tumblr blogs.

What I like: Mostly, it’s ease of use. These are things I come across throughout the day, and they don’t always have a place elsewhere. In the past I’ve thrown similar-style blog posts up on our campus blog, but it’s not well-suited for a quick quote, photo or link. And sometimes that’s all that needs to be shared.

I’m not so sure how this fits into our overall strategy, or whether it serves any purpose.  Even if it does, I’m not sure if it’s something that is worth devoting limited time and resources to. We’re steadily gaining followers, and we’ve gotten a good deal of traffic from links posted to Twitter, but whether readers get anything out of it is another question. Undoubtedly we’re reading a different type of audience than we typically do though, so the question becomes then how to get them to dailytarheel.com. And that I haven’t figured out yet. Any suggestions?

I’m really happy to announce what will be my last job at The Daily Tar Heel: community manager. As online managing editor I helped create this role, and I’m excited to see it continue and play a part in shaping it. We’ve made so many strides this year under Emily Stephenson’s leadership, and I only hope to continue in that vein.

My title is officially community manager, but I most identify with the notion of a community host similar to how Steve Buttry has described the role. Here’s how I described the role in my application:

Ideally, the community manager would realize that there’s actually very little about the community that can be managed; instead, she needs to be able to participate and know how to get the most out of each interaction. The community manager needs to be a personable and recognizable figure in the community, such that people know who to contact with concerns and ideas. She also needs to be trusted by the community. The community manager must recognize that she needs to build a relationship with the community before she can accomplish her goals. We can’t just swoop in and ask readers to share things with us — there needs to be a relationship from the beginning that encourages openness. For the DTH, the community manager needs to be someone who can relay concerns back to the newsroom and make its mission more transparent to readers.

I have my own ideas for what I can do with the role, and I’m excited to get started. For those who are old hats at this job, any advice?

In about a month, The Daily Tar Heel’s Facebook fan count has grown by slightly more than 1,000 people — approximately 250 percent. How?

We created our Facebook page in early March, but beyond entering basic info and setting a profile picture, we didn’t do much with the page in terms of interacting with readers. Our fan count was growing gradually, but lacked any sort of momentum.

The community manager post at the DTH is a new one this year. We felt like devoting one person — Emily Stephenson — as the face behind our social media accounts would increase the quality of our interactions with readers. The rapidly growing number of fans validates this theory, and because a good amount of traffic to our Web site generates from Facebook, the more fans we have who are potentially clicking through to our Web site clearly benefits us in the long run.

On a daily basis, Emily chooses selected articles to post on our Facebook page. Other times she asks readers for input for future stories we’re working on. Sometimes she asks for feedback on stories we’ve written. She responds whenever readers ask questions, and she’s also solicited reader-submitted photos via Facebook. Emily’s also the face behind @dailytarheel on Twitter (which has seen considerable growth in followers since mid-August too, but had a much more developed fan base than our Facebook page initially).

What Emily’s doing isn’t rocket science, but the results show there’s incredible value in what she’s doing. They also show how much news organizations can benefit by just talking and listening to readers online. Fancy apps are great, but they can’t replace basic reader-reporter relationships.

I’m working on getting things ready for the DTH when we get back in the fall, and already I’ve had some questions about what search engine optimization is and what it’ll mean for our workflow.

Since this was a topic I felt I’d come back to a lot, I went ahead and organized my thoughts into a slideshow that I can use for future training for staff. Here’s what I felt were the basics of what any journalist needs to know about search engine optimization. Have I left anything off I should include?

One of the things I learned while managing editor for print last year was the importance of knowing what you want to accomplish. I took time today to jot down my goals and iron out with my awesome boss what my job will detail next year as online managing editor.

I realized I can be most effective if I focus on small-group training, giving intensive feedback and delegating the execution of projects to others.  I also realized while making this list that I can’t do it all, and that I can do much more if I help others do it well.

I think this list is pretty thorough, but I learned last year that the never-ending role of management is to deal with whatever is thrown at you. I’m sure my job will end up encompassing much more than this, but I think this is a good start. Thoughts?

Daily

• Ensure Web site, blogs, social network accounts are all working properly; get problems fixed.
• Oversee the homepage and posting of Web updates throughout the day with online editor.
• Oversee interactions with readers via social media throughout the day with the community manager.
• Send staff e-mail of readership statistics.
• Critique blogs, videos, podcasts, slideshows and other online-only content when the lesson is applicable to all staff. Send links of interesting things to read.
• Send individuals feedback on blogs and other online-only content when critique is too detailed for staff listserv.
• Work with reporters while they edit and upload videos, podcasts, slideshows and other online-only content. Approve before publishing.
• Work with copy editors on hyperlinking and headline writing for the Web.
• Be a third-read on online-only stories. Work with reporters to format print stories for the Web.
• Answer questions from readers and help troubleshoot problems, or refer to someone else to answer.

Weekly

• Send out an e-mail of weekly highs/lows of online content.
• Set goals for the content for the week ahead.
• Weekly management meeting.
• Coordinate plans for multimedia, photo coverage for the week ahead after enterprise.

Monthly

• Meet twice-monthly with online representatives from all desks.
• Meet with Innovation team.
• Solicit professional critiques of our work.
• Work with news adviser to schedule enrichments.