by Photo by Yaroslav Shuraev on Pexels
By Catalina Kurihara
One viral post can build an advocacy movement, and one careless post can undermine it. When a campaign shares a misleading statistic or mislabels a photo, the campaign could lose trust, credibility, and could cause harm to the people the campaign meant to help. With young communicators entering into social media positions, understanding online advocacy campaigning and how to build trust is a valuable tool.
While advocacy campaigns are often thought of as “raising awareness” or “driving change,” these goals are hard to measure. Strong campaigns set SMARTIE goals: specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, timebound, inclusive, and equitable.
While SMART goals are effective, SMARTIE goals expand the framework by adding inclusion and equity to center social justice and shared power. When creating content for online advocacy campaigns, it’s important to keep the campaigns’ SMARTIE objectives in the back of your mind for effective and productive communications. Every post should in someway relate back to your SMARTIE goals.
By having clear objectives that center social justice, we can begin to find our audience and learn how to earn their trust. According to Fenton, campaigning begins by finding out how your target audience perceives the issue you want to advocate for. Much like other campaigns, background research about your issue is critical. Campaigns build trust by being relatable, specific, and culturally aware.
Principles in credibility, adapted from the Fenton report:
- The power of colloquial conversation: People shouldn’t have to decode your message to understand your why. Using direct, common language allows for more people to find your campaign.
- Rinse and repeat: Showing up consistently creates a sense of familiarity that could grow into trust. Find your brand, establish it, repeat it, and let it grow.
- Authenticity over performance: Social justice campaigns focus on real-life issues. Therefore, campaigns need to be authentic in their representation of these issues. Lived experience is expertise when it comes to advocacy.
Once you know your objectives and understand your audience, you can begin crafting your content calendar and posting. However, the easiest way to lose trust on social media is by skipping your evaluation. Verifying your content is paramount before you post.
Trust takes months to build and one false claim to lose. Fact-checking and contextual research should become routine throughout your campaign and always be thought of before, during, and after posting. This starts with lateral reading.
Lateral reading is a media literacy strategy to evaluate the credibility of information. It can be as simple as cross-checking sources or as in-depth as researching stakeholders in a company. For social media advocacy campaigns, lateral reading is a valuable tool for strategic communications in how it acts as a method of verification. Being diligent about contextual information protects the integrity of the campaign.
Ultimately, successful online advocacy is more than creating engaging content or gaining followers. Online advocacy is about building relationships grounded in trust and authenticity. By setting SMARTIE goals, understanding your target audience, incorporating Fenton’s principles for credibility, and consistently verifying information before sharing it, young communicators can create impactful and ethical online advocacy campaigns.
Social media is changing social advocacy. That means we have to adapt.
With online campaigns having power to reach people and inspire change on a broader scale, it’s important to remember that power comes with responsibility. Every post is an opportunity to strengthen credibility and move a campaign closer to its goals. Never forget to think before you post.
