Unlocking Success: Tips for Keeping Your Social Media Active and Engaging During the Holidays
With the Summer Term comes an abundance of content; from post-exam celebrations to sports events and school productions. Your school becomes a bustling hub of activity and this is usually reflected in your social media content. However, once that final school bell of the year rings, school social media content tends to dwindle quite dramatically. Whilst the summer break does offer families a chance to wind down and relax, away from the school environment, it’s important that Marketers don’t take their foot off the pedal as it is important to keep reminding both your current and prospective audience just how great your school really is.
To empower your school’s storytelling this year, we have provided some suggested content ideas, to enable your key stakeholders to remain in-the-loop during the down-time:
Content Ideas
Behind The Scenes: Share footage of teachers preparing their classrooms or opening any exciting new equipment, partaking in any professional development, any changes to the school grounds etc.
Departmental Challenges: Set students different challenges and encourage engagement. This could include a themed reading challenge, where students send in pictures of themselves reading in unusual places or even a photography challenge where students submit their favourite summer snaps.
Achievements: Just because school is shut doesn’t mean your school community isn’t continuing to achieve great things!
The Year in Review: Share your favourite memories from this past academic year.
Open Day Events Advertisements: Make sure you’re ready for the busy upcoming admissions season.
Virtual Tours: Remind your prospective audience of the great facilities your school has to offer. This is also another great opportunity to show off the newest developments on your campus!
Results day posts: Share how all of your staff and students hard-work has paid off and really celebrate those personal victories, and indeed how the students support those disappointed students.
Summer Camps: Show your families that just because school is closed, it doesn’t mean that there isn’t an array of activities taking place on campus.
Pride Contest: Have students send in images and videos of them repping their school merch in the coolest of places!
Upcoming Events and Notices: While many of your students and parents may have clocked-out for the summer, it’s important they are made aware of any upcoming changes and events in the new academic year.
School Mascot Update: Share what your school mascot has been getting up to whilst the students are away.
Student Holiday Takeover: Encourage your students to share what they're getting up to as they prepare for the next academic year.
Wildlife Watch: Quieter campuses may also attract local wildlife, so try to channel your inner wildlife photographer to capture these visitors!
Furry Friends: For those of you luck enough to have school pets, share what they’re are getting up to during the holiday period.
#ThrowbackThursday: Share memories from your school’s varied history, and be sure to encourage engagement by asking users to share their favourite #ThrowbackThursday moments.
Staff Introductions: Encourage the new members of your staff community to introduce themselves and share a fun fact.
Trips Content: Share all the wonderful places your students have visited this academic year.
Back to School Countdown: Increase the excitement of returning to school by using the Instagram Stories Countdown feature when sharing your behind the scenes snippets.
Community Corner: Share where your school has been represented in the community, whether this is at summer fayres or at local service programmes.
Holiday Plans: Share your students’ and teachers’ plans for the holidays, no plans are too big or too small!
Looking Ahead: Share what you as a school would like to achieve in the upcoming year and how you plan to get there.
Graduation Snaps: The pinnacle of the school experience for many, share all of the great content gathered from such a special day!
As always with storytelling, it’s important that you remember to use your #BrandedHashtags to emphasise the breadth of your school’s offering, and to show that members of your school community continue to live into your school values both on and off campus. If you are struggling to understand where best to post the above summer holiday content, please reach out to us at social@interactiveschools.com and we’ll be very happy to share our #ContentStrategyBlueprint with you, and to talk through any ideas you may have.
By continuing to post engaging stories during the school holidays, you will avoid losing any followers who mistakenly brand your account as inactive. You will remain at the forefront of prospective families' minds as they consider their options ahead of the busy admissions period that the new academic year brings and will continue to remind your current audience exactly why your school is the perfect place for their child to thrive.