USING FACEBOOK FOR OUTREACH AT WISCONSIN GEOLOGICAL AND NATURAL HISTORY SURVEY: FEEDING THE BEAST WITHOUT GETTING EATEN ALIVE

The goal of the outreach program at the Wisconsin Geological Survey is to increase awareness of and access to the information produced by our scientists. Our website is our primary online portal, with most of our publications now available for downloading (www.WisconsinGeologicalSurvey.org). Material that we publish to our website requires scientific and editorial review. Because generating new content is time-consuming, our website is not well adapted to presenting issues of the day. For this reason, we actively maintain a Facebook page as an important part of our outreach effort.

So, how do we keep the Facebook page up to date—feed the monster—without it becoming a dangerous time sink? Here are some tips based on experience at our Survey: 1) Stay on target – focus on delivering content to your audience and don’t get distracted by likes, reach, and shares. 2) Use Google Alerts to follow specific issues and receive emails about content related to your query. 3) Hire a student to initially set up the page, but use experienced staff to choose content. 4) Have Facebook send email notifications when someone comments on your page. 5) Take action if comments offend. Remember, a social medium is a conversation but you don’t have to engage with everyone. The anonymity of the web can bring out the worst in some.

Our Facebook page is a tool to communicate about earth science issues and to let people know that the Survey has experts with information to share. Our page includes links to articles about geologic issues as well as to educational materials for teachers and notices of events involving Survey staff. Facebook data gives feedback on what our audience is interested in. Geologic issues can be controversial and posting links to even-handed articles is the goal. Keeping an eye on the page by automatic email is a minimum requirement. As young people move away from Facebook we are adding other social media (Twitter and Pinterest) to continue providing timely information—and a link back to our website.