Bethlehem Housing and Support Services: Social Media Case Study

The objective of this independent project was to develop a social media strategy to support the communication goals of Bethlehem Housing and Support Services (BHSS), a charitable organization.

Bethlehem Housing and Support Services (Niagara, Ontario) provides a staged approach to assist and support men, women, and families to make a successful transition to having safe, stable housing. Programs and services provide clients with the ability to gain the skills necessary for self-sufficiency and successful independent living.

Communication Goals

The identified goals included increasing awareness of BHSS services and fundraising events, as well as meeting the needs of the volunteers and donors. There has also been identified a need to bring more recognition to donors and sponsors. Social Media presented itself as an opportunity to extend their reach and frequency of these messages to their audience, as well as an opportunity to gather realtime feedback for their key stakeholders. Expected outcomes of this strategy were to create a foundation to support long-term social media objectives for BHSS, taking into consideration their limited resources.

Social Media Goal

To engage with online audience of key stakeholders that will help to increase awareness of Bethlehem Housing and Support Services, and offer the opportunity for conversations that could lead to positive action of increased donations, sponsorship, and volunteers.

Research

Primary research was done through phone and face-to-face meetings with BHSS Communications Manager to collect available information; including existing communication channels (both traditional & digital), challenges, engagement analytics to-date, key stakeholders, target audiences, upcoming BHSS event calendar, operational procedures, as well as, skill levels and resources available to manage a social media plan. Secondary online research was used to further understand the target audience. As well, find relevant content that could be used to support BHSS messaging on Social Media, including both owned & third-party content, and explore opportunities to promote and encourage engagement.

Evaluation

An evaluation of the current management techniques and skills for time management & effectiveness, analysis of current social media channels and potential gaps, integration of social media opportunities with other forms of communications, and quality of existing content.

Results

Deliverables included planning, management & evaluation tools (custom and third-party), new social media BHSS profiles set-up, content marketing materials created (graphics, blog writing, website forms), training outline, guidelines & policy samples, recommendations for next steps, final report and presentation to BHSS Communications Manager.

Social Media Project Duration: April to June 2014

Laura’s insight into current social media trends and technology assisted Bethlehem to engage with a more diverse demographic. She understood non-profit resource challenges and provided recommendations that proved useful on many levels, such as creating online forms on Bethlehem’s website which increased our volunteer base substantially.
Dawn Marie Cavasin, Dipl. PR Communications Manager [former] , Bethlehem Housing and Support Services