Social media campaign of similar projects
This is my research report on social media campaigns on project related to Wikidata. I would first begin with Wikimedia Foundation itself.
Facebook page: Facebook
The Facebook page of Wikimedia Foundation has 3442 likes and only 48 Notes with last updated on February 18, 2010. Nevertheless to say, Wikimedia Foundation page is not active on Facebook. Regular updates need to be added. Many people all over the World don't know what Wikimedia Foundation is. All they know about is one or two most popular projects of the Wikimedia Foundation like Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons. The Facebook page also don't give any information about the various projects of the Wikimedia Foundation. This should definitely be added to the Facebook page to spread awareness and attract more followers. Few updates about the Wikimedia Foundation on the Facebook page of Wikipedia can also support campaigning, as Wikipedia has a lot of followers.
Twitter page: Twitter
Compared to Facebook Wikimedia Foundation is more active on Twitter with 1,444 tweets and 19.3K followers. But definitely needs improvement. This page needs to be made more attractive with video presentations and photographs of the events of the Wikimedia Foundation to increase the number of followers and spread awareness about other projects too.
I would now draw attention to one of the most popular projects of the Wikimedia Foundation, Wikipedia
Facebook page: Facebook
Huge followers, with over 1.5 m likes and regular updates. Wikipedia, undoubtedly is known to and followed by many people all over the World.
But again when I moved to the posts there, I found very few people talking about them. This needs to be improved. Regular posts in regional languages of people are one option, like we see on the Facebook page of Mozilla. One more way could be update of posts in an attractive manner. For example, Celebration of pie day, nice photos, cartoons or video could have been added apart from a Wikipedia page, so that people could go through the page on Wikipedia to know more about pie day in a more interesting way.
Also more advertisements can be done in the Log in page of Facebook.
Followers over 54,020 and with similar posts as on Facebook. Again clicking on Photos and Videos I found none. So, photos and videos need to be uploaded to draw the attention of people who don't know much about the world of Open Source.
Twitter page: Twitter
Doing very well with about 2,594 tweets and 272 K followers. One good thing I liked bout Wikipedia's Twitter page is that we have tweets related to almost every project of the Wikimedia Foundation.
Wikipedia pages, being the most among the most popular pages in the World is the best platform for promotion of other projects of the Wikimedia Foundation like Wikidata, which is supposed to be Wikipedia's Game Changer. Hence, one of the best ways to promote and make users understand what Wikidata is could be Wikipedia pages.
Now, I'll move towards the free and open source wiki software, Mediawiki
Mediawiki powers almost all the Wiki projects like Wikipedia and Wikidata.
Facebook page: Mediawiki
Very few people following Mediawiki on Facebook with 1,553 likes. This reflects unawareness of people about Mediawiki. We can have advertisements about Mediawiki in popular pages like Wikipedia. Also regular uploads about events should be added. For example there was no update FOSS Outreach Program For Women – Mediawiki Round 8, or even about GSOC as compared to the Debian page on Facebook, which is also a participating organization for GSOC (link to Debian Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/debian).
Twitter page: Twitter
Mediawiki is comparatively at a better position on Twitter, with 375 tweets and 821 followers. One good point about Twitter is when someone follows Mediawiki or allied projects like Wikipedia, it opens up saying
You might also want to follow
And below appears similar projects like Wikidata, Semantic Mediawiki and others. So, Twitter can be the best platform for social media campaigns. Regular tweets could enhance Mediawiki's popularity.
Thus, summing up few steps to be taken that can enhance the popularity of Wikimedia Foundation and its projects:
- Regular updates on events happening in Wikimedia Foundation and allied projects.
- Advertisements on the log in pages of social media like Facebook.
- Adding videos and presentations on the social media pages about events like Pie Day, Women's Day. Also many events organized by Wikimedia Foundation like Language Summit.
- Regular tweets is another good option. As Retweeting (RT) allows other people who are not following a particular page on Twitter, to follow them.
- Posting articles published in newspapers, magazines and journals popular among people can be an indirect way of campaigning.
- Wikipedia is most popular among all the projects of Wikimedia Foundation. So, posts abut it's sister projects in Wikipedia pages can largely attract the attention of users.
- A few posts in the native languages of people all over the world.
Links to some of the most popular pages related to Open Source in Social Media
1. Mozilla Firefox
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Firefox
Twitter: https://twitter.com/firefox
2. Debian
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/debian
Twitter: https://twitter.com/debian
3. Ubuntu
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ubuntulinux
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ubuntu