Ideas on promoting our pages

Everyday living
1

Hi All,

I’m a young adult carer for MS, have many friends with MS and volunteer throughout the MS Society. I run a Facebook and Twitter for our local MS branch (Shrewsbury and District) and was wondering if any of you guys had any ideas on promoting the pages? Are you even interested in Facebook and Twitter pages?

https://twitter.com/?lang=en&logged_out=1#!/ This is the Twitter Page (Shrews MS Society: @ShrewsburyMSS)

https://www.facebook.com/shrewsburymss & here is the facebook page (Shrewsbury MS Society)

Any ideas greatly welcome!

xx

2

Hiya Sarah

I admire your enthusiasm!

I think you are correct-F/B and the likes are the way to go forward. Personally I have no interest in them BUT I do appreciate that many folk participate in such online activities.

I have just learned this past week that the local MS nurse CANT advise folk to contact the MS Society because the Health Board cant been seen to be favouring one charity over another. Whilst I understand this to some extent the MSS are the only charity with a physical presence locally. Its madness! The local MSS can of course promote themselves but life would be much easier for them if they had the 100% backing of the Health Board.

Anyway-I will be watching for any other replies that you get so that I can pass on the tips to my local branch-the one that I aint allowed to say exists! Oh-I can cos I aint the MS nurse! You gotta laugh-blooming red tape and rules GGGRRR!

Good luck with any future support events and ideas!

Ellie x

3

Don’t you just love bureaucracy? The hospital I attend has a specialist MS Physio, who runs a course for clients with MS (1 day per week for 6 weeks). Lots of handouts, including the full range of MS Society leaflets. Yes, one of the handouts does mention another organisation, and the MS Centres in our county, and all the local branches of the MS Society.

If you need the support of a local branch, what other organisation can offer this?

The problem with Facebook, is its terrible security. Apart from the fact that it is easy for some people to run hate campaigns on it, you cannot get personal data deleted. FB will tell you that it has been deleted, but it remains on their servers - just in a less accessible location. As a technophile, with almost 30 years computer experience, there is no way that I would open a FB account. At the other extreme, for some folk, FB IS their social life.

But, coming back to the original post. Do you want to promote your branch? Or, do you just want to get attention for the FB and Twitter pages? They are different goals. If you look at the MS Society [Near Me] tab, Telford is shown as having a branch, with “Club MS” for Shrewsbury and Telford. If Shrewsbury is a full-blown Branch - then:

  • Get the Society to update it’s information.
  • Use the local press and local radio to publicise your Branch.

Probably, you could join with Telford Branch to get some joint publicity. of course, while you are at it, you could ask the Society why the website they give for the Princess Royal Hospital, is actually the one for the Brighton and Sussex? get your local data right first, then use your local media, then work on the FB and Twitter pages.

Geoff

4

Hi Sarah

Hope you and the family are well.

I’ve added your FB and Twitter feeds to the branch landing page on the website.

I will discuss this with your branch editor next time I talk to them as you can put the feeds on othe branch web pages too.

http://www.mssociety.org.uk/shrewsbury

Greg [admin]