Housing associations have more diverse audiences than many other sectors, and increasingly represent social housing requirements as well as new build developments, making the job of social media manager to represent that work even harder!
But with each of these challenges, housing associations are innovating to overcome them. In today’s blog we wanted to shine a light on some of the great examples of social media management from housing providers. Lots of ideas and tips for those in the sector who are planning social media campaigns and delivering social media content, but also other sectors as many of these learnings are transferable!
1. Building Communities & Digital Inclusion
One of the key marks of success for any social media account, but particularly housing associations is building a community.
As I’m sure many marketing and communications professionals have found, your online communities can help you in many ways, whether that’s aiding others with queries or helping to defend your decisions. An active and engaged community on social media is very valuable!
In the case of housing, online communities can really help to drive better community engagement between neighbours in real life, translating that online relationship into offline connections.
This example from Wakefield District Housing raising awareness of their community grant projects really demonstrates that link between the organisation and their community.
2. Creativity
With so many audiences to attract on social media, housing associations need creative ways to draw fresh attention. This is certainly true for customer service where simply posting customer service availability has become the norm.
While we all appreciate knowing when an organisation is available to answer their comment, it adds a nice human touch when the organisation gets creative with it.
We love how The Hyde Group uses Gifs on Twitter to announce when their social media customer service team sign on and sign off for the day. These posts give great personality to the brand!
Related content: How The Hyde Group Deliver Exceptional Customer Service On Social Media
3. Leading From the Top
When it comes to building a ‘digital first’ organisation and encouraging your colleagues to get involved in the delivery of social media for your organisation, support from senior management is crucial!
Often social media projects can only reach their full potential when the initiative is being driven from above and filtered down as is natural with many processes in larger organisations. Therefore, we must start at the top: the CEO.
We wanted to highlight Moira Bayne, Ceo of Housing Options Scotland, who has a fantastic online presence and is active in joining conversations, especially for disabled people, veterans, and older people!
4. Social Selling
As mentioned earlier, housing associations are increasingly expanding their new build development work and with that their social media strategy must evolve.
Instead of just focusing on brand awareness and engagement, housing associations like Aster Group have developed dedicated channels to appeal to new buyers.
There’s no doubt that social selling is an art and one that the team at Aster Sales team have a great handle on. Building lots of excitement for home ownership with frequent updates on their latest contract completions and available properties.
This fun and friendly approach helps show off the Aster Sales team’s knowledge and approachability.
5. Social Customer Service
Finally, social media is rapidly becoming the channel of choice for consumers of all ages and backgrounds to raise their concerns and ask questions. This is particularly true for housing associations where tenants can quickly and easily let their landlords know if there is an issue with their property to get the right help.
Although this can be a difficult transition for some organisations in getting customer contact centres on board to help manage inbound content, once embedded, customer satisfaction is often higher.
The example opposite from Bromford shows just how quickly queries can be resolved via social, especially during this time where tenants are going to have lots of questions around financial security and the pandemic. This great customer care is then clear to see for current and future customers who may be considering a property with the organisation.
Those are our 5 stand out examples in housing associations, but we know this is only the tip of the iceberg! Tweet us and let us know how your organisation is innovating on social media @SoCrowd
