Social Media Guidelines

Social media is a great tool for promoting the LR brand while also connecting with multiple audiences in and outside the university and hearing the voices of our students, faculty, staff, parents, friends, fans and community and what is important to them. 

To help identify and avoid potential problems, the following guidelines will aid you in the best practices for social media use for university communications consisting of the LR name. Additionally, these guidelines provide you with guidance on reaching your communication goals and how to effectively follow university policies. 

Purpose

The purpose of Lenoir-Rhyne's social media strategy is to use social media platforms and channels to be consistent with the university’s core values of excellence, integrity, care and curiosity. 

These guidelines apply to faculty, staff and others officially affiliated with the university who create or contribute to social networks. 

Guidelines & Best Practices

Be accurate and factual

Any information you send out is permanent. Posts and comments may be deleted, but a digital footprint has already occurred. It is vital to ensure that the information you send out and share is accurate. Cite and link to your sources when possible. 

Think twice before posting

It is important to know that whatever you post is a direct reflection of the institution. If you find yourself second-guessing a post, then it is probably not appropriate to be posting. If you have any additional concerns, ask a supervisor for input or you can contact Marketing and Communications.

Establish a presence

Social media can often turn into a full-time job. The best accounts are ones that are posting, sharing, and commenting regularly.

Understand your audience

Keeping the audience in mind when posting content to social media is a major key to generating traffic on your accounts. Social media is often a recruiting tool for LRU. As a university, our core audience can range from current students and alumni to prospective students, parents, and the Hickory community. However, there is a clear understanding that anyone can view our content at any time.

Make your posts accessible 

To help followers and fans of your page who have visual disabilities, ensure you are including alt text for images posted and captioning for videos. Additionally, it is best practice to not post flyers as images as screen readers are not able to read the text posted as an image. Consider placing all important text in the caption and sharing a photo that is relevant or from a past event. 

Show respect

People may become very opinionated while expressing their viewpoints on social media. While some comments from followers may be positive and show encouragement, others may spark discussion for opposing ideas. Responses to a user’s comments should be carefully considered, as they reflect the institutional voice.

Have two administrators

In having multiple account administrators for every social media account, you are helping to ensure that account will be relevant, updated regularly and thrive - even if one of the admins is not available or leaves the university. 

It is the department/units responsibility to appoint a new admin if one leaves and inform Marketing and Communications of the change. Account admins are responsible for managing the social channels as well as monitoring posts, remove content that may violate the social media's respective terms and conditions, and keep up to date on trends. 

Password protection 

In protecting your passwords, it is best to change them quarterly. Be sure to store them in a secure location - such as a password-protected file. This will help keep the page from being hacked as well as make it easier if an admin leaves the university. 

Timing and response to user comments

When engaging on accounts that represent the university, you must consider the time. Be aware of timely events and the presence they may have when planning your posts. You should monitor conversations and provide information for those who need assistance by responding accordingly and in a timely manner. If you are unsure of how to respond to any user questions, you may refer to lr.edu or direct the user to someone who can help.

It is also important to consider “after-hours” when liking or commenting on other accounts. If you happen to see a post late at night, think about waiting until the next morning before liking or responding. However, if there is a particular post or response that is related to emergency and crisis communication, the time of day may be ignored.

Monitor posts, mentions

Perform regular monitoring of your social media accounts which includes looking at replies, comments, tags and comments at least daily. Efforts should be made to encourage page followers and friends to engage with each other and comment on posts and content. 

Posts are not to be removed or deleted unless they: 

  • Contain hateful, threatening or abusive content 
  • Contain content looking to incite violence 
  • Devolve into personal attacks 
  • Include profanity 
  • Engage pages to do anything unlawful or discriminatory

Only ban users from your page if they engage in this behavior repeatedly, and they are only banned from posting on our page. They still have access to read the page. 

Keep personal views separate

Do not include political commentary or comments on social issues and do not conduct any political activity on behalf of candidates or any party. You are not representing your personal opinions as being endorsed by the university. 

Adhere to the rules of each platform 

Look at the terms of service and policies of the social media channels and networks you are looking to participate on. Be aware of updates and changes. 

Adhere to the LR brand 

When creating and running social media accounts on behalf of your unit, department or club, use the official logos and graphics provided by the Office of Marketing and Communications. 

Push users to the institutional website and accounts

Always drive your audience to additional initiatives of the institution. This can be done by sharing links and directing people back to specific web addresses within the lr.edu framework.

Emergency and crisis communication

All information regarding crisis communication will be posted on the University’s official accounts. Additional information will be posted under the safety and emergency preparedness section of our website. You are encouraged to share emergency information posted from the main University accounts on your own channels. Sharing the posts of official accounts creates a more direct message to users and eliminates the confusion of many accounts attempting to pass along the same information.

Additional Style Guidelines

Times and Dates

  • For times, use am and pm (lowercase, no periods). 3 pm, 10 am.
  • Write out full words for days of the week (Monday, Tuesday), unless characters do not allow. In which case, they may be shorted (Mon., Tues.).
  • Months can also be abbreviated (Jan., Feb.) for space.
  • June 1 may also be abbreviated to 6/1 to accommodate for characters.

Word Choice/Context

  • All LR accounts should maintain professionalism and stray from casual tones.

Correct Example: Have you registered for our graduate open house? Admission counselors will be in attendance to answer questions about the application process.
Incorrect Example: Let’s hang out tomorrow for food and drinks! Our favorite people are ready to help you enroll. It’s as easy as pie!

  • Always assume the average user is not familiar with specific campus terms. Provide additional context.

Correct Example: Join us for the 3rd Annual LRU 5K on our Hickory Campus.
Incorrect Example: The 5K is on Saturday.

  • The LR voice must be consistent across the board and match official terminology.

Specific examples: 

Student-Athlete not Athlete
Cromer Center not Cromer
Residence Halls not Dorms 
Asheville Center not Asheville Campus

Punctuation

  • Always proofread posts to refrain from typos, inaccurate information, or broken links.
  • Avoid using exclamation points. They may be used in rare instances, depending upon scenario.
  • Ellipsis (three periods, no spaces) may be used to show when part of the text has been omitted (i.e. shortened quotes or an attempt to signal suspense).
  • Em dashes may be used to set off various parts of a sentence.
  • Colons are encouraged when adding URLs at the end of copy

Example: Learn more about graduate studies: lr.edu/graduate.

Graphics 

  • Graphics should avoid containing text but, when necessary, the text should be minimal as to not crowd the graphic and to stay within accessibility guidelines. Text that is on a graphics needs to be present in the associated caption. Facebook, X and Instagram all have an option to enter “descriptive text” with a photo or graphic, which allows a screen reader to describe what is in the image. Please be aware that you cannot add descriptive text to a post retroactively - so be sure to add it when scheduling/publishing the post.

    • Like a billboard: When using text on graphics, keep the text to 3–7 total words. If there must be more than a handful of words, make two or three much larger and attention-grabbing, knowing the rest will only be seen by those who zoom in.

    • Use the 2x2 test: When your graphic is viewed at 2 inches x 2 inches, can you still decipher everything in it within three seconds? 

  • Instead of designing a graphic that is predominantly text, incorporate that information into the caption that accompanies the graphic. While alternative text is helpful for a subset of visually impaired users, some users magnify content instead of using screen readers. Magnified images containing text often become blurry and unreadable to the user.

  • Posters, invitations, postcards and other materials that are designed for print should not be used on social media. Print materials contain embedded text and their linear structure often does not correspond well to social media or websites.

  • QR codes should never be used on websites, graphics that will be shared on social media, or electronically delivered messages such as emails or evites. 

Network Specific 

  • If URLs do not have a unique redirect, shorten the link using bitly.com.
  • Use ampersand (&) in replace of “and” to save characters, when necessary.
  • Avoid using 4+ hashtags in a single post.
  • Review all articles before sharing or retweeting.
  • Use line breaks if characters count allows.
  • If you are using Gifs within a post, please only use references you know, so it will not be mistaken or link to an inappropriate source. The same is true for viral trends, such as memes.
  • University-level accounts event promoters. The volume of university-affiliated events  greatly exceeds best practices for posting on social media. That's why university-level social  media accounts only promote signature events. 
  • Do not post selfies or other content that would be more appropriate on a personal account. Think about how your post reflects the institution prior to posting.
  • Only create posts that have an LR connection. If there is no association or tie to LR, then do not post.
  • Avoid multiple live sessions on the same day, unless they are announced and coordinated in advance.

Regularly Used Hashtags

General

  • #WeAreLR
  • #LRViews - Used to showcase the beauty of campus in posts
  • #FriendsOfLR - Visit Friends of LR for the complete list of Friends of LR partners
  • #LRUGOGRAD - Commencement

Admission

  • #LRSaidYes
  • #ChooseLR
  • #LRBound