We want to share with people all of the exciting things that we do. By being active on social media, we can engage with people and be a source for them to find information and inspiration. Social media by its nature is fast paced; therefore we aim to review what we’re doing on a regular basis to ensure we’re in the right places with the right content.
Taking from our Digital Principles, physical location is no longer the only way that people interact with us. More than 60,000 people follow us on social media – at the moment you can find as individual museums on:
M Shed | Bristol Museum & Art Gallery | Blaise Castle House Museum | The Red Lodge Museum | The Georgian House Museum | Bristol Record Office
M Shed | Bristol Museum & Art Gallery | Blaise Castle House Museum | Bristol Record Office
Wikipedia
M Shed | Bristol Museum & Art Gallery | Blaise Castle House Museum | The Red Lodge Museum | The Georgian House Museum | Bristol Record Office
TripAdvisor
M Shed | Bristol Museum & Art Gallery | Blaise Castle House Museum | The Red Lodge Museum | The Georgian House Museum
..and then Instagram and Youtube with accounts representing all museums.
Our principles for social media
- Being an open door to the organisation
- Inspiring people with our collection
- Showing people who we are, what we do, what’s on
- Inviting conversation, encouraging discussion, sharing ideas
1. Being an open door to the organisation
Whether we’re on social media or not, people will talk about us. Social media provides us with a way to informally communicate with our audiences, who may not necessarily interact with us in person. It’s one of the main voices of our organisation and is often the first or only way they will talk to us so we need to do it well.
2. Inspiring people with our collection
Our collection needs to be publicly accessible. We want to use social media to talk about it as a way to inspire people about history, science and art.
Our digital representation of the amazing collection is growing all the time and we can use this in all sorts of ways. Digital has provided a way to make physically ‘hidden’ objects come to life and be available for the public.
3. Showing people who we are, what we do, what’s on
We do so much every day. Social media is a great way to tell people about what’s going on, giving them access to information they may not otherwise have access to.
4. Inviting conversation, encouraging discussion, sharing ideas
Museums are a space for exploring ideas and our social media accounts can be an extension of this. We want to be actively involved in discussions with communities – locally, nationally and internationally.
Social media champions
We give access to our social media accounts (though this mainly applies to Twitter) to anyone in the service who would like to post on our behalf. The admins of our accounts are Fay, Lauren, Zak and Mark. We’ll be nominating and training 25 ‘social media champions’ covering all teams in the service, who will be the main point of contact for their area. They will help people in their teams to use social media, and will collate content so that all areas are represented.
We’ll keep you updated with who these people are (and how it goes!).