Five tips for digital storytelling ahead of #HousingDay

Digital expert John Popham is doing a Housing Day roadtrip today and tomorrow to teach six housing associations’ staff about digital storytelling. Here are his tips for best ways to tell stories online:

1. Figure out how to reach your target audience

There is a trend for social landlords to put content online and not always know who they are speaking to. It’s important to figure out first who you want to reach and then what you want to say.

If you are speaking to tenants, Facebook is the best social media channel to use. It is still the most popular space for tenants to use so you need to make sure your Facebook offering is up-to-date and informative.

If you are speaking to the media or politicians, Twitter is the best place for creating noise and getting them to pay attention.

If you are looking to speak to a younger generation of tenants or potential trainee employees, Instagram and Vine can be used to reach these audiences.

2. Stories that will interest people

According to Mr Popham, housing staff should be looking at what’s popular on TV for inspiration about stories which will interest and engage readers. To find out what works, he recommends looking no further than the X Factor and soap operas.

He said: ‘People love stories about everyday folk overcoming adversity. There are lots of people who live in social housing who have fascinating stories like this to tell which will capture the hearts and minds of readers.’

3. Photos and videos are more effective than words

Whether it is content on your website or on your social media channels, video and photos are better for capturing your readers’ attention than words alone. When sharing stories of your tenants, photos and videos bring the words to life.

For a good example of this, see how Circle Housing has captured a case study of a staff member on video below.

4. Capture the moment with a mobile phone

You don’t need thousands of pounds worth of professional video editing software or a state-of-the-art camera to capture tenants stories. Modern mobile phones produce high quality images and videos if used correctly. Mr Popham offers training for social landlord communication teams about getting quality

5. Pulling content together

Using a tool like Storify, you can pull together content from across social media and the web and put it all in one article. This is a free tool which creates content which can be embedded into your website.

Here is an example of a Storify by Inside Housing’s Daniel Douglas from the Community Housing Cymru Group annual conference last week.