November 2018
On Friday October 5th I held the second social media workshop of this project at STEAMHouse in Birmingham. We continued to use the hashtag #BAMECraftUK to capture thoughts throughout the day. There were five attendees, all makers at different stages of their careers wanting to learn how to use social media for the benefit of their practice.
After introductions, Alexa Torlo of STEAMHouse provided an overview of the facility. STEAMHouse is a makerspace in central Birmingham ran by Birmingham City University and funded by Arts Council England. It provides opportunities for local makers to develop their skills and engage in interdisciplinary collaboration. After the introduction from Alexa I provided an overview of different social media platforms. I found that most of the participants were relatively inexperienced with social media. Two of the members had met before at a Google Garage workshop, but that facility has now closed in central Birmingham. They told me that free learning opportunities were valuable for them, not only to learn about social media but to socialise with other makers. While social media may provide a means through which some people can socialise, for those without the skills and/or confidence to use it they can find it particularly difficult to connect with other makers. As I have suggested in previous research, the opportunity for women creatives to connect and collaborate with others can be valuable, and social media platforms can potentially facilitate this activity.
In relation to the research questions I am exploring in this project, it was interesting to hear more about some of the barriers or challenges participants face with using social media. For the participants in this workshop such challenges mostly related to not knowing how to use the platform –Twitter was often mentioned in this respect. They struggled to see the usefulness of some platforms and this was often linked to not quite knowing their audience, and a lack of confidence with putting themselves ‘out there’ and not knowing who they are reaching. As with the previous workshop, some participants did not know what a hashtag was or how to use them, so I took some time to go through hashtags and how using them in posts can help people to find you, particularly on Instagram. Through running these workshops the value of taking people through aspects of social media which most might take for granted, such as hashtags. For many makers, social media use is a learning curve and is increasingly an important part of their daily routine which they must make time for.
After the social media overview, Alexa ran an appreciative inquiry exercise. This was a positive and empowering activity which I would like to introduce in any future workshops I may run. Appreciative inquiry helps participants to focus on what they want to achieve, based on the successes of their past and the things they do well.
After lunch the rest of the workshop was dedicated to helping makers plan their social media posting. This was followed by further discussion on the challenges around using social media, directed by suggestions from the previous workshop. These challenges include finding the time to post, which platforms to use, how to keep your presence consistent and how to avoid distraction or procrastination. Using case studies, I presented the benefits of social media planning to mitigate some of these challenges. Drawing on this discussion the makers devised a social media plan. Feedback from the workshop was very positive and the makers were happy with what they had learned. I would like to thank Alexa, the STEAMHouse team and the participants for helping to create such a productive environment in the workshop.