One of my monthly challenges a while ago was to share entertainment industry or union related things on social media every day. I’ve been able to keep that up every day and I feel like it has been a very good thing. Not only am I sharing news with the people who follow me on social media, it makes me more aware of what news is happening as well. When I’m going through the various tweets to see which ones I want to share, I have to go through the news as well. I’ve been a big fan of making sure I’m staying educated with my union and this has been a great way to continue that.
My activity on social media hasn’t gone unnoticed. Some groups I’m a part of have used me as an example to others about how you can make a daily habit of sharing news online. I get a bit embarrassed when that happens, but I’m also proud that I am able to set a good example. I never did this to make others do it as well, but the more people who can educated themselves and others about what is going on the better.
It was also noticed by the slate that I am a part of for the SAG-AFTRA elections. They have had different people running their social media from time to time, but they needed a new person and asked me if I’d like to do it. I was so honored that they asked me and of course I said yes! It’s been a bit of a learning curve to find exactly how we want to represent the slate on social media, but everyone is going through the same thing so the expectations are similar among us all. I hope that as we get closer to election season that it will be easier to know what are the right things to post and be able to have a unified message.
I want to make our slate’s social media feed a great resource for other actors. I have so many Twitter accounts that I follow to use when I share news every day. I want the same for our account. I do try to repost things on that account that I would use on my own and then retweet it from the slate’s account. And I post original content as well too. Everyone with the slate knows that this isn’t a paid or regular job so they don’t expect me to be posting all the time. But I try to do is when major news happens so we can share what is current.
And through being active myself as well as doing work for my slate, I’ve had people come to me asking for help with their social media. I’m in no way an expert (and there are experts as a part of my slate) but I’m always happy to help however I can. Usually it’s pretty simple work like showing how to use Twitter or Instagram and I’m able to keep it very basic. That’s all they need and I don’t want to overwhelm them with all the amazing things you can do besides just posting. Hopefully they all find it easy enough to do and eventually they can start doing more advanced things because I know how much they will benefit from them. But when I’m helping someone start out, I have to remember that if they get overwhelmed that they aren’t likely to use the basic things.
I know that social media isn’t everything and educating myself and other about union issues should also be done in person, but it’s a big part of the picture. Our union and industry are all over the world and social media is a great way to connect myself to others and visa versa. It’s a very quick way to spread the news when big things happen and to make sure that other people are aware of things that might affect their career. And the good thing about doing all this union/industry related social media work is that it about sharing good things. Not all news is good news like when there are strikes or things that affect the industry. But being aware of even the negative things is a good thing.
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