Social media guide
How we use social media and tips and guidance for getting started yourself
BIOS Member only content
What platforms are available?
There are a growing number of social media platforms available, each slightly different both in the way they work and the audience they attract. We’ve put together a very brief summary of the main ones that we use below.
If you have any questions about the BIOS social media accounts or have any questions about getting involved, please do get in touch with our policy officer at r.huzzey@orthoptics.org.uk.
How it works …
- Users can post longer messages, along with links, images and videos
- You can become ‘friends’ with others, giving you control over who sees your posts (see privacy settings)
- You can follow organisations and companies to see their posts on your news feed
- Posts can be liked and also shared with your friends
How we use it …
We find our members are much more likely to use Facebook in a personal capacity, using it to keep in touch with friends and family. As a result, it tends to be easier to share information beyond the ‘bubble’ of orthoptics and healthcare, making it ideal for sharing public information or promoting campaigns.
Users on Facebook tend to post less, but these are often longer. Due to this, and the fact that people tend to have smaller networks of friends than on Twitter, while posts may be viewed by less people, it’s possible to get greater engagement with content.
How it works …
- Focused on professional networking, members can create profiles and ‘connect’ with others
- Members can post CVs, and employers can post jobs
- Companies and organisations also use it to post content for followers
How we use it …
Due to the professional feel of LinkedIn, we tend to use posts to highlight resources and news of relevance to orthoptic and other healthcare professionals, rather than content of interest to the wider public.
By maintaining a profile, we also give out volunteers an opportunity to link to the work they do with us.
Partly due to the relative decline of X/Twitter, LinkedIn seems to have become the primary platform where members engage in a professional capacity.
How it works …
- Used for sharing images and videos
- You can add hashtags and tag people in posts
- You can edit and apply filters to images and videos before publishing
- Posts can be linked together into ‘stories’
How we use it …
Our Instagram account was initially focused on recruitment and the promotion of careers in orthoptics. We relaunched as a more general-use account in 2024, but it still has a strong focus on careers, as it is the platform we gain the most engagement from prospective students on.
Due to the focus on high-quality images and video, we tend to post less, but consistently, on Instagram, instead increasingly using stories for updates and repeat posts.
YouTube
How it works …
- Used for sharing videos
- Videos can be sorted into playlists of related content
- Videos on YouTube can easily be shared on social media platforms or embedded in web pages
How we use it …
While we maintain a channel on YouTube, we primarily use this to more easily share videos and embed them onto our website.
There are a number of very similar video-sharing sites. We have a private Vimeo account, which we use to embed member-only content on our website.