This page is the single source of truth for all administrative tasks, templates, and processes focused on GitLab brand social channels. If your question is "how?", the answer will be here.
Many requests for social media coverage could sound like one ask, but ultimately have different end-user objectives or where we'll need to promote different assets or links. Please keep the following in mind to help us better manage requests.
If you are requesting coverage for something that is:
This will allow us all to better understand due dates, milestones, and to close issues promptly when the specific request is fulfilled.
If you're not sure if you need an epic or just an issue, feel free to ask in the #social_media Slack channel.
Once you've opened the epic (if the ask is a part of the list above)
#social_media_action Slack Channel.The goal of organic social promotion on an integrated marketing campaign is to strategically bring awareness to a designated landing page.
By tailoring polished messaging to our target audience across the GitLab branded social media channels we are able to drive page views, sessions, engagements, and link clicks. The content that organic social will promote, falls under the awareness funnel that is also mapped out by MPMs in the GANNT sheet under the content journey map and bill of materials.
Integrated Marketing Content promoted on the GitLab branded social media channels include a combination of blog posts, webinars, case studies, and more. It is important to explain that what is shared via organic, is different than what is advertised through paid social and digital ads. The social media team will not craft copy for content pieces that are mapped in the consideration and purchase funnels.
In an effort to continually improve our ability to derive success of organic social campaigns, a reporting issue will be added to the Organic Social Epic that pulls data from Sprout Social and Google Analytics on a monthly basis.
The social team will create a social-specific child epic for every Organic Social promotion that is tied to an integrated campaign. Marketing Program Managers will open individual issues for each organic social request and relate it back to the specific Organic Social Epic.
The Social Media team member responsible for the promotion of an integrated campaign will create the epic with the following structure - details and links to be added upon creation of documents and timeline defined.
Epic Name: Organic Social: CAMPAIGN NAME [Integrated Campaign] Epic
## #️⃣ Organic Social Overview of the CAMPAIGN NAME [Integrated Campaign]
This is the child epic, organizing the issues for the **CAMPAIGN NAME** integrated campaign. The related issues will be included below upon rollout of each piece of content listed in the Awareness category of the GANNT Sheet and its [Content Journey Map].
## How often will `@gitlab` post?
Frequency of posts will reflect the content in the awareness category. As content goes live- frequency will increase. We will schedule posts per piece of content to expand over the next few months mirroring an always on approach.
## Is there a hashtag `@gitlab` will be using?
Yes. We will base hashtags off of the content we are sharing. These include (but are not limited to) `#INSERT HASHTAGS`
*Please see related issues for details related to specific organic social promotions.*
## High Priority Links
* [Campaign Execution Timeline (GANTT) >>] - Owned by MPM
* [Campaign Brief >>]
* [Live Campaign Page >>]
## 🔗 UTM for tracking URLs
* Overall utm_campaign - **`INSERT UTM`**
* More on [when](/handbook/marketing/marketing-sales-development/online-marketing/#url-tagging) and [how](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/12jm8q13e3-JNDbJ5-DBJbSAGprLamrilWIBka875gDI/edit#gid=0) to use UTMs
When sharing a link on social media, all channels will look for opengraph frontmatter information, allowing the sites to pull a social media sharing card. This includes unique specifics for the page like its title, a description, and a unique image. It's critical that all pages intended to be shared across social media sites have this informaton attached, so that our users are aware of where we're linking them to, as well as, following best practices.
Social Media Sharing tags are set by the post or page frontmatter. Please use the following template and add it to the frontmatter:
title: your page title/cta
description: page description
twitter_image: "/images/opengraph/file-name.png"
twitter_image_alt: "describe the image being used here"
twitter_site: "gitlab"
twitter_creator: "gitlab"
Be sure to update the title, description, twitter_image, twitter_alt_image, and other non-social tags necessary for your page. The twitter_site and twitter_creator tags should remain the static value: "@gitlab"
The description meta tag is important for SEO, but it's also a part of Facebook and Twitter social cards. The description should be a short summary of the page. You can think of this as a subtitle.
The description is not meant to repeat the post or page title, use your creativity to describe the content of the post or page. Try to make your description less than 100 characters, if possible.
Adding an image file to the frontmatter for twitter_image should be added to the [www-gitlab-com] project at /images/opengraph/ and must be named after the page's file name. While listed as an image for Twitter, this code works for all social sharing sites.
It is important to be as inclusive as possible, which is why providing an alternative text for your image is necessary. Image alt's provide a written summary of what is in the image for users who prefer to be read what is in the image vs seeing it, think of users who use screenreaders to read social media. Text included here should not repeat the title or description and it is not another way to add additional SEO properties - you should simply describe the image. Is the picture a group of GitLab Team Members gathering at Contribute New Orleans? Then that is your image alt text.
This frontmatter aides sites like twitter in understanding how to present additional content. When the link is shared on Twitter, a user may see content that Twitter believes is related to the one shared. This is more of an administrative tag that assists on the backend. These values will always be the same and do not require you to update them.
Frontmatter requires a merge, therefore, you'll need to include this as a step in page creation. Once merged, please test your link. Preview the social cards by adding your link to the [Twitter Card Validator], or the [Facebook Debugger].
UTMs are used to track traffic sources & reach of posts/links. All posts that contain GitLab-owned URLs must contain a UTM parameter.
Please see details in the Digital Marketing handbook. In short, it's important to outline UTM campaign, content, and other variables if you're looking to measure more deeply. Campaign section is a requirement, and is likely connected to your ongoing marketing campaign. If you have questions or are unsure how to tag a URL please reach out to the Digital Marketing team &/or the Social Media Manager responsible for the campaign.
LinkTree is bio link tool. The Social Media team uses LinkTree to drive traffic to the GitLab website. Folks will click the link in bio and have a few options to choose from before landing on a webpage. The GitLab brand Linktree is: https://linktr.ee/GitLab
At GitLab we have multiple CTA's and campaign goals. The idea here is that a LinkTree will give our community an exit route and determine themselves- on where they land. Once you click the link in bio you'll have tiles to choose from: Homepage, Handbook, Press, Blog, Get a Free Trial, etc. Tile options are a continuous iteration as they will change to reflect current campaigns.
LinkTree credentials are managed via the Social Media Vault in 1 Password. Links in the LinkTree would need to be approved by the social team, as these links are considered inventory for organic social.
Consider our labels as a way to be transparent about our work at every level of our marketing organization. At any given time and at any given level, a Team Member can recall what volume and mix of work is happening. Not only does this help the social team to better organize, but would allow our Team Members up our organization to better understand their entire team, too.
Every social media-related issue should have the following labels, each of which covers our organization in a broader look further up the chain.
More on optional labels will be available soon.
Pre-giveaway
Post-giveaway
Find out more about the swag giveaways here.
Share your GitLab story! Tell us your favorite thing you made with GitLab tell us a time GitLab helped you out of a tight spot)
/source/community/sweepstakes in the www-gitlab-com project. Name the directory the same as the giveaway /source/community/sweepstakes/name-of-giveaway/name-of-giveaway/ folderindex.html.md file.Tags in Sprout enable social to measure performance outside of general level metrics. If a post needs a tag but did not get one when scheduled, we'll need to tag the posts after they've been published. While this can happen from forgetting to add the tag in Sprout, its most often related to publishing natively on channels. E.g. when we use Twitter Ads/Media Center to publish unique card content or when publishing stories in Instagram.
To tag a post after its been published:
reports tabcross-network reports categorypost performance reportAdministrative Details on Social Media Design
All members of the social team manage their own login access to Canva Pro. We have shared these logins with the design team as well. For self-service work, we will link to the template URL created by Canva so that team members have quick access to the templates without the risk of logging into the social team accounts or voiding our contract with the vendor.
Must be logged in to a social team Canva Pro account to edit. Viewable links are available publicly.
Please use the following hex colors to represent the channels in reports, in charts, or when calling it out in plain text.
