Starting social media from scratch
From 2008-2017, I researched, created and managed these social media presences for the UC Irvine — growing the community from 0 to over 100,000.
Main accounts:
- Instagram (shot all photos and videos using iPhone, except TBT vintage photos, reposts or where indicated)
Additional accounts:
Social Media Projects:
- President Barack Obama at Commencement 2014 (curated crowd-sourced content via Storify; developed and implemented social media strategy and #UCIGrad campaign, created unique content with photos and videos, conceptualized “Selfie Stations” and more).
- Dalai Lama’s 80th Birthday and Global Compassion Summit (curated via Storify)
- IAmUCI – social media project for admissions season (conceptualized, created, executed, used on UCI homepage). Learn more here.
- UCIYes – social media project for newly admitted college students (conceptualized, created, curated, executed, used on UCI homepage)
- FirstGenUCI – social media project for First-Generation Faculty Initiative to support students who are the first in their families to attend college (conceptualized, created, curated, executed)
- Anteater Love Stories (Valentine’s Day project: proposed, wrote, edited, photographed and curated. Also experimented with iPhone video recording and editing.)
- Anteater Advice: Alumni to New Graduates: (Commencement: proposed, edited, curated)
- Anteater Advice: Graduating Seniors to fellow UC Irvine students (Commencement: proposed, edited, photographed, curated)
UC Berkeley
During 2017-2018, I managed the UC Berkeley Twitter account and increased followers by 20% over previous years — despite declining Twitter use overall from the general public.
By reassessing the strategy to include unique content blended with breaking news, I was able to integrate an existing UC Berkeley News account into the main account. As one colleague mentioned: “You put the fun back into Twitter!”
I also initiated and created Instagram Stories and Facebook Live broadcasts in order to add in-the-moment coverage that created strong engagement and built community. Up until that time, those options were not being used. Once I demonstrated how valuable they could be, they became integrated into the larger social media strategy.
Tonya Becerra 