Social media: administrator’s guidelines

Facebook is a social network connecting people, companies and organizations. It allows people to share any kind of content, comment posts, engage in public and private conversations.

Tips on how to open and manage an official profile

Official page

USI's official page is USI Università della Svizzera italiana (Official Page) and it is to be considered as the primary reference for any University related pages. All other pages (Services, Masters, Institutes and Faculties) must show a link to the official page.

Page vs Profiles

For any USI related matter, the best option is a page, while profiles are reserved to actual people. To set up your page, please start here. Pick the category "company, organisation or institution" and select "University".

Name

In order to underline the connection to the University and to make your page easy to find, the name of your page must contain USI as a first word, followed by the specifics:

• if the page belongs to a service, the acronym USI must be followed by the official name of the service in Italian (for questions please contact [email protected]). If the name of your service is not in Italian, use the English name. Examples: USI Servizio bibliotecario universitario, USI Career Service.
• if the page belongs to an Executive Master, USI must be followed by first the acronym of the Master and then the complete name of the programme. Example: USI MIC Master of Advanced Studies in Intercultural Communication.
• if the page belongs to a Master of Sciences / of Arts, USI must be followed by the name of the programme. Example: USI Master in International Tourism.

For further questions please contact [email protected]

Please note that once you choose your name you will not be able to change it after you reach more than 200 likes.

About

In this section you can add essential information about the institution in charge of the page. In order to appear in searches, to identify your page and to underline your connection to the University, in the section "about" you must mention USI's official page with the following link: www.facebook.com/usiuniversity. For services we suggest enter your information both in Italian and English, repeating the service's name in both languages.

Description

Other than the name and the essential information (see section About) Facebook allows you to further explain who you are. Here you could insert the complete official description, which is already on your website or in the Study Guide.

User name

The URL should be customised by choosing a unique username. It will appear in the browser after https://www.facebook.com/. In any case the acronym USI must be included (e.g. www.facebook.com/usialloggi). Please note that the choice of the username is irreversible.

Visibility

It is crucial to give maximum visibility to the Fan Page also outside of Facebook (e.g. e-mail signature) in order to increase the number of contacts.

Profile picture

The profile picture (avatar) is shown next to your name anytime you post something. The University has developed a graphic system of avatars to highlight affilitiation to the university, according to the corporate design guidelines. Please contact the Institutional Communication Service ([email protected]) to obtain the suitable version of your avatar, with the appropriate font, size, resolution and quality. 

Cover photo

With the introduction of the new Timeline Design, Facebook now allows you to further personalise your page by adding a Cover Photo to your profile picture. A cover is the larger photo at the top of your timeline, above your profile picture. As it covers the full width of your page, your cover image has to be at least 720 pixels wide. For further information on how to upload your Cover Photo please consult Facebook's Help Center. While your profile picture identifies your page, the Cover Photo is a feature that makes it more appealing  and that interacts visually with your audience. Therefore it may be wise to keep your profile picture and regularly change your Cover Photo in order to keep your page attractive. However, please make sure you choose pictures related to your page or activities  page or activities.

For other tips on how to use Facebook, please refer to the attachment.

Twitter is a social media born to quickly share short text and links to photos, presentations and movies. It calls for a frequent use and an agile and almost instant interaction with the target community. It stands out as a very demanding and time consuming tool in terms of resources needed.

Tips on how to open and manage and official profile

Username

The username is the name proceeded by @ which Twitter asks you to indicate. In order to highlight the link to the university and to render your page more easy to be found, the name must contain the following characteristics:

• if the profile of a service, following the @ there must be USI followed by an underscore and the name of the service. Example: @USI_Servizio Alloggi. Twitter allows you a maximum of 20 characters, therefore not always will it be possible to use your service's name as a whole, in this case please contact [email protected].
• if the profile of an Executive Master, the name will be @USI_acronym of the Master. Example: @USI_EMSCom.
• if the profile of a Master of Sciences / of Arts, @USI_acronym of the Master. Example: @USI_MT.

For all entities not mentioned please contact [email protected]

Name

The profile's name is the name without @ Twitter ask you to indicate. In order to highlight the link to the university and to render your page more easy to be found, the name must contain the following characteristics:

• if the profile of a service, USI is followed by the name of the service. Example: USI Career Service. Twitter allows you a maximum of 20 characters, therefore not always will it be possible to use your service's name as a whole, in this case please contact [email protected].
• if the profile of an Executive Master, USI is followed by the acronym of the master. If you wish to be more specific and identify your programme as Executive, you might insert "Executive" between USI and the acronym of the programme. Example: USI EMSCom, respectively USI Executive MBA.
• if the profile of a Master of Sciences / of Arts, USI is followed by the acronym of the Master. Example: USI MT.

For all entities not mentioned please contact [email protected]

Avatar

The profile picture (avatar) is shown next to your name anytime you post something. The University has developed a graphic system of avatars to highlight affilitiation to the university, according to the corporate design guidelines. Please contact the Institutional Communication Service ([email protected]) to obtain the suitable version of your avatar, with the appropriate font, size, resolution and quality. 

Profile Background

In order to promote a common identity between USI's official profiles, the background image must be chosen with the help of the Institutional Communication Service, with USI's logo on the upper left corner.

Bio

In this section you can insert essential information about the institution responsible of the page. To foster the retrievability and the identification of your profile and to highlight the link to the university, in the section "Bio" you must include:

• the complete name of the entity you represent (i.e. the complete name of the Service or Executive Master or MSc/MA)
• the complete name of the university (in Italian)
• the link to your web site/to the web site of the university

For the rest, the most effective text to choose is a short and incisive presentation of the entity responsible of the profile.

For other tips on how to use Twitter, please refer to the attachment.

USI is present on LinkedIn with a single official profile, which simultaneously performs the functions of a University Page and a Company Page. In addition, two official groups are active: USI – Università della Svizzera italiana and USI Alumni.

It is important to indicate the correct affiliation in personal profiles: “USI Università della Svizzera italiana”, in order to be officially linked to the University.

USI's LinkedIn groups encourage the sharing of ideas, professional exchange, and networking. Those wishing to create a thematic community can request the opening of a subgroup within the two official groups (for example, USI Alumni MT).

The creation of pages or groups dedicated to individual programs (Master, Executive Master) or specific services is discouraged.

Any new USI pages must be created exclusively as Showcase Pages of the main page, so that they fall under the institutional umbrella “USI Università della Svizzera italiana”. This configuration ensures image consistency and allows each page to benefit from the visibility of the main channel, which has over 37,000 followers.
The creation of a showcase page must necessarily be initiated by contacting [email protected], so that at least one representative from the Orientation and Promotion Service and one from the Institutional Communication Service can be configured as super admin and guarantee support if needed.

Furthermore, strict adherence to USI's brand identity is required, which includes:

• the use of the official nomenclature of the institutes, in line with the corporate identity;

• the exclusive use of the official logo, which must not be modified or reinterpreted;

• adherence to institutional graphic and communication standards.

Any failure to comply with these guidelines will be reported to the relevant offices, to ensure the uniformity and correctness of the institutional presence on LinkedIn.

The group USI – Università della Svizzera italiana is open to students, graduates, academic staff, and administrative staff. The USI Alumni group, the only official group dedicated to graduates, allows for the creation of thematic subgroups. The only admitted exception concerns the communities of executive master alumni, which may exist as separate groups.

For any requests related to USI's presence on LinkedIn, please write to [email protected].

YouTube provides a visual environment allowing people to connect, communicate, share knowledge share ideas, share projects, share art using Video. Visual communication is the ultimate effective way to capture people's attention and interest.

YouTube makes video sharing easy and fast. Videos can be easily embedded in blogs, Wikipedia and shared on other social networks. With the help of relevant title and tags a video can get most of the viewer's attention needed and through the search engine it can also reach most of the desired target audience.

USI on YouTube

The central YouTube profile for USI's videos is USI University which is divided into different theme channels. Other official profiles of some of the University's entities and programmes are listed under official profiles. We use YouTube to build a solid image, to promote USI's activities also outside the University's grounds, to build a valid and recognised video archive which can be used as reference and background material for researchers and experts. USI's official YouTube Channels' primary audience are in fact students and alumni, media and the press, researchers and experts. You are welcome to upload a video.

To upload a video on one of USI's official YouTube channels, please see the attachment.

Instagram offers a visual environment enabling users to create contacts, to communicate, to share information, ideas, projects and art, with the use of images/photos and videos. Visual communication is an excellent means for attracting attention and interest from people.

Thanks to Instagram (and related applications, such as Repost) sharing photos is easy and fast. Content can be linked or commented. Thanks to the use of hashtags (#), the search engine of the application can easily search for content.

Suggestions on how to open and maintain an official profile

Official profile

The official profile of the Università della Svizzera italiana is USIuniversity. This profile is the main reference for all other USI entities. Other profiles of individual USI units, Master programmes, observatories, institutes or Faculties are required to relate to the official USI profile.

Other profiles

In order to underscore the relationship with USI and to enable correct visibility, other profiles must include the acronym "USI" in front of the name, followed by the related specifics:

• For the profile of a USI service, the USI acronym must be followed by the official name of the service (when in doubt, please contact [email protected]), Examples: (Italian name) "USI Servizio bibliotecario universitario", (English name) "USI Career Service";
• For Executive Master programmes, the USI acronym must be followed by the acronym of the programme and its full name;
• For graduate programmes (2-year Master), the USI acronym must be followed by the full name of the programme. Examples: "USI Master in Lingua, letteratura e civiltà italiana", "USI Master in International Tourism".

For all other university units, please contact [email protected]

Profile image (avatar)

The profile picture (avatar) is shown next to your name anytime you post something. The University has developed a graphic system of avatars to highlight affilitiation to the university, according to the corporate design guidelines. Please contact the Institutional Communication Service ([email protected]) to obtain the suitable version of your avatar, with the appropriate font, size, resolution and quality. 

Description

In this section, you can indicate essential information on the unit responsible for the profile. In order to help the searching and the identification of your profile and to underscore the relationship with USI, the section must mention the official USI website www.usi.ch. For USI services, we recommend you include information in Italian and in English.

For other tips on how to use Instagram, please refer to the attachment.