Using Social Media for Health Behavior Change: Technical How-To Guide

This guide is a how-to actionable resource for country teams and partners to lead effective SBC social media campaigns. It is a step-by-step guide for preparing for, planning, developing, implementing, adapting, and measuring social media campaigns. Lessons and tips based on practical experience implementing SBC campaigns across nine countries are included. While many of the steps and lessons can be applied to a wide variety of platforms, this guide is focused on Facebook and Instagram. Further, while this is specific to paid campaigns, much of the content is relevant to organic (unpaid) campaigns on Facebook and Instagram, and social media more widely.

The rise of social media has transformed how we communicate and engage with one another and with information. Of the various social media platforms, the most popular among both males and females is Facebook, with nearly 3 billion global active users per month. Instagram is also widely popular with more than 2 billion monthly active users.2 On average, individuals use multiple platforms and spend two hours and 26 minutes per day on social media.

The expansive reach of social media platforms makes them a viable channel to implement social and behavior change (SBC) interventions, inclusive of communication. Social and behavior change (SBC) is a systematic, evidence-driven approach to improve and sustain changes in behaviors, norms, and the enabling environment. SBC interventions aim to affect key behaviors and social norms by addressing their individual, social, and structural factors.3 Social media can influence our knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors at individual, community, and social levels. How can we leverage social media as a tool for public health social and behavior change?

This comprehensive guide has four sections taking you through preparations, planning, developing, and implementing to monitoring and evaluating your campaign. We do not expect you to read this document in one sitting, but rather use it as you develop your social media campaign. Use the table of contents to the right to navigate to relevant parts. For example, if you need to refer to Pre-Testing, click on the Pre-Test step.

Meta Program Scaled Support – FHI 360 Project Page

Last modified: December 5, 2023

Language: English

Source: FHI 360