Innovation and the digital craft of diplomacy and social impact in the year of the pandemic.
The pandemic has shaped the year 2020 in multiple ways. Diplomacy — whether traditional or digital — has been affected as well: meetings and summits have moved to Zoom and other video platforms; governments and international organizations have worked closely with social media and content platforms to combat COVID-related disinformation; foreign policy stakeholders in the public and private sectors have tried to engage with new audiences, online and offline.
While the pandemic has impacted every facet of our daily lives — not only on politics and diplomacy — other factors have come to play during this past year, many of…
A practitioners manual with tips and best practices to leverage TikTok for good, for government, and for social impact.
I spent the summer interviewing the social media managers behind some of the hottest TikTok accounts in the social impact and digital diplomacy space. I also spoke to experts and scholars to better understand how TikTok is growing in this space. And I asked TikTok creators and influencers about their experience on the platform and their advice for both users and organizations to amplify the causes they believe in.
What a summer it has been!
I learned so much about TikTok. Most of all, I had lots of fun experimenting with content and exploring the many innovative ways international organizations…
Digital Diplomacy has grown to a community of almost 80,000 followers on Medium and it is poised to hit 10,000 followers on TikTok soon. In addition, we have started to experiment a bit on Instagram, where we recently launched daily “Briefs” and posted more short-form content on Reels.
On TikTok in particular, in just over six months, we have contributed to grow hashtag #digitaldiplomacy to over 3 million views, and we have collected a total of almost 300,000 likes on our channel. The growth is due mostly to educational videos about human rights, climate action, and other international…
7 reasons why the most downloaded app worldwide in 2020 is also a powerhouse for social impact.
2020 was quite a year for TikTok: very, very recently, Sir Paul McCartney launched on the platform and top creator Charlie D’Amelio and her influencer family announced a deal with Hulu for a reality show. But the list of achievements goes on… And on!
The app’s popularity is undoubtedly growing. “TikTok beats Facebook to become most downloaded app worldwide in 2020,” tweeted social media and digital guru Matt Navarra in early December citing App Annie. “TikTok was the best-rated iOS app in 2020,” he added a few weeks later sharing a graph by Sensor Tower.
Most importantly, in 2020, TikTok showed how its impact goes beyond music, trending dance moves, and silly videos.
In the year of the pandemic, Digital Diplomacy has grown both content and readership.
Digital Diplomacy has grown tremendously in 2020. With almost 80,000 followers, we are now the 64th largest publication here on Medium and amongst the top 25 fastest growing publications on the platform, according to SMedian.
2020 has also been a growing year in terms of stories and writers, with more than 500 articles published, and hundreds of returning writers choosing Digital Diplomacy to feature their stories.
This is also been the year of the pandemic and, like many other publications, we have seen an increase in subscribers, readers, and all metrics.
Eight of our top-stories-ever have been published in 2020…
A look at gender equality and the status of the old boys’ club.
1. After the November US election, Kamala Harris becomes the first woman to be elected as Vice President of the United States. She will be sworn in on January 20, 2020 alongside President Joe Biden.
Don’t miss our 2020 top 10 moments in digital diplomacy and social impact!
Twitter has rolled out its ‘story’ feature with mix reviews. They’re not like Instagram’s and the goal is to make Twitter “friendlier.”
Even Twitter admits it on its Twitter feed…
Fleets — Twitter response to the success of the story feature on social media platforms — has been rolled out. Created by Snap Inc.’s Snapchat and made big by Instagram, they’re now everywhere, including Facebook, LinkedIn… Am I forgetting anywhere else?
“From one perspective, this is just Twitter keeping up with the Joneses, launching a familiar feature in a characteristically belated fashion,” writes Will Oremus in OneZero. “In a call with journalists on Monday, however, Twitter executives made the case that Fleets are part of a larger push to reshape the service as something friendlier, safer, and more…
A look at how Presidents and Prime Ministers approached social media to congratulate Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.
How do world leaders use Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram? Do they approach them differently?
The recent digital outpour of congratulations and best wishes to US president-elect Joe Biden and vice president-elect Kamala Harris from presidents and prime ministers around the world show Twitter is still the preferred social media platform for digital diplomacy.
Let’s see how, for example, leaders of the G7 countries approached Twitter v Facebook and Instragram to congratulate the newly-elected US leadership.
French President Emmanuel Macron on Twitter:
On Facebook (a post without images) and Instagram (as an Instagram Story):
Presidents and Prime Ministers around the world went to Twitter to celebrate the next president of the US.
The moment all major news outlets projected Joe Biden and Kamala Harris as the next President and Vice President of the United States, world leaders around the world flooded Twitter with messages of congratulations.
Most G7 leaders sent their congratulations: French President Emmanuel Macron, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, CanadianPM Justin Trudeau, Italy’s Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte and President Sergio Mattarella, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, as well as European Council President Charles Michel and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
Andreas Sandre
Comms + policy. Author of #digitaldiplomacy (2015), Twitter for Diplomats (2013). My views only.
