Written by Denise Miller, Firesteel Advocacy Coordinator

It’s become a tradition: Each year, in the lead-up to Housing and Homelessness Advocacy Day, we co-present an online workshop on social media for social change with Joaquin Uy of the Washington Low Income Housing Alliance.

In the three years we’ve done these training Hangouts, one fact has remained constant: Social media is all about relationships and community. When used well, tools like Twitter and Facebook facilitate conversations and build real-world relationships.

But with technology, many other things do change quickly! That’s why we offer this training each year. We also have new resources to share, like StoryCorps interviews about family homelessness, our Spark Change Podcast about digital advocacy, and the Housing Alliance’s advocacy postcards. We encourage you to check those out, and also to engage with us and the Washington Low Income Housing Alliance on social media!

Advocating on Twitter

Please follow Firesteel (@firesteelwa) and the Housing Alliance (@wliha) on Twitter. Then copy and share the advocacy tweets below, or write your own! (Some of these sample messages come from the Housing Alliance; find even more in their media advocacy guide.)

• Looking forward to #HHAD2015 on 2/17! Help us advocate for #affordablehomes & #HTF2015. Register at @WLIHA website: http://wliha.org/hhad
• Get engaged in #WAleg process advocating for #affordablehomes & ending #homelessness at #HHAD2015. Register here: http://wliha.org/hhad
• What does #affordablehousing & fighting #homelessness mean to you? Tell your legislator directly at #HHAD2015 2/17. http://wliha.org/hhad
• #FTSA2015 will be discussed in committee today at 3pm. Now is the time to call your legislator & tell them tenants deserve accurate reports.
• So proud to be a member of the 99th District! @RepSoAndSo publicly supports fully funding #HTF2015. Go to http://www.wliha.org/advocacy/state for more info
• #WAleg voting on #FTSA2015 today! Get on the phone & advocate for these valuable safety net services. Contact info: http://apps.leg.wa.gov/DistrictFinder/Default.aspx

Advocating on Facebook

We invite you to “like” the Firesteel and Housing Alliance Facebook pages. Once you do that, our posts should appear in your newsfeed. If you like, share and comment on our posts, you’ll see them frequently in your feed. You can also write your own advocacy posts based on these examples:

• Washington Low Income Housing Alliance‘s Advocacy Day is tomorrow. I’m excited to meet my lawmakers for the first time! I’m ready to talk about why I believe everyone deserves the opportunity to live in a safe, healthy, affordable home. Let me know if I’ll see you in Olympia!
• More than 32,000 Washington schoolchildren don’t have a stable home in which to do their homework. Join me in advocating for the Homeless Student Stability Act, which will help ensure all students in our state get the education they deserve. Learn more on the Firesteel website: http://firesteelwa.org/ensure-classroom-success-through-the-homeless-student-stability-act/

Don’t forget that you can tag the organizations that are in bold. Just type an “@,” start typing the name of the organizations, and select the correct name from the pop-up list of suggestions.

Social Media Day of Action is Feb. 3

Next Tuesday, we’re going to make a big online push to encourage our friends to register for Housing and Homelessness Advocacy Day. Please use your newfound media skills to:

• Change your avatars to this image:

• Share #HHAD2015 social media posts
• And, if you’re feeling ambitious, create your own image to share! Here’s a clever one from the Housing Alliance:

See you online!