A fascinating if not slightly disturbing report found that the average person’s thumb travels around 52 miles per year scrolling through social media. That’s like running a marathon. Twice. With your thumb.

Love it or hate it, you can’t really underestimate the power of social media. Its importance in building (and destroying) businesses could be a book in itself. In fact, there are thousands of them knocking about. 

But businesses' use of social media has come a long way. A tweet a day is no longer enough. There are now so many platforms and so many different ways to harness its power that it is often hard to know what to do with it all. But whichever platform you land on, there is a way you can enhance its influence for your business and/or event: social media walls (with digital signage, of course). 

A social media wall collects content from multiple social media platforms and shows them all in one place. A social media wall collects content from multiple social media platforms and shows them all in one place. Using apps like Walls.io (see our app guide here), you can also go beyond social media and allow your audience to upload content directly to the wall. 

This means you could show off the best of your Instagram alongside your Twitter feed, Facebook posts, Pinterest board, YouTube channel…And you can showcase user-generated content too. And showcase user-generated content around your brand, whether it’s posted on social media or submitted through direct posting. Basically, you can bring together all of your social media efforts and incorporate them with user-generated content in a visually appealing way. 

Posts, likes and user-generated content, is a goldmine – especially when combined with a digital signage strategy. Show UGC with certain hashtags; engage guests with real-time posts; run competitions; and even get content rights directly from users to repurpose their content for your future campaigns. Your customers are basically another member of your marketing team – except you don't have to pay them.

Take a look at our guide to UGC, social media walls and digital signage – plus how app integrations like Taggbox can help.

Add an interactive and visual layer to your event with social media walls. Engage visitors with real-time user-generated content while pushing your own – or your sponsor’s – brand exposure. Create a sense of community within the event by setting up specific hashtags for guests to direct their content to, and allow those not present to see what’s going on. 

Set up digital signage screens in your shop, office or franchise to show-off user-generated content like reviews and photos. Combine this with news about your brand, QR codes to follow you on your social media platforms and encourage visitors to interact by contributing their own content. 

Create a page on your website to embed a social media wall. Increase brand awareness while easily maintaining up-to-date content.

Social media walls for internal communications

Set up a screen in the canteen or break out area and showcase company Instagram posts or videos to connect and engage your colleagues. Celebrate birthdays, announce new arrivals or simply post all the embarrassing Christmas party content.

1. Select your hardware and digital signage platform

Luckily, setting up a social media wall and selecting your digital signage platform doesn’t require commercial-grade hardware or software. You don’t even really need to be that techy at all (unless you’re looking to scale across multiple locations and screens. In which case, give us a call!). Or check out our range of ScreenCloud digital signage media players such as PIXI and our original Station P1 Pro.

Some of the social media wall apps we offer include:

Walls.io - collect and showcase the best posts, photos or videos from multiple social platforms using hashtags, keywords and profiles

Gallery for Instagram - a live scrolling wall of Instagram posts matching a #hashtag or @account

Social feed for Facebook - send your company’s Facebook updates to the big screen

Strea.ma - social media display solutions for multiple channel

Follow us - promote your social media accounts and contact details 

A great example of a digital signage menu board in action using Walls.io

What is it that you want to achieve with your social media wall? Is it for customer or employee engagement? Do you only want to show your posts or include user-generated content? Which platforms will work best for you? 

What action do you want viewers to take when looking at it? (e.g. add a QR code for a quick follow, highlight a hashtag to use)

Is it permanent or just for a specific event?

Our comprehensive guide to a digital signage content strategy could also help. 

Deciding on your purpose will also indicate which channels you should be using on your social media wall. 

User-generated content at events suit apps like Twitter and Instagram for real-time promotion. A restaurant or shop would better suit review platforms like Yelp or Facebook.

An Instagram social media wall created with Walls.io

You may also want to use playlist and scheduling functions so that you can adapt the social media feeds depending on time of day and clientele. A restaurant might only want lunchtime content to show before transitioning into relevant posts for the evening. Setting up rules for what shows via keywords and hashtags is a great way to manage this.

To make sure your posts go out at the right time and stay consistent across platforms, consider using a social media scheduler. This allows you to pre-plan and automate posts that feed into your social media wall, keeping your content timely without constant manual updates.

One of the biggest concerns with social media wall setup is  moderation. Social media is a floodgate of content and can be risky when sharing in an open environment. Especially during an event when the drinks are flowing.

Luckily with some social media wall apps there are moderation tools built in. These will range from allowing you to exclude hashtags and  ‘NSFW’ keywords, to a ‘safe filter’ like the one used on our Twitter app. There's even the ability to approve all content before it gets passed to  the wall. For example, Walls.io offers powerful moderation tools like a spam filter and a blacklist to keep unwanted posts unseen. 

There are also tricks you can use such as setting up a specific Twitter handle or Instagram feed where you only share ‘safe’ content, so that you can publish and promote on-the-go and the screen will automatically update. 

The true beauty of showing social media on your digital signage walls  as opposed to content such as image galleries and presentations, is  that the content updates itself. Once you’ve set up the parameters, any content shared within those terms will appear up on your wall, updating in real time.

However, a little engagement strategy will go a long way to making the most of your displays. There are plenty of ways to engage your  audience and get them thinking about how and why to share.

Building community around a specific topic or hobby (for example,  sports) will ensure that people want to add their voice to the  conversation and see their update live on the big screen. 

The Dallas Mavs' social media wall by Walls.io

You could also create competitions, sharing incentives such as free  products or discounts and referral incentives between your patrons. When used internally you can encourage sharing between employees with a ‘most social’ monthly award. You’ll also find, like many of our clients,  that digital signage serves as a physical reminder for company culture  and incentives, encouraging staff members to get involved and be more  social.

Setting up your social media wall - Try for free

A little strategy goes a long way. Request a demo of ScreenCloud and we can take you through how to set up your own social media wall, as well as making the most out of a wider digital signage strategy.

Guidelines for setting up a live social media wall using Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and more that engages customers and gets them sharing.

Setting up a social media wall is so much more than a rolling feed of Instagram shots...

Things to Consider When Creating a Live Social Media Wall

Things to Consider When Creating a Live Social Media Wall

Things to Consider When Creating a Live Social Media Wall

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