Great Social Media Idea: Celebrating Spring

Look around, the grass is high, the fields are ripe, it's the springtime of my liiiiiiife! (Yeah, I'm all about me some Simon and Garfunkel.)

If we can take away one lesson from the bitterly cold winter, it's that campus snow photos (and videos... and timelapses... and really anything weather related) are social media engagement catnip. 

Now that spring is rearing its sunny (if you're lucky) head, can the same hold true for photos of blossoming flowers? Indeed it can.

Here's proof from the University of Washington's lovely cherry blossoms:

The Huskies clearly do not take their cherry blossoms lightly... they are going full bore sharing pics, and their fans are responding in droves.

Even though the cherry blossoms aren't at full bloom yet (only 15% according to the press release they put up on their website, which is freaking fantastic when you think about it - a press release about blossoms getting close to blooming!), UW is very smartly priming the pump by sharing lots of photos well before peak blossom season, highlighting user submissions to encourage people to share their own photos, and even launching a novelty Twitter account - which racked up 250 followers in just a few days - to help spread the word and generate some buzz.

Maybe not every campus is lucky enough to have a spring tradition like cherry blossoms on the quad (I'm among the fortunate - UP has beautiful cherry blossoms too... maybe it's a Pacific Northwest thing?), but no matter what there will be something freshly blooming, so you can at least take advantage of that.

Thanks, UW, for reminding us that the weather doesn't always have to be cold to turn into #hesm gold. (+1 for the rhyme! I'll be here all day, folks.)