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Currently, all sites have a official Twitter account run by a SE bot. I suggest that, to best harness social media for the benefit of the SE Network, each site should have official Facebook and Google+ pages as well. As both these sites now support hashtags, the same posts that go on Twitter can be posted on FB and G+ pages. This way, no extra work will be needed to run either of these associated pages.

As is well known, social media can create a buzz around new things and popularize them much faster. The bump in views and userbase that will be gained from these pages will have a major impact on beta sites, especially newly launched ones.

It will also help in spreading awareness about the SE Network as there are a huge number of people who are interested in specific subject areas and have questions to ask, but dont know of the existence of SE sites.

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    I can see all the complaints now filling up the FB page about how Stack Exchange stinks as a "social network". I also don't really imagine much quality traffic would be brought here, nor helpful interaction that users cannot already do. – Andrew Barber Jul 18 '13 at 3:23
  • @AndrewBarber The main idea is to increase visibility. All new traffic will of course not result in positive changes, but even if 1 knowledgeable new user is gained per 40-50 unique visits, it will have a big impact on small sites. Also, the complaint that SE stinks as a social network is something that I have seen primarily on SOFU metas. Users on newer communities are more focused towards learning how to use SE rather than complain about what it isn't. – asheeshr Jul 18 '13 at 3:28
  • it may or may not have impact, but it would take a significant amount of work to get any. – Andrew Barber Jul 18 '13 at 3:32
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    @AndrewBarber I think you are looking at this from the viewpoint of a SO user. I am looking at this as a RE.SE or PP.SE user, hence the difference in opinion. – asheeshr Jul 18 '13 at 3:49
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    We've discussed some pros and cons of this on The Workplace Meta: meta.workplace.stackexchange.com/questions/1868/… – yoozer8 Jul 18 '13 at 3:52
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    What about Facebook pages where only Admins can post? So we don't get crybabies there asking why they can't ask any more questions? – Cole Johnson Jul 18 '13 at 4:15
  • @ColeJohnson Mods are not responsible for handling every single "crybaby" on every platform. Every site is run by a community, and the more a site's presence expands, the more users will have to step up and help. The Meta site serves exactly that^ purpose, btw. – asheeshr Jul 18 '13 at 5:46
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I would like to see this. Not so much as a tool to drive traffic (I would expect only garbage traffic coming from FB) but as a feeds page to keep people updated about

  • Blog posts

  • Events like the worldwide meetups

  • Mod elections

Yes, I would like those events to show up in my FB / Google+ stream.

Also, a FB / Google+ page is an opportunity for members to fly their colours.

Re the danger of garbage questions ending up on the page's timeline, yeah that's going to happen of course. What can be done about it is either

  • Recruit trustworthy community users to help delete that kind of stuff without comment

  • Simply block posts from non-admins (Not sure whether that is possible, but I think so)

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