You’ve all be sent – and asked to share – social media toolkits and assets for national campaigns, or in support of your wider partners. Do they ever perform well, get good engagement, or add to your own social performance?
by Alex Waddington
A couple of years back, a senior comms leader for a London council told me an interesting story.
We were discussing what data analysis by Whetstone Communications was suggesting about what 'worked' and what didn't when it came to maximising cut-through on organic social in the public sector.
They said when they pointed out to a central Government department that the social media comms toolkits they produced never achieved good engagement or reach locally, they were sniffily told that all messaging and assets had been thoroughly tested and the evidence showed they worked well with the target audiences.
In other words, get back in your box and toe the line.
That story came to mind just before Christmas, when Resident Doctors went on strike. It was clear from some research that a comms toolkit (see here for an example) had been produced, and that identical assets and text were being pushed out across regional and local NHS channels.
This is, after all, how a toolkit is supposed to work - the co-ordinated and concerted sharing of a core message by different stakeholders to reach the widest possible audience.
But what actually happens when, in good faith, dozens of the same pieces of content are pumped out onto a social media platform that has zero interest in giving 'free hits' to important but prosaic public sector content?
From a quick and dirty analysis, several localised NHS Facebook accounts with large Followings struggled to secure more than a handful of engagements for their dutifully posted toolkit-derived messages and images.
And in broader analyses of social media datasets for dozens of different public authorities, I have found that designed graphics - particularly on Meta platforms - tend to be associated with the lowest engagement.
One senior local government communicator said on LinkedIn that poor performance of graphics on Meta has always been the case. “I removed it on our corporate channels years ago,” they commented.
My observation is that the gap between engagement on graphics and ‘authentic’ images has become even more pronounced.
I also see evidence that when copycat content is 'hammered' - eg the same text and image is pushed out again in quick succession on Facebook - engagement and reach drops off a cliff.
It's effectively shouting into the void while the little audience you have gradually walks away. Soon you're in an empty room, shouting ever louder in the hope someone might hear you.
“As well as graphics, there's also something about the copy and TOV (Tone of Voice) that needs to change. Reposting isn't going to achieve much on its own,” reflected one senior social media and digital comms manager on LinkedIn.
I don’t have insider insight into the inner workings of Facebook. But from the data I see, I strongly suspect organic content that has been ‘seen’ already by the platform is recognised and then downgraded by the algorithm for being, effectively, 'spam'.
Which if true is a serious challenge for the effective cascade of key messages - especially at a time when many organisations are now relying on reach via organic social media due to tight or non-existent budgets.
Stakeholder sharing of co-ordinated key messages on organic social is being done in good faith, of course. But the data suggests co-ordinated amplification of core messaging on organic social is an outdated tactic, and may actually be counter-productive to achieving maximum reach.
“Organic social media is dead, sadly, especially as you say toolkits pushed out by multiple organisations,” reflected one NHS comms leader and behaviour change expert on LinkedIn.
“The graphic campaign toolkit is really more of a hangover from the older days of Twitter and blogging, when everyone posting the same thing could build into something bigger,” reflected one senior press and media officer.
“Now platforms prioritise unique content and downgrade repeat content as potential spam or a copyright issue. Corporate-style graphics just feel like ads so users associate them with inauthenticity. I cannot tell you how many campaign kits like this I am still sent, but they never work.”
Another NHS digital comms lead said: “Anything we produce ourselves - the simpler the better - always outperforms this type of national/regional toolkit content. We have also started to use paid social for really important 'stuff' to ensure reach.”
But as we look ahead to 2026, my view is that not all is lost with organic social media.
However, starting a TikTok channel and lifting and shifting your usual corporate fare over, in the hope it’ll somehow engage a whole new audience, is definitely not the way to go. In 2025, it was good to work with several teams to give them the data insights to argue for a different approach to ‘younger’ platforms.
It’s about using ALL the data available to you - rather than hunches and outdated theories - to understand how to maximise the return for the things that really matter. This can be your own data - and in the case of a new channel like TikTok, capturing and drawing insight from peer analytics and content themes.
“Organic social media offers more opportunity than ever...if your content feels native and is unique,” concludes one comms professional on LinkedIn. “Good quality organic still works when used strategically,” concludes another.
Organic social media in 2026 will not be easy and your big, priority campaigns will need some budget behind them to deliver real impact with the people who matter, no matter how brilliant the creative might be.
But for those comms pros willing to look deeper for bespoke and applied insights - general reports and trends are only so useful - organic social can still play a role in achieving objectives, using informed innovation and tactics based on real insight.
Alex Waddington is owner and creator of Whetstone Communications
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