Spanish universities on YouTube: the institutional channels and content management

Abstract

The present study aims to give to know how managed institutional channels that the different Spanish universities have developed on YouTube as well as define the descriptive process applied to the content disseminated through such channels. A quantitative research technique was chosen for the study: the survey. In this way, developed a questionnaire that was sent to the set of public and private universities in our country. The questionnaire consisted of a total of twenty-one questions with which it was intended to identify the person or service which bears the responsibility for managing the channel, what objectives pursued academic institutions with their implementation in March, what type of resources are dedicated to it, who deals with the description of audiovisual content and how are assigned metadata besides if apply performance measurement systems. Obtained response rate was 57%. The data collected highlight the following: the predominance of the direct management by the Spanish universities of its institutional channel on YouTube; the dissemination of knowledge and the generation of a brand image are the main purposes of institutional channels; the scarcity of human and financial resources management; the versatile profile of your/s responsible/s; the absence of clear, common guidelines concerning the description of content; and the widespread application of metrics about University channels.