Critics say TikTok is Chinese owned and there is a requirement in Chinese law that the Chinese Government are able to access data. The company say that they don’t let them. Critics point out that they could.
I’ve not seen the detail of the concerns and its one for wider public sector people to reflect on. What’s the risk of a foreign entity accessing data on a Minister’s phone? Potentially, quite serious.
However, as far as I can see, the ruling only covers UK Government. Those outside the corridors of power are not covered. Of course, other organisations may take a lead or may weigh up the risks of using it against walling off a substantial growing user base. Ofcom say a majority of under 34s use the platform. It’s in the top three most favourite social apps of of under 54s. It’s a serious player and sceptics would say there’s a reason why California-based Meta have more than 100 people employed in Public Affairs lobbying Washington DC.
In short, if your a Cabinet Minister and there’s a risk of data being accessed then that’s one thing. If you’re Dudley Council or Dudley NHS I’d probably there’s probably less of a global risk.
It poses the question if there is a risk, shouldn’t it be banned for everyone?
But would stopping everyone in the UK from accessing dog, cat, recipe and other videos be politically tricky? And legally litigious?
(Disclaimer: I deliver training on a range of courses including TikTok & Reels).
This tool will give you astonishingly rich data not just by country but by local authority area, ward and also sub-areas of each ward.
You can use the tool to find age demographics, which of 22 languages is their first language, if they were born in the UK, their national identity, housing, work, education and a pile of other fields, too.
Here’s two key things to look at…
Age demographics
For a social media review, age demographics can be especially useful in building up a picture of how old people are. Use this in conjunction with Ofcom social media data which links age with preferred social media channels. This will give you pointers into which channels people are using. From there, you can tell if you are focusing in the right places.
Nationality and language
Having an idea of nationality and language can help you see if you are talking in the right language to reach people. For example, there’s a big Yemeni community in Dudley who came over in the 1960s. There’s 0.29 per cent who have Arabic as a first language. In Brent, this figure is 3.2 per cent. If you know people’s preferred languages you can better understand if your comms is reaching the right place.
Of course, a conversation with the councils equalities team to understand the best way to reach people would be a next step. But the ONS tool gives you a starting place.
The tool covers England & Wales. It’ll be interesting to see how Scotland and Northern Ireland present their data.
I was listening to the radio the other day as Spurs manager Antonio Conte was trying to explain why his side had lost.
The Italian’s response was to almost audibly shrug and blame the fans.
In football terms, a rule has been broken. The manager is often not long for the chop.
This episode got me thinking to the manager Tony Pulis who took over my team Stoke City over two spells that saw him take is to promotion, an FA Cup Semi Final and a stint in Europe.
It got me thinking to how Super Tone would handle post-match interviews.
There were three phases he’d cover.
Praise the fans. “They were the 12th man today. They never stopped getting behind us. They’re turning this place into a fortress. They know it’s Stoke-on-Trent against the rest of the world.”
Praise the players. “We were terrific. They really worked ‘aard today. X in defence really was immense. He never let Y kick the ball. The attitude of the players was first class.”
Praise and gently pressure the board. “The Coates family have done a magnificent job in charge of Stoke and they deserve full credit. They’re football people who are from Stoke-on-Trent and know what this city needs. When it comes to the transfer window I’m sure they’ll be supportive to help me get that little bit of quality in the final third.”
That’s basically it.
What was he doing? He was identifying three audiences. The fans, the players and the board. He very rarely deviated from this formula. He may shuffle the pack and deal the cards in a different order and he’d talk about the game, too. But he’d always cover those three bases.
"We made it the area against the rest. It's not just Stoke City Football Club, it's Stoke-on-Trent." 🏠
"The way the crowd got behind the team was just extraordinary." 🗣
Tony Pulis explains why away trips to the Britannia became a nightmare for top clubs in England
Each audience knew what their job was. For the fans it was to get behind the team. That they had been recognised. For players, it was a reminder of shared values. For those in charge it was an ego stroke accompanied with a reminder of what was needed. After all, you don’t just demand money, you charm money.
When Stoke were good the three constituent parts – supporters, team, manager and board – all pointed in the same direction. We all knew our job and we tended to deliver.
Remembering Tony’s post match interview, it got me thinking to how rare it was that people managing big organisations do this. How often does the chief executive thank customers, staff and those in charge?
If those in charge don’t, how are we supposed to know what our role is and get recognition when we deliver it?
Those historians who predicted that we’d soon forget the pandemic were right. We largely have.
I sat with a cup of coffee today reflecting that in a few weeks time it’ll be the third anniversary of the first COVID-19 lockdown. That day in March 2020 when the country stopped to see and hear the Prime Minister address us.
Overnight, we were told, all our lives changed. We couldn’t do what we used to do. We couldn’t go to places. Do you remember? It feels such a long time ago.
Do you remember seeing an old film with crowds and worrying?
Or the metre wide markings outside supermarkets?
Or the industry of facemasks that sprung up from nowhere and faded?
What was the pandemic to public sector people? Long days with Teams calls with no end in sight. Struggling to home school while running a job. Burn out. Missing relatives.
As I drank my cup of coffee I recalled how the branch of Starbucks I was sat in was closed. As I’d gone down with suspected coronavirus my house was under quarantine in March 2020 and I couldn’t go to the shops. We lived off what we had.
Looking back, I remembered how I’d listened to a BBC Sounds podcast on the Spanish Flu and was surprised at the time at what it said about how we reacted. As soon as they could, it said, those who lived through it put the outbreak to the back of their minds and it was largely forgotten about. It was so traumatic, the programme had said, that people didn’t want to remember it.
There are no memorials to the 17 million who died of Spanish flu. I heard a TV producer talk about how of the ideas being turned into films and dramas none are COVID-related.
In the UK, 200,000 have died of COVID-19 and almost seven million globally. Almost 18 million people in the UK have tested positive.
‘All things must pass,’ I used to think on bad days. It broadly has.
But the family and friends of those who died haven’t moved on. Nor have those with long COVID.
You’ve posted your content, but how well is it working? What can you measure and how does that compare? Lucy Salvage takes a look at what numbers to look at.
When we talk about measuring data, KPIs, benchmarks and the like, one thing that can be useful is knowing what other people are doing and how well they are doing it.
Sure, in a lot of cases, particularly in business, competitor analysis is key to formulating an effective marketing strategy. But what about Local Government? In particular social media? I would argue that when it comes to social media engagement, you should only be concerned with numero uno.
“Try telling the Big Boss that!” I hear you cry into your gin – and so the next time your Big Boss wants to know how you are doing on social alongside neighbouring councils, here is your argument for why that’s a bit of a silly question.
It’s a one-horse race
The main reason why it’s more or less impossible to benchmark social engagement against other authorities is simple. We’re not in competition with them. We’re not trying to sell an identical product to the same target market. Thanks to local democracy and the Boundary Commission, you have your territory and they have theirs. Think The Hunger Games but without military rule or a fight to the death, everybody has their own district (or borough). For this reason alone, there is little if any value in regularly spending time analysing what other LAs are doing on social, unless that is they are doing something really spectacular and you want some of that action.
Too many variables
Benchmarking social engagement against other local authorities is tricky because of the many different variables that make up each authority. If we break it down in the simplest of terms, most of it comes down to the diversity of our audiences – not one will be an identical match for another. Here are a few variables that make it hard to compare one authority’s social media engagement with another:
Geography – some are more rural/urban than others and with that comes varying needs and challenges. For example, a densely rural district may have poor broadband coverage resulting in a higher number of residents unable to access the internet compared to a densely populated urban borough with greater coverage.
Age – areas with a higher percentage of an ageing population will have differing service needs to those areas with a more active younger audience. Age will also determine which social platform is the most effective home for your messaging and if you even use social media at all. Ofcom’s Adults Media Use and Attitudes Report (2022) shows that the percentage of people using social media varies considerably by age, as we would expect.
Gender – each social media platform will have a differing split of male versus female followers. In my experience, audiences tend to mirror the national trend of having a higher proportion of female followers on each platform. This will impact how you position content, and therefore the results you get from it.
Regional ethnic diversity – this will impact content as varying needs and traditions within the community are catered for. For example, content produced by the London Borough of Newham, named as the most diverse local authority in England and Wales, will produce different content to that of the least diverse authority, Allerdale District.
Each of these variables means that whilst we might be offering similar services to our publics, the way they are communicated and presented will be very different, rendering it a pretty pointless task to try and make social media engagement comparisons between authorities. I realise, even if your Big Boss does not, that you have far better things to be doing with your time.
How you should be benchmarking your social media engagement
If you’re accessing your social analytics natively (i.e. for free via Twitter, Meta, or LinkedIn) then it’s likely you’re going to be limited in terms of what data you can collect.
If you pay for analytics via your management system, then you’ll have a lot more at your disposal. The key to utilising this data by whichever means is to be sure of your purpose. What will help you improve your content? What do you want to know? For monthly KPI reporting, I’d choose no more than four metrics to focus on. My top four:
Number of followers
Engagement (all)
Engagement rate
Reach
Whilst the number of followers might appear to be somewhat of a vanity metric, it is still nice to see your following increase each month and confirm that actually, you’re doing something right. It’s also the quickest indicator of things going wrong if suddenly a large number of people abandon ship.
There are some metrics that I personally find provide little value. These are:
Brand awareness – just because someone doesn’t @mention you doesn’t mean they aren’t engaging with your content in other ways, and if you’ve ever tried to accurately @mention a company in a post you’ll know it takes FOREVER. Nobody has time for that)
Best time of day to post – this changes all the dang time day by day, week on week. It’s impossible to keep on top of and a waste of time to even try to. Just use your noodle. You know when your audience is most likely to be online.
Impressions – they’re just big numbers that lull you into a false sense of security – always best to choose reach over impressions IMHO.
Sentiment analysis doesn’t get British humour
I include all engagements in my monthly reporting as I don’t trust sentiment analysis. Whilst management systems such as Sprout Social and Hootsuite offer sentiment analysis as part of their higher-tier paid packages, the technology isn’t as reliable as it could be. The last time I checked, artificial intelligence (AI) is yet to get to grips with British humour, particularly sarcasm.
I got fed up with having to manually check sentiment reports which were so far off the mark, that I stopped including them in my monthly reporting long ago. Until AI is better at recognising the context of a comment, then for me anyway, this data is meaningless.
Don’t forget to add the context
What isn’t meaningless is YOU. You hold the power. You know your audiences and how they are likely to react to stuff. You are the one ‘in it’ so you are best placed to read the room when it comes to sentiment. Sometimes it is easy to lose sight of that when drowning in data. Don’t be afraid to include free text analysis of your observations in your reporting. You can give this context to supplement the inclusion of all engagements in your numerical reporting.
Engagement is important
Engagement rate is one of the most valuable metrics as it gives you an overall indication of how you are doing and it’s the best way to benchmark against yourself. Only by regularly collecting data on a monthly basis (or more often if you are mad) will you come to know what an expected good engagement rate for you is. Remember, no one else matters. You are only in competition with yourself.
Setting benchmarks by platform
Here’s how I set social media benchmarks (by platform) for 2023. This was following the collection of a year’s worth of data in 2022:
I used the data over the twelve-month period to calculate averages for each metric (such as reach, engagement, and engagement rate.)
I then used these averages to create my benchmarks for 2023. For example, for LinkedIn I have a benchmark engagement rate of 12 per cent, and for Twitter it’s 4 per cent. This is reflective of the popularity of each of these platforms with my organisation’s audience.
Your bad is someone else’s good
To further reinforce the point that comparing your social media performance to that of others is a mug’s game, a bad engagement rate for you may be exceptionally good for someone else. Another reason why it is crucial you find your own ground when determining what is good and bad social media engagement.
According to our feathered friends at Hootsuite, a good engagement rate is between 1 – 5 per cent. So, if you are punching well above that anyway, happy days! Your challenge now is to maintain that. For those struggling to achieve 1 – 3 per cent, then I would advise that you need to revisit your strategy to try and get to the bottom of why your content isn’t landing. This is the point where looking at what your neighbours are doing may come in helpful.
Hootsuite lists six engagement rate formulas (oh look, another variable!). The one I use is ‘engagement rate by posts’. This will tell you the rate at which followers are engaging with your content, however, it won’t take into account anything that goes viral given that reach is not considered. Here is the magic formula you need for the engagement rate by posts calculation:
No. of engagements / no. of followers * 100
This blog from Hootsuite lists some other engagement rate types, such as by reach, by impressions, and by paid-for, which may work better for you (because only you matter remember!).
You can be flexible with KPIs
Another thing to remember is that you can always tweak your KPIs as you move through the year. It isn’t cheating. It’s not fiddling the books. It’s progress and the best way for you to compete with yourself is by setting realistic and achievable targets that are bespoke to your organisation.
Only then will you be able to accurately report your brilliantness to the Big Boss. It might be dog-eat-dog out there, but you’re always number one when it comes to reporting on social media engagement.
Lucy Salvage MCIPR is Digital Content Creator, Chartered Institute of Environmental Health and previously worked as Media and Communications Officer at Wealden District Council.
Cormac Smith was known to many through his career in local and central government. He’d also been communications advisor for Ukraine government. So when Russia invaded the country he looked for a way to make his experience count… in TV studios.
In early December 2021 I was visiting friends and former colleagues in Kyiv. Between 2016 – 2018 I had served as special advisor to the country’s Foreign Minister. Over lunch one day, a number of those present including Ukrainian diplomats suggested I should be speaking about their country on the media back in the UK, because in their words, I understood them.
Storm clouds were already gathering, they knew what was coming, so I said I would see what I could do. Long story short, I returned to the UK, hit the phones and began pitching myself as an expert on the region.
Over the next 13 months to date I have carried out in the in the region of 150 TV and Radio interviews across nine countries. As a seasoned media trainer and public speaker, the following is a summary of the lessons learned or in some cases, simply confirmed.
1. Media relations can be tough
Despite a strong resume, buckets of determination and over 30 years’ experience of selling in stories and placing interviews it took me over a month after my return from Kyiv to get my first gig. But I had made a promise to my friends; what was I going to do, except keep buggering on as Churchill once said. Finally, around mid-January, with Putin’s further invasion still over a month away I got my first interview
2. Honest tough feedback is critical
I am fortunate to have a number of professional friends and colleagues, both in the UK and in Ukraine who can be relied on to give honest feedback. Getting this feedback and acting on it to make improvements, especially in the early days was very helpful.
3. Do your research
Find out as far as possible what the interviewer wants to talk about, then prepare meticulously. Nothing will lose credibility quicker than not knowing your subject. Having said that know when to say; I don’t know.
4. Key messages are critical
Having done your research decide what you want to get across. Expect the unexpected, always answer or at least address the question but learn how to bridge back to your key messages, and bridge back as often as necessary. This takes skill and practice if you are to keep interviewer and audience happy and not antagonise them.
5. It’s not just what you say, its how you say it
As little as 10% of what we communicate is verbal. Body language and tone of voice are critical if we are to grab attention, be trusted and gain traction. Assess posture, eye contact, hand movements and facial expressions. And analyse tone of voice and pace as well as strength of delivery. All of these things combine to make you either likeable and credible, or get them wrong – and you lose your audience.
6. Find the full stop
Despite coaching others for years to be concise and economical with words this was the biggest lesson I needed to learn early on. Prime time opportunities with the likes of Nick Ferrari on LBC will generally see you get between three and four minutes. Their clock is running and if you talk too much you will be cut off and fail to get your key messages across. It was when two trusted friends and colleagues, one a Brit and one a Ukrainian diplomat, told me on the same day that I had to learn to find the full stop, that the lesson finally sunk in.
7. Develop relationships with producers and interviewers
As an interviewee part of your job is to add value to producers and interviewers lives by being easy and pleasant to deal with and guaranteeing quality content every time. The other part of your job is to get your message across consistently, credibly and memorably. Be prepared to be strong and hold your ground from time to time, but don’t get confrontational.
Summary
I have been placing stories and setting up interviews for 30 years. I did my first interview on national television almost 24 years ago. I have also been coaching others to go on TV or radio, formally or informally, for 20 years. Nothing I had done compared to the intensity or importance of what I have done for the last year. Never assume you know it all or can turn up and wing it. Preparation is key and hubris comes before many a fall. On the other hand, humility and a little bit of fear will serve you well and keep you honest.
Cormac Smith is a freelance communications consultant who specialises in a range odf areas including public speaking and media training.
Back in the olden days – 2008 – people didn’t shout so much on social media.
Heck, they were just amazed their council or wherever was using it.
Then people got a bit testy and then during the pandemic they got full on sweary and abusive. I’ve a feeling that when the inflated gas and electric bills land it’ll get even worse.
Here’s a round-up of some of the points made in the Public Sector Comms Headspace session on dealing with online snark. Thanks everyone who came or contributed.
Have a set of social media house rules
Yes, this is the ditch I’ll die in. You need something to say what’s acceptable and what’s not. A line in the sand. Then you need to enforce it and tell people why you’ve enforced it. Give them a warning first if you like but don’t tolerate abuse, hate or racist comments.
Once you’ve got your rules then use them. But explain how they are being used.
People eventually twig that they’ve had their views removed and can get even more testy. What’s more helpful if you explain the action taken and also the reason why. Having seen that done I’ve certainly seen the burst of warm feelings when it is done.
Support your staff because it’s the law
Support your staff. It’s a nice thing to do. They’ll come back to work again next day and anyway it’s the law.
People not liking a policy is fine. People hurling abuse isn’t.
It’s always worth challenging
The origin story for many of public sector media was the riots in 2011. An analysis of Twitter at the time showed how some key tweets ebbed and flowed. It also showed the importance of challenging misinformation through a trusted account. The Guardian and LSE produced some landmark research ‘Reading the Riots’ that showed that challenging them in public saw the impact diminish.
Post something contentious when you’re around
Several years ago I remember Aly from Coventry City Council saying that posting about the Pope’s visit at 5pm on a Friday and then going home maybe wasn’t the best idea. When she returned on Monday morning was hundreds of comments playing out a religious flamewar better suited to the 17th century.
Someone made the point in the Headspace session. Don’t post something that you know may be contentious without you being around to keep an eye on the comments.
It’s always worth challenging over and over
Every year the urban myth gets repeated that Cadbury’s have banned the word ‘Easter’ from their eggs for fear of offending muslims. They haven’t. But someone challenges this about 350 times a day. If they haven’t, they’d be 35,000 false comments.
Hi Ringo, this is not true. We have used the word Easter in our marketing campaigns for years, and it is clearly stated on several of our packs where it makes sense and where there is appropriate space. We invite people from all faiths to enjoy our delicious Easter treats. pic.twitter.com/U8kqvYBT1G
It’s a good tip. A real person – a resident – talking about something doesn’t attract the same attention as a bland corporate announcement. So, include real people in your content. Employes talking about their job also works, too.
You don’t have to put up with someone swearing at you
Loop back to the social media guidelines. If you’re telling people that you’ll not tolerate racism or being sworn at then after a warning ban them. Just as you’d be banned if up behaved like that in my local Post Office. You deserve to be able to do your job without being the target of abuse.
The argument for shooting, editing and posting your own content is well and truly won. But how should it look?
There’s a few things to consider when you are drawing up a video strategy for your organisation. Content would be one. A style guide would be another once you’ve got some confidence.
This would dictate things like the typeface you’d use and maybe where your logo sits.
You are probably used to using brand guidelines in marketing and print. What you do with video needn’t feel as onerous but some basic pointers will make your collective output look much better.
Here are some things to think about. You can use as much or as little as you like with this. Certainly, as an extra task it’s going to add some time onto the end of your workflow but you need to ask yourself if the process adds any or takes away.
Certainly, there’s sometimes where speed is of the essence.In that case maybe it can all go to the wall. It’s up to you.
The steps here aren’t that hard and can be replicated using a smartphone and an editing app. I’ve used Kinemaster here.
I’ve editing some editing points in italics showing you the steps I took.
Video isn’t print
First things first. Breaking news: video isn’t print. The idea of picking up your brand guidelines and dropping them lock stock and barrel into video is a really, really bad one for me. What’s been developed for print works best in print.
The NHS brand, for example, is a thing of wonder with a clear typeface that directs people around the hospital. It immediately reassures people that they’re getting health information. But a sign isn’t video.
For me, the starting point may be your brand guidelines but you’ll need to start with a spirit of flexibility. BBC News on TikTok, for example, has some broad pointers that identify it as BBC but it doesn’t drop in the opening music of a news bulletin, for example.
A typeface
Video editing tools give a variety of different typefaces. If you’re using something like Kinemaster you’ll get some free. If you upgrade to Pro you’ll get access to plenty more which is where the value of Pro pays dividends.
If you’ve got a font you use but you’re maybe not clear on what the font is called there’s a great website called whatthefontis.com. Drag and drop a piece of content and it’ll tell you what the font is and a number of close matches. Then look for the matching font that’s available to you in the video editing app.
Making your typeface work
Once you’ve got your typeface you’ll need to think of a size for the title, maybe you’ll need to use the editing tool to create an outline for the title to make it stand out.
A title
You’ll maybe think of how you’d like titles to appear and depart the screen. Using an editing app it’s very easy to create an in-animation and an out-animation. Fade is a pretty standard one but having one makes your content look that bit better.
Here’s a title created using Kinemaster Pro and uses Plus Jakarta Sans Bold downloaded from the shop.
Text on screen
This is the part where you want to tell the story using text on the screen maybe with some supporting footage.
This uses Plus Jakarta Sans Bold.
A caption
This is the additional information that maybe shows the name and the job title of the individual in question. It’s sometimes know as a lower third. What would you like your template to look like? You may want this to be part of the family of typefaces you’re using for the title.
I’ve created two separate lines. For the first one, the name, I’ve created a text layer, enabled background colour, changed the colour to red, changed opacity to 100 per cent. This creates a solid block of colour. If I wanted it to be really opaque as a background I may knock this down to something like 30 per cent. I’ve used Plus Jakarta Sans Extra Bold. The default text colour is white. I’ve then duplicated this to create a second text box. I’cve switched the typeface to Plus Jakarta Sans Light. I’ve changed the colour of this second textbox to red and I’ve changed the background to white. In other words I’ve flipped it round entirely.
A sub-title
This is the accessibility-friendly part of the video where you’re adding the what the person on screen or voice is saying.
There’s two ways of doing this. Yes, you can do this on Kinemaster. Yes, you have to do it letter by letter. No, there’s no shortcut. I’ve changed the typeface here to Plus Jakarta Sans Extra Light. It’s part of the Plus Jakarta family of fonts I’ve downloaded but it’s lighter so more suited to a sub-titling role.
A logo
You may be watching something like Al Jazeera English and you’ll see a logo in the top left or maybe top right corner of the screen. This is really useful as it reminds the viewer the source of the information. It plays a supporting but helpful role.
Here I’ve emailed myself the logo and I’ve added it as a media layer. I’ve changed opacity to 75 per cent. Feel free to experiment with your own. My own logo is white text on an orange background. You may feel that white is less obtrusive. Go with what works for you.
A style guide
All of this builds up a style guide. Mine may look like this…
Title: Plus Jakarta Bold with fade for in and out animations.
Caption: Plus Jakarta Sans Extra Bold for the name and Plus Jakarta Sans Light for the job title.
Sub-title: Plus Jakarta Sans Extra Light
Logo: Orange logo top left corner at 75 per cent opacity.
You may want to add to it as you go along using this as a starting point. Maybe your style guide may include something like resolves – how each clips bleeds into each other – or other things. That’s all fine.
Remember that all these things are part of the language of film. It’s fine to play around with them from time to time.
The bottom line is with a bit of teaching being able to do this isn’t hard. The results outweigh the effort you put in. For more on video, I deliver ESSENTIAL VIDEO SKILLS REBOOTED on planning, editing, and posting video. You can find out more here. I also deliver ESSENTIAL PORTRAIT VIDEO FOR TIKTOK & REELS. More on that here.
It’s been a while since I blogged an example of human comms.
This examople comes not from public relations but from a Judge. A judge in the Family Court.
I’m grateful to Gareth Nicholson for posting this letter to LinkedIn.
It’s a beautiful example of how to write with an audience in mind. The audience here are two children who are the subject of a contested custody case.
In it, the Judge tells the children that he’s told their parents to ‘cut the crap’. But its not such a direct phrase that makes it stand out. It summarises the arguments for and against and sets out a decision.
I love it. If a Judge can speak clearly then what’s your excuse?
Scroll down for the full text.
The full text is here…
RECORDER JOHN MCKENDRICK QC
CENTRAL FAMILY COURT
LONDON
30 August 2022
Dear [A] and [B],
My name is John and I am a judge. I met your Mum and Dad at court in London last week. Your mum and dad have asked me to make decisions for you both about where you should live.
Your Mum asked me to decide that you should both come and live with her in Somerset and see your Dad only every second weekend and at holidays. Mum wants you to go to schools in Somerset.
Your Dad asked me to decide that things should stay as they are. That you spend one week with him and the other week with your Mum in London. Dad wants you to go to schools in London.
I think you met a lady called Shelley in July and you told her what you wanted. She told me you both liked the idea of living with your Mum in Somerset. Shelley spoke to me as well last week.
I hope you both understand that I have made the decision and not your Mum or your Dad. Judges sometimes have to make decisions when parents cannot agree.
I have decided you should both continue to live in London with one week in the care of your Dad and then one week in the care of your mum. This means you will both go to school in London from next week. I have decided you should have nice holidays in Somerset and I will speak with your Mum and Dad again to sort that out.
I have made this decision after considering who you both are, what you both need and things like your education, happiness and your welfare. I have decided you need each other – I think you are good brothers to each other. I also think you need to spend time with your Mum and with your Dad. They both need to play an important role in caring for you. I was worried your Dad might not have a full and proper role in your lives if you lived in Somerset. Looking at all these things in the round I felt this was the best decision for your both, although of course I considered what you both wanted.
I have also asked your Mum and Dad to behave a bit better. I know you both find the arguing that happens between them difficult. Although it is a naughty word, [A], you are right to describe it to Shelley as “crap”. I have told your parents to stop “the crap”.
I hope you can both settle down with the new school term with week about with Mum and Dad in your London homes. I hope you will enjoy nice holidays in Somerset. I wish you both good luck.
If you were to take a few minutes to think about where social media is in the public sector is right now, what would you say?
What would your first reaction be as a communicator be? Excitement at the possibility ahead of you? Or weariness at the reality you’ve been faced with? Maybe anger at your council who won’t reply to messages online?
That’s the broad question I’ve been reflecting on this week prompted by Glasgow City Council’s Vicky Kerr in her session for the Public Sector Comms Headspace Facebook group.
As someone who has worked in the field, I’m not entirely sure that I like the answer that presents itself.
In short, public sector social media has evolved at times from being an exciting innovative field to at times being a leaking sewage pipe on the cramped wall of a North Sea submarine. It pumps effluent into the room and doesn’t appear to help.
It’s the place where people complain, shout and abuse people, isn’t it?
Yet, it needn’t always be so.
The days of militant optimism
In 2008, when I first got involved with public social media it was a time of excitement at the possibility. I worked under the radar to develop new ideas inspired by people like Sarah in Derbyshire,. Carl in Devon and Al in Newcastle-upon-Tyne. We connected through Twitter and we shared ideas and encouragement. We were a growing band. A force for good.
Ohio State Professor Everitt Rogers in 1962 mapped the innovation adoption curve. It applies in so many places and its language has entered the dictionary. The first 2.5 per cent are the innovators who would take the risks and work out how things could work. Early adopters came next, the academic said. Theis group makes up 13.5 per cent but are quick to see the possibility. Then come the early and then late majority then the laggards.
In 2013, I wrote and researched a whitepaper called West by West Midlands where we looked at social media innovation across the wider West Midlands. You can still find it online here. It’s an optimistic work. It brought together innovators and early adopters like fellow Kate Bentham in Shrophsire, Geoff Coleman in Birmingham and Pete Jackson at the IEWM. We all subscribed to the movement of militant optimism that we would do good things despite everything. It was better back then to seek forgiveness if things went wrong rather than permission.
Reading it now it feels lille a bulletin from another era. But I’m also reminded of a line from Dave Briggs who did some really important early work in the field back then. “It’s when these channels get boring,” he said, “is when it gets most interesting.”
He was right. The novelty of using live streaming or ebooks takes you so far. The real value is when people get used to it.
The days of change
All this brings me to today.
I’ve a feeling people at the coal face feel that social media is an extra burden. It’s a must have rather than a nice to have but too often its a source of annoyance and inconvenience. People are fed-up at the algorithm switches. Just put it on Facebook, people are told. Then we can tick the box and move on.
Then there’s Twitter which many think is locked in irreversible decline the plaything of a billionaire who keeps making wilfully bad decisions.
The tone has changed on social media. Maybe it was the pandemic or perhaps the signs were there before. Global trends have certainly shifted away from the open town square to safer spaces.
The militant optimist still sees how social media can be a powerful way to reach people. More than 80 per cent of UK people have at least one profile. Half of time spent on the UK’s largest channel Facebook is spent watching video. The average TikTok user spends 29 minutes a day scrolling and watching. The user data has never been better.
Yet, all this blizzard of data and numbers can be blinding.
Academics speak of the sensation of ‘heart sinkage’ amongst junior doctors when they are faced with family who expect miracles when the loved one is ill. That’s a sensation familiar, I’m sure to the comms person who posts the update and is greeted within a bin query.
In the pandemic, public sector social communications helped the Government and NHS keep people safe, got them jabbed and through the worst of it. Social media played such an important role in this. Some content was good and some was bad. On balance it worked.
