For example, apps and websites that used Twitter’s API to enable sharing of content to and from Twitter are now seeing that functionality break. WordPress reported Tuesday that it was no longer able to access the API, rendering its websites unable to automatically share posts to Twitter.
Engaget.com
As an overall point, Twitter are making it really hard for the public sector to use the platform. One BBC documentary ended with the conclusion that it can no longer protect users from trolling.
A report every public sector communicator needs to be aware of has been published and the findings are grim.
According to the UK in the World Values Survey, the UK is suffering from a collapse in trust in the public institutions of Government and media. Not just a small fall but a whopping great big one.
If you live in the UK, regardless of how you vote you can probably reel off a list of reasons as to why this is. But as a public sector community the reality of this feels important to look in the face.
Let’s look at the data. Firstly, this is a piece of academic rigour. This comes from Kings College London’s Policy Institute. Part think tank, part consultancy this operates in the field of public policy.
The numbers in the report are bleak and can be read in full here.
As a summary:
Confidence in Parliament has halved in the past 30-years while confidence in the EU since Brexit has increased.
Trust in Government is 24 per cent
Trust in political parties is at 23 per cent.
Trust in the EU in the UK is around 40 per cent which is double the position of 2009.
Trust in police has fallen to 67 per cent from 81 per cent three decades ago.
Trust in the press lies at 14 per cent.
Trust in institutions is even lower in Northern Ireland with just 10 per cent trusting political parties.
All this compares unfavourably to other countries with the UK’s residents on 18th in a league table of 24 in trust in government.
So what does this mean for communicators?
For me, it means that public sector communicators have a harder task to communicate with people. Police and central government can take lots from this. Local government and NHS can’t shrug off what is a deep seated malaise.
It means that corporate communications through corporate communications channels may not be the way to go. If something lands in your inbox from government it’s a harder hill to climb.
So, what’s to be done?
Robert Phillips, the late author of ‘Trust Me PR is Dead’, was asked by a burger chain to make a pitch for rebuilding reputation work after an undercover journalist found traces of manure in their burgers.
“You’ll be pleased to know this is very simple,” he told the room. “Stop putting crap in your burgers.” Then he sat down.
It’s not the job of comms to rebuild trust. It’s the job of the institution as the Metropolitan Police are finding out.
Besides this. I can’t help but think the key to part of this is in another piece of research. The Ipsos Mori Veracity index looks at who the most trusted professions are in the UK. You’ll not be surprised to learn that the most recent set of figures show politicians generally bottom of the league table with 13 per cent trusting them.
Look up the league table there is nurses on top trusted by 89 per cent, museum curators on 81 per cent and doctors on 85 per cent. Even the public is on 57 per cent a trust rate that institutions can only dream about.
Once when I was training and I showed these figures someone said that their campaign to reach Afro Caribbean young men had failed using traditional routes. So, they used barbers instead because they see them every few weeks.
Maybe, the answer is also to take the Afro Caribbean barber route a bit more.
TikTok is a fascinating platform and is now a genuine contender for the most important channel you can use.
But what are the numbers? Who is using it? Isn’t the public sector banned from it?
In this post I’ll look to tackle those questions which are ones I often get asked.
How many TikTok users are there in the UK in 2023?
Fresh Ofcom data has put TikTok right at the heart of the social media landscape in the UK in surprising ways.
It has moved from the fringe to become central to the social media landscape. The demographics are vital. A majority of under 35s use it and heading for a majority of under 44-year-olds.
16 to 24-year-olds 75 per cent use TikTok
25 to 34-year-olds 63 per cent use TikTok
35 to 44-year-olds 44 per cent use TikTok
45 to 54-year-olds 32 per cent use TikTok
55 to 64-year-olds 19 per cent use TikTok
65+ 5 per cent use use TikTok
Can you use TikTok when the UK Government have banned it from their devices?
You work in the public sector. Does that mean that you can’t use it? No.
What are good public sector TikTok accounts?
South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue. With 150,000 followers they use trends as a starting point and weave in the messages they need about recruitment, fire safety and youth engagement.
Sandwell & West Birmingham NHS Trust. With 35,000 followers they are making a name for health advice aimed at young people. This shows you don’t have to follow the trends.
Charlotte Maidment. An occupational therapist who uses TikTok in a private capacity where she talks about her husband’s struggles with depression and what that’s like for her. More influencer than corporate account.
Mayor of London. Sadiq Khan’s office which comments on news and makes announcements. A good corporate account with a human face.
There’s been no denying there has been changes at Twitter since Elon Musk took over.
This week, Twitter’s changes to reward subscribers come into effect. Where once the platform was a democratic real-time platform you could speak to famous people directly its morphed into something else.
I’ve blogged here on whether or not its worth paying for better access. But in the meantime here’s excerpts from a thread that analyses what algorithm now looks like.
10. Followers, engagement & user data are the three data points
If you take away anything, remember this – the models take in 3 inputs:
• Likes, retweets, replies: engagement data • Mutes, unfollows, spam reports: user data • Who follows you: the follower graph pic.twitter.com/0hFaQenqDx
Public sector comms people in the next few days will have to make a decision over Twitter… to pay or not to pay?
The question is being forced on people by a move to scrap verified blue ticks and replace them with a paid for version.
The blue ticks have long been a Twitter-verified hard won badge of trust that singles public sector organisations out as being trusted.
Twitter’s model
Under the new model, organisations can apply for Twitter Verified Organisations at $1,000 dollars (£810) a pop. It also charges $50 dollars (£40.50) a month for further affiliate accounts. So, an organisation with 10 Twitter accounts will be paying $500 (£405) a month.
The advantage, Twitter says, is longer tweets, longer video and your content in the Twitter For You page which Twitter has quietly introduced as a landing page which you’re served when you you navigate to the page. This serves what Twitter’s algorithm wants you to see rather than your friends and followers as happened in the earlier days of Twitter.
Individuals can take out Twitter Blue at £84 a year. You get longer tweets and tweets shown to more people.
Meta’s model
Over at Meta in the UK a verified programme has also been launched. It gives a verified badge for Instagram and Facebook and access to support at $15 a month for an account. You also get proactive account protection.
To pay or not to pay? Yes and no
And here’s the rub. Yes and no.
Twitter feels increasingly like a broken platform whose every decision is framed around irritating existing users. Elon Musk has clearly overpaid in a moment of hubris and is frantically trying to wring cash out of the platform. Blue ticks gave an element of trust to the platform. It’s tempting to think you’re paying for what you had with these moves but the reality is that you won’t be. When anyone can pay for it, including potential bad actors, the trust is devalued.
The wider issue is Twitter as a platform. As the recent BBC Panorama investigation showed, it is no longer a platform that can guarantee people’s safety. The question should be not should you pay for it but should you even be on it?
As a strategy, a gradual easing away from Twitter is the sensible way forward. Twitter was always useful for reaching journalists and for a crisis. WhatsApp may be a better way of messaging a hack. So too is a newsroom on the website. For an emergency? It will be interesting to see what channels are used in the next terror incident. In the Manchester Arena attack, Greater Manchester Police established a trusted voice within minutes and then filled in the blanks. Would people be looking at something like Facebook if something like that happened? I’m tempted to think so. The pandemic certainly showed us that other ways of reaching people exist.
Which leads to paying for Meta. Frankly, Facebook’s own customer service offering is so bad and so opaque that paying something a month for the ability to reach them represents value for money.
We’ve sometimes thought of social media as a free channel for some time. The truth is it’s never been free. It takes time and resources to produce organic content that works. It costs to boost a post to make sure it reaches people. These moves to pay for verification just brings the cash-hungry nature of social platforms into the open.
Elections are changing and you’d be well served wherever you are in the UK to do some simple things to bring yourself up to speed.
At first glance, much is the same with polling day. The same church hall with the same pencil stubs to write an X on the ballot paper just as people have always done. It’s as traditional as a cup of tea, no?
But the big change in 2023 is Voter ID. Before you stop reading this won’t affect you if you’re local government in England, Wales and Scotland it will. In Northern Ireland it already does.
Talking to Kelly Quigley Hicks from the Association of Electoral Administrators for a piece of work for LGiU there’s a few pointers all communicators need to know. She had some excellent ideas.
All this means there’s a really strong chance people will turn up without the right ID and tempers are likely to flair. Yes, if people don’t have a passport they can apply for a Voter Authority Certificate by April 25. But they’ll need to apply for one. You’ll need to tell them how.
While Scottish and Welsh councils aren’t adopting voter ID for council elections they’ll be mandated to for any general election after October 2023. There is a temptation to sit back and look through binoculars at potential chaos unfolding in England. It’ll be your turn for a General Election.
So…
Before election day, offer to partner up with a council that’s introducing Voter ID at polling stations
If you’re not staging a Voter ID election make friends with one that is. If you’re a communicator who lives nearby see if you can go along to the count to see how the changes take place. That’s harder if you’re Sctland or Wales but a Zoom call is an easy thing to do after the event to see what’s worked.
There’s several useful resources to explain voter ID. Having a one pager drawn up with elections that every comms person, polling station staff member and candidate has feels pretty mission critical.
Communicate, communicate, communicate
If you’re a council where Voter ID is being brought in tell people. Over and over. Keep a record of how often you told people and how. I can promise you you’ll get challenged. So don’t just think that this is someone else’s job.
If you’re not running one then take a look at what others are doing. Chat to one that is to see what they’re learning.
On the day, embed comms in the elections team
Kelly suggests having a comms person embedded in elections on election day. That way you can respond far quicker to developing issues as they come through. Having been a council comms person sat in the police gold control during an emergency I can see the value in that.
There’s likely to be a lot of misinformation and disinformation flying around and being able to target that in real time will be really helpful.
If you’re not running one then chat to one that is to see what they’re learning.
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?
