Right, I’m going to say something bold and then directly contradict myself. But just stay with me on this, okay?
We all need to be doing more of this digital communications stuff from the hard-bitten pr to the frontline officer.
There shouldn’t be a digital comms team and a traditional comms team in a different part of the building.
There should be one. Which doesn’t mind if frontline people use digital too.
But this is the tricky bit. Every organisation now needs a digital communications specialist to help make this happen.
Let me explain.
Why there shouldn’t be a divide between digital and traditional comms
Back in 1998 the newspaper I was worked at with reluctance set-up email addresses. Our office of 12 reporters had one email platform rigged up to one machine. We gathered around like a bunch of Marconis as the first e-mail landed. “Oooooh!” we cooed as it landed and someone plucked up the courage to type a reply. When the inbox filled we didn’t know what to do.
Back then email in the office I worked in email was seen as specialist job trusted to just one person. Times change and now every new reporter there gets an email address. Which is as it should be.
When digital communications emerged to greet the social web a whole new series of skills were required. Cutting and pasting a press release didn’t work so people re-discovered conversation and informality. It became clear that the language of each platform was different to each. People’s media use splintered and people could no longer be found in one place but several.
This is something I’ve blogged about before and others have too and GCN’s Ann Kempster has written:
I don’t see how a modern press function can operate in isolation, not taking up modern communication methods and solely relying on press cuttings and column inches. The world just does not operate this way anymore. We all need to be able to operate across comms disciplines. That goes for digital too – we need to grasp marketing and press and internal comms.
And also Jeremy Bullmore in Campaign was at it in 2008:
As soon as everyone realises that digital is nothing to do with digital and all about interactivity and that interactivity allows brands and people to interact as no other medium does then trad and mod will all regroup under the same roof.
To communicate over a range of platforms needs new skills
According to Google, 90 per cent of our media consumption takes place via a screen. Sometimes several screens at once as the Newsnight TV audience contribute via their smartphones to the debate on the #newsnight Twitter hashtag, for example.
Acording to Ofcom’s annual survey, in 2012 more than 50 per cent of adults have a social networking profile with 78 per cent of those aged 15 to 24. It makes fascinating reading.
In short, if you want to communicate with people you need to use a variety of channels.
A press release is no longer your gateway to the media.
A press release, web update, a picture of a nature reserve posted to Twitter on a mobile phone, a sharable Facebook image, a Soundcloud audio clip of a politician speaking or a LinkedIn group contribution from a named officer is. But the thing is. It’s not always all of those things. Knowing the landscape means knowing which will be relevant.
Which is why we need a digital communications specialist.
But won’t a digital comms specialist mean that people think ‘oh, that’s their job?’
I’ve heard it said from people I rate that having a social media officer or a digital comms specialist means that things get chucked over to them to tweet, or whatever. That’s certainly a fair point.
But the specialist whose job it is to share the sweets, advise and train others is vital and won’t let that happen. Think about the teams you’ve worked in. If you are lucky you work with great people who come up with great ideas. But not everyone in the team is always like that. Often, you can only be as good as your least enthusiastic employee and if their grasp of digital comms is poor their delivery will mirror it.
The pace of change in technology is frightening. It’s unrealistic to think that everyone will be equally across it.
Which is why we need a digital communications specialist.
What a digital comms specialist should look like…
1. A trainer…
2. A geek…
3. A solver of problems that aren’t problems yet…
4. A horizon scanner…
5. A builder of an internal community…
6. A source of help…
7. A winner of internal arguments…
8. Someone who knows the channels. Trad and digital…
If you have someone who is already doing this full time you’re quids in. If you’re not your organisation risks falling behind.
Some great work has been done adhoc with digital communications across local government. But without mainstreaming the advances at best will be patchy.
Creative commons credits
TV logo http://www.flickr.com/photos/jvk/6701931811/sizes/l/
Talking http://www.flickr.com/photos/yooperann/7830838870/sizes/l/
Screen http://www.flickr.com/photos/mr_t_in_dc/6754500383/sizes/l/