Tag Archives: Social network

Decentralized Social Communications: Scary Stuff!

Posted on June 10, 2013 | 11 Comments

Post by: Kim Stephens

ad697e01Do you keep your social media presence “close to the vest” (e.g. only allowing Public Information Officers the ability to post content) or does your strategy include the ability for all agency officials to reach the community?  The latter type of presence involves letting go of control to some extent and this, of course, requires a huge leap of faith from leadership, especially in top-down oriented public safety organizations. However, this type of strategy is currently being done quite successfully.

Decentralized Communications: Is this The Evolution of Your Social Presence?

In the book “Social Media in the Public Sector Field Guide” Ines Mergel and Bill Greeves suggest that a decentralized approach to social media content production is evidence of an evolved use of social media in organizations. They state that agencies that have been using social media for a while often “make social media the responsibility of everyone” and offer the benefits of this decision:

A recent decision at the Department of Defense was to abandon the role of the social media director and instead transfer that position’s responsibilities onto many shoulders in the organization. It is very difficult for a single department or division to speak with the knowledge and authority of all the business units of an organization. “Official” responses often require time and research. They frequently result in formal answers that do not fit the casual tone inherent in social media. By formally distributing the tasks and response functions to those who have the knowledge required to have meaningful online conversations on social media channels, you can decrease maintenance costs, increase trust in those exchanges and reduce the number of missteps or rounds of interaction it takes before citizens get the “right” response from your agency. (pages 110-112)

Jim Garrow, who blogs at “The Face of the Matter” makes a similar case: “My point, and it naturally follows from last week’s post on having others write for your agency, is that we [PIOs] need to get the hell out of the way. Let your agency shine through every day. Give your experts the podium they deserve. Build them a following (or let them build a following).”

But how would this work for public safety organizations?

The Toronto Police Department provides an example of complete decentralization of social media content. As can be seen in the image below their agency’s website homepage has all the “big 3″ social media buttons: Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. These buttons take the user to their official account, most likely administered by a Public Information Officer.

toronto

Choose, however, the “Connect with us” tab right below it, and their world opens up. I counted 119 different social media accounts for this organization–119! What are all these people talking about? Ideally, the content they are posting should be directly related to their position or function in the organization, and with each of the samples I chose at random, that proved to be the case. Take for instance Sgt Jack West—who has the title of “Traffic Enforcement.” No shocker, he talks a lot about traffic and how people can stay safe–e.g “Don’t text and drive” etc.

Patricia Fleischmann or @caringcop on Twitter, has the title of “Vulnerable Persons Coordinator.” What does she post about? How elderly and other people who might be vulnerable to crime and natural disasters can be better prepared. She also Tweets quite a lot about people that are helping each other, organizations folks can turn to for assistance, and information from community meetings she attends. She has a healthy following of 762 people.

I could go on for while with examples, but feel free to explore of these great social feeds yourself by clicking here. So, how do they keep everyone in their “lane?” How do they keep all of these people from embarrassing the organization and posting inappropriate content? Yikes–this is scary territory!

I have been told by some of these Toronto Tweeters, that they do the following:

  • Before they get their social account, they are required to attend a 3-day intensive social media training class that provides them with not only information about how and why to use social networks, but also how NOT to use them. This would include Department and City posting policies.
  • Each of the accounts are clearly marked with the fact that the person works for the Toronto Police Department, however, they do often choose to use their own picture instead of the PD’s logo–giving the account a personal touch, which I think is critical for community outreach and engagement (it says to the public–we are people to).
  • Each account states that they do not monitor the account 24/7, and that if anyone needs emergency assistance they should dial 911. (See below–each person’s account information looks almost identical.)
  • Each Twitter profile links back to the official website.toronto2

This obviously is not a willy nilly hey, all-you-guys-go-Tweet-something strategy. Their strategy is obvious, their goals are clear; and it seems to me they are meeting the objectives of reaching out and  connecting with the public on platforms that the public uses everyday.

See, it’s not so scary after all!

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Researchers Review Boston Bombing Social Media Activity

Posted on May 10, 2013 | 2 Comments

Post by: Kim Stephens

800px-2013_Boston_Marathon_aftermath_peopleProject HEROIC–which stands for Hazards, Emergency Response, and Online Informal Communications (see footnote)–took a close look at the online activity of official organizations during the recent domestic terrorist event in Boston and the ensuing suspect chase–that seemed like a marathon in itself.  They released a report today (May 10) titled “Following the Bombing” which I have summarize below.

Their Methodology and Findings

In order to understand  what types of information was provided to the public and how broadly it was distributed, the project team reviewed 29 different government agency or related Twitter accounts. The first question might be: why only Twitter? Researchers like Twitter–the data is easy to grab and analyze.

The project team reviewed two main items: 1. Rate of posting by the selected organizations and elected officials;  and 2. The percent change in followers  (spoiler alert: Boston PD had a 500% increase and the Boston PD PIO Cheryl Fiandaca had a 2291% increase).  The rate that these organizations posted was tied to their increase in followers, which is no surprise, however, there was a notable exception–Boston Fire Department.

Boston FD gained a 25% increase in followers without posting once the day of the attack. Their absence  was not lost on the Twittersphere, and the Boston FD even felt it necessary to defend their decision the next day.  They Tweeted that they deliberately did not post any Tweets from the scene because it is their policy not to “…show any injured person or discuss our treatment.” Quite a few people, however, thought their decision was unfortunate; at a minimum they could have simply ReTweeted the Boston PD account. As the researchers pointed out:  ”…organizations that have increased their network size must provide information of value and to be aware that the public is watching.” Honestly, its about trust. People who follow official accounts do so because they know they can trust the content. The public followers also have a notion that they will provided information in timely manner-especially during incidents such as this one where everyone was looking for any tidbit  they could find in order to make sense out of the chaos.  It is not a stretch to see why people were upset.

Read the whole report here. I like some of their questions they pose at the end:  What can organizations do to ensure their newfound followers stick around? and What educational preparedness-type information should organizations provide to take advantage of the narrow window of attention they have? Let me know your thoughts.

Footnote: “Project HEROIC is a collaborative, NSF funded effort by researchers at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs and the University of California-Irvine to better understand the dynamics of informal online communication in response to extreme events. Through a combination of data collection and modeling of conversation dynamics, the project team aims to understand the relationship between hazard events, informal communication and emergency response.” (via: http://heroicproject.org/)

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Managing Public Expectations….or not.

Posted on January 14, 2013 | 8 Comments

Post by: Kim Stephens

English: Washington, DC Metro logo

I live in the DC corridor and therefore I follow the WMATA (Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority) social media accounts. The authority has great social presence and I  find their Twitter feed especially useful. I look to them to see, for example, why I’m standing on a platform with no train for 20 minutes. More often than not, they will have posted the problem(s) that caused the delay.

Watching a conversation that took place with WMATA the other day, however, made me re-evaluate some of my own advice. I have often stated that it is important to communicate with the public how you will be using social networks in order to manage their expectations. For example, “This account is not monitored 24/7.”  The public, however, pushed back to WMATA for saying almost this exact statement.   I captured the conversation below.  They simply stated:

I’m not sure why WMATA said to report emergencies to that long number versus 911. Whatever the case, the idea that the account was not being monitored 24/7 was astounding to some:

The last exchange reminds me that exclamation points can demonstrate that someone is excited, enthusiast or sarcastic…I’m going with the last choice. Nonetheless, this exchange makes me a bit nervous. Is a 24/7 monitored social media presence now something the public will demand, especially for public safety organizations? If not today, will this be a demand in the near future? What are your thoughts?

Update: @WMATA responded to this post via Twitter. I really appreciate their replies!

For those readers that do not live in the DC area, the MTPD is the Metro Transit Police and they ”have tri-state jurisdiction with responsibility for a variety of law enforcement and public safety functions in transit facilities throughout the Washington, DC Metropolitan area… MTPD police officers have jurisdiction and arrest powers throughout the 1,500 square mile Transit Zone that includes Maryland, Virginia, and the District of Columbia for crimes that occur in or against Transit Authority facilities. It is the only tri-jurisdictional police agency in the country and serves a population of 3.2 million.”

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#SMEM Challenge for 2013: What do I post? Are you ready to be amazing?

Posted on January 4, 2013 | Leave a comment

Post by: Kim Stephens

MC900442000It is easy for emergency managers to learn   social media in terms of the purely technical aspects–these platforms are pretty straightforward to use. However, one of the complaints I often hear, is “Now what?” Never before has the EM community been expected to communicate with the public on an almost daily basis. Once an emergency manager has a Twitter feed and a Facebook page they  understand that they have to post something so that it doesn’t look like a ghost town, but what?

Deciding what to post is not usually a problem during an emergency or a disaster situation, but social communication during the preparedness phase can be  challenging (even after an organization has determined they will invest time and resources to the effort). There are several inter-related issues to consider:

  1. Coordination with response partners.
  2. Managing Public Expectations.
  3. Being creative enough to get the public’s attention.

Coordination with response partners

In bigger communities it is increasingly common for almost every department or agency to have their own social media account.  The Department of Transportation is likely to be posting information road closures, traffic problems, and real-time road conditions during storms:

Police Departments tend to post content about  a wide range of activities from car crashes, to arrests, to the weather, as well as safety tips.

Fire Departments often provide updates about where they are responding, fire prevention tips, and general safety information as well.

So, where does that leave the Office of Emergency Management?  If all of the “sexy” up-to-the minute content is being reported by other agencies, what’s left to be said? Even once your agency decides what “lane” you should be posting in, it’s still possible that other city or county agencies will infringe on your territory. I have heard statements from some annoyed EMs such as: Why did the Fire Department post emergency preparedness content? That’s my job!

Solution:  In order to prevent “social-media envy” coordination and collaboration are key. The results of coordination could manifest in a city or county-wide written content strategy or simply in a verbal agreement regarding expectations. However, it is important to keep in mind that in the social media world, repetition of a message is NOT a bad thing. Your Tweets and Facebook updates  are never seen by everyone that follows you (see Jim Garrow’s article “The Demise of Facebook” in which he points out how few people actually do see what you are posting in their feed). Therefore, amplifying each other’s messages should be an overarching goal.  Here are two great examples of how this is done and communicated to the public in Baltimore.

Managing Public Expectations

I like the Tweet immediate above this paragraph because it also denotes  the type of content OEM will provide and when. I have heard concerns from emergency managers that once they start posting something, such as road closures or the weather, the public complains when they stop. One social media admin told me “The public now thinks I’m the weather man.”  However, continuing to post the same information daily can turn your feed into a very boring presence, ultimately reducing the amount of community engagement and interactions.

Solution: There are two ideas to consider:

  1. Pre-determine your thresholds for when your office will post emergency content (e.g. not every road closure, but only major incidents; not every fire warning, but only “red-flag” events; not every day it rains, but only severe weather ). You can publicize your intentions, however, by simply staying consist, the public will learn what to expect.
  2. Make it very well known, either via your website and/or Facebook page, the types of content your response partners are posting on social networks and where people can find that information. See the National Capital Region ”News Feeds” as an example of this.

Being creative

Whether or not we want to admit it, the ”Be Ready” message gets very little traction when there isn’t an emergency.  Posting “Are you Prepared?” along with a few tips to your Facebook page does not mean your community is now more resilient.  In fact, they are probably ignoring this message altogether. Why? Frankly, it is boring.

What works? Storytelling. Stories  do many things: reshape knowledge into something meaningful; make people care, transcend one’s current environment; motivate; and give meaning, among other things.  In a blog post titled “The Importance of Storytelling in a Digital World”  the author discusses why TED Talks (the ultimate in digital storytelling) work. His logic applies to all digital communication:

 I believe that storytelling is critical for public engagement on the web. Storytelling is a fundamentally human and social practice that allows individuals to connect through mutual cooperation and shared empathy. Storytelling inspires. Storytelling moves. It is a timeless practice that is the future for public engagement on the web.

A great example of storytelling in emergency management this year was from  ”Ready Houston” with the video: “Run. Hide. Fight,” embedded below. This 5 minute video holds viewers attention and has received over 1.8 million hits. The protective action measures the public should take during a shooting incident are demonstrated via the story of an attack in an office building. It was also successful because, unfortunately, it is all too relevant for the times we live in.

In contrast, the Ready Houston Facebook page has only 208 “likes” and features typical “Be Ready” content.

ready1

Solution: What are we trying to do here? We are trying to change behavior, which is not an easy task.  Posting “Get Prepared–here’s your list” is probably not going to get anyone off the couch. A little more work might have to be involved.  (For some reason I’m reminded of  kid in the movie The Incredibles who’s asked “What are you waiting for?” and he says, “I don’t know. Something amazing, I guess.”) See the video clip below, just for grins.

What can you do? You don’t have to invest thousands in producing slick videos, but you can find a family in Home Depot shopping for winter supplies and take a pic. Ask them why they are getting prepared and post that. Or repeat news stories (even older ones) about someone that almost died in their car during a snowstorm because they didn’t have food or blankets in their car.

Storytelling can also be short and sweet.  The Brimfield Police Department, whom I’ve written about previously, tells little stories that amuse, and get people to act and engage. Below are two posts from their Facebook page. The second one had almost 1500 “Likes” and many comments.

brimdogs

brimdogs2

Let me know, are you ready to provide good content for 2013? What’s your plan to be amazing?

Bonus Video #1:

See this video which demonstrates how boring “data” can be enthralling when given meaning and context.

Bonus Video #2:

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I Don’t Have Time! Facebook “How-to” Resource

Posted on August 4, 2012 | 4 Comments

Post by: Kim Stephens

Every time I talk with public employees about social media the one complaint I hear is how limited they are in terms of resources. The first problem with limited resources is that people are unable to invest the time required into learning how to use social tools–even though they do (or might) believe they are important. I recently called a fire department to talk to their social media “coordinator.” The  chief answered the phone and he said,

“That would be me. I’ve only been in this job for a month and I’ve been told I’m also the administrator of the Facebook page.” Then he added with zero enthusiasm, “Great.”

Taking on this responsibility can be daunting. I understand. This is why quite a few public sector Facebook pages look a little bit like ghost towns–especially during the summer months when the one person who actually enjoys updating the page is on leave. Help, however, is available. Facebook has produced a great resource for public employees: “Building your presence with Facebook pages: A Guide for Governments.” (Download the 10 pages here: Facebook Guide for Governments).

This attractive guide provides pictures and key points to users on exactly how to:

  • Set your strategy
  • Create your page
  • Develop your posting plan, including:
    • Finding your voice
    • Creating a conversation
    • Offering a rich experience
    • Sharing exclusive content
  • Grow your Audience
  • Measure and Refine
  • Resource Links (all internal Facebook links)
  • Top 5 Tips (These tips, by the way, are great. I love #1 “Don’t be boring!”) the other four:
    • Offer historical content
    • Thank supporters and engagers
    • Be timely
    • Post bi-lingual content

Of course this content really only applies to the emergency management and first response community during the preparedness phase: there is no mention of what happens to social networks during a crisis. However, this is a great start for organizations looking for “how to’s”.

Take the 10-20 minutes to read this! It could help your page go from ghost town to boom town!

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Social Media tells the Story of Storms in Harford County, Maryland

Posted on June 2, 2012 | 6 Comments
  1. See the original “Storify” version here, with all of the hyperlinks enabled.
    The storm’s approach was widely tweeted and posted to other social networks.
  2. nbcwashington
    Tornado watch for D.C., MD, and VA until 2 a.m. Radar: http://bit.ly/iCjvBg #Breaking #dcwx #mdwx #vawx
    NBCWashington
    Fri, Jun 01 2012 20:02:36
  3. As damage occurred people and news organizations posted it to social sites.

  4. PayNoDcom
    RT @TxStormChasers: Sign/tree damage photo from Pleasant Hills, MD from TSC volunteer Ryan Sheff #mdwx #tornado #severe http://twitpic.com/9rqbq3
    Deductible Saver
    Sat, Jun 02 2012 10:39:53
  5. doyourpartorg
    Fallston, #Maryland has major damage, collapsed building, people trapped http://goo.gl/6RJfc #Tornado #MSWX
    Do Your Part
    Fri, Jun 01 2012 21:19:10
  6. Although the tag “MDWX” which stands for Maryland Weather, was widely used, some folks used MSWX–not sure what that means, and “AuntieEM” also popped up as a tag. I thought it demonstrated that people not only have a sense of gallows humor when it comes to disasters, but also that we in the emergency response community have to be prepared to go where the people are!

  7. Escandalo26
    Heading to the basement in Reisterstown. Bringing wine w/ me. #AuntieEm would be proud. @JustinWeather @owingspatch http://pic.twitter.com/QtKzFGBx
    Escandolo26
    Fri, Jun 01 2012 21:31:33
  8. shayneadamski
    Ha. DC. “@Kim26stephens: Funny–ppl are using #AuntieEm for this weather event. Goes to show, you can’t tell the public which tag to use!”
    Shayne Adamski
    Fri, Jun 01 2012 22:35:58
  9. dawnauburn
    Ironic. Tornado today. Going to see the Wizard if OZ tomorrow at Toby’s dinner theater. #auntieem
    Dawn
    Fri, Jun 01 2012 18:44:22

  10. CITYPEEKpatti
    @donnahamiltontv #AuntieEm is trending i just walked my 2 Toto’s in b city http://pic.twitter.com/yhb2LD4f
    CITYPEEK Patti N.
    Fri, Jun 01 2012 18:38:46

  11. YoureRTed
    CoryChass: @wbaltv11 Fallston, Maryland http://pic.twitter.com/LISoKwhW @CoryChass
    You’re ReTweeted
    Fri, Jun 01 2012 18:21:12
  12. There were a few homes damaged by falling trees. This image was one of the most widely circulated.

  13. MelserWBAL
    RT @AvaWBAL: Dry, breezy and cooler in #Baltimore today for cleanup efforts #MDwx MT @MelserWBAL: How’d you like to wake up to this? http://pic.twitter.com/dmmhBnJr
    Lowell Melser
    Sat, Jun 02 2012 08:44:29
  14. Norma Huczek
    Well…our little town of Bel Air, Maryland made national news tonight because of terrible storms! No fatalities, only minor injuries from downed trees. Some nearby neighbors in Fallston, Maryland had the most damage to property. We still have lots and lots of wind and rain tonight, but our area does have power….whoot! Guess it’s officially summer in Maryland! “The sun will come out tomorrow………yes, indeed ;) “.
    Norma Huczek
    Fri, Jun 01 2012 23:42:36
  15. People also reporting that they made it through without problems.
  16. Adelaide Oehlsen
    Bad storms last nite, small tornado touched down in Fallston, not too far from where we are. We just had lots of rain.
    Adelaide Oehlsen
    Sat, Jun 02 2012 11:17:22
  17. Steven Archer
    So this is less than a mile from our house. What’s crazy is all we got is some heavy rain and some downed limbs.
    Steven Archer
    Sat, Jun 02 2012 09:58:29
  18. People like to tell their disaster stories.
  19. Mary Ann Chenoweth
    Storms last night. Went to Walmart in Fallston, left about 5:44 pm. Then went down Harford Rd, tree down, had to go out to Belair Rd. Should take about 20 minutes to get home, took hour. When I got home, TV said that storms were so bad in Fallston that Walmart had been damaged along with other stores in area. Belair Rd in Fallston was closed down. Guess I just made it. Driving home was heavy rain, wind and darkness at around 6 pm. Didn’t realize it was so bad until I turned on TV
    Mary Ann Chenoweth
    Sat, Jun 02 2012 07:31:07
  20. The Baltimore Sun and other city papers picked up the story, which was circulated via social networks as well. Interestingly, the Baltimore Sun requested pictures from the storm via their twitter feed.
  21. MdWeather
    Have any pictures from last night’s storms? of #tornado damage? share it: http://photos.baltimoresun.com/2000588606/maryland-now #mdwx #mdweather
    Maryland Weather
    Sat, Jun 02 2012 11:29:36
  22. baltimoresun
    “It sounded just like a freight train.” NWS says tornado likely hit Fallston area of Harford County. http://bsun.md/JG7mCL
    The Baltimore Sun
    Fri, Jun 01 2012 22:06:51
  23. BaltimoreCP
    The after effects of the storm passing through Maryland has left Fallston with extensive d http://baltimore.cityandpress.com/node/4753873
    Baltimore CP
    Sat, Jun 02 2012 01:32:05
  24. Here is one example of the volunteer and donation spirit coming to the fore, even with a very small, localized event.
  25. Heather Ziehl
    The Calm AFTER The Storm – My heart goes out to ALL that were affected by the tornadoes throughout Maryland and Virginia last night. A tornado touched down in Fallston, MD just a few miles from our home. I’m thankful and happy to report that our family and friends are all ok.For those of you in our community still without power, I just got off the phone with NVS Salon & Spa; they’re setting up complimentary shampoo and blow-dry stations for your use.
    Heather Ziehl
    Sat, Jun 02 2012 07:59:42

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Data, data everywhere…Monitoring Social Media During a Crisis

Posted on May 17, 2012 | 16 Comments

Post by: Kim Stephens

When it comes to social media, monitoring these networks is the biggest concern of emergency management organizations, and for good reason: the stream of user-generated content becomes a torrent the second a crisis happens. I’ve blogged about this numerous times, but I’d like to mention a couple of resources and articles that have recently been brought to my attention.

1. Social Media Monitoring Tools Wiki  This wiki has an extensive list of over 100 free and for fee monitoring tools and services. Each item is hyperlinked, and you can sort each column, even by category. Although there isn’t an opportunity for users to rate the services or provide feedback, it is one of the few places I’ve seen such an exhaustive list.  (As an aside, I’ve toyed with the idea of a user-rated website for all tools used by emergency managers. The consumer would be asked to rate their experience with the tool and discuss what they liked and didn’t like about it, similar to ratings for merchandise on Amazon.com or restaurants on Yelp.)

Of note,  most of the tools on the wiki are designed for business clients or individuals and are probably sufficient for performing sentiment analysis. However,  these same tools have distinct limitations when they are used for the purposes of gaining situational awareness after a disaster. This brings me to#2 on my list.

2.  Mark Cameron, et. al, in the paper Emergency Situation Awareness from Twitter for Crisis Management break down social media monitoring needs of emergency managers and first responders into 5 distinct areas.

The need to:

  • Detect unexpected or unusual incidents, possibly ahead of official communications;
  •  Condense and summarise messages about an incident maintaining awareness of aggregated content without having to read individual messages;
  • Classify and review high-value messages during an incident (e.g. messages describing infrastructure damage or cries for help); and understand the impact of an incident on people and infrastructure;
  • Identify, track, and manage issues within an incident as they arise, develop, and conclude; pro-actively identify and manage issues that may last for hours, days or weeks;
  • Perform forensic analysis of incidents by analysing social media content from before, during, and after an incident.

Their solution is the “Emergency Situation Awareness–Automated Web Text Mining” (ESA-AWTM) system. The paper and this power point describes the system’s functionality as well as the trial deployment with the Media and Crisis Communication team within the Strategic Communication Branch (SCB) of the Australian Government.  The ability to classify high value messages alone would be a significant improvement. Overall the system looks extremely promising, but unfortunately they do not indicate when it will be available for broader distribution.

3. Computer aided analytics is one solution, another is crowdsourcing. This paper, “Towards Real-time Emergency Response, Using Crowd Supported Analysis of Social Media”  was written by researchers at the University of Madeira in collaboration with the IBM T.J Watson Research Center. They propose an architecture for  how crowdsourcing can be incorporated as part of an emergency response system in order to “analyze and structure social media content posted by micro-bloggers and service users, including emergency response coordinators and victims.” The key to crowdsourcing, they state, is ensuring that the crowd is given appropriate tasks to accomplish, and ultimately, that their analysis is fed back into the response community’s knowledge base in a structured way. This diagram illustrates their concept:

This is just a short list, today, but there is a lot going on in this realm. If you know of other interesting studies please post them in the comments section and I’ll add them to the resource tab of the blog.

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Should you Cross-Post to Social Platforms? What does FEMA do?

Posted on April 26, 2012 | 10 Comments
Post by: Kim Stephens
twitter logo map 09

twitter logo map 09 (Photo credit: The Next Web)

The other day in a SMEMchat we debated (briefly) the pros and cons of cross-posting to Twitter and Facebook, particularly the practice of posting to Twitter from Facebook–not necessarily dual  posting from a third party application such as Hootesuite or Tweetdeck. I recalled reading that this was problematic in a scholarly article by  Axel Bruns, et al (see page 12). They were writing about QPS Media (yes, I know everyone is a little tired of me bringing them up) during the flood event of January, 2011. They stated in the report:

Indeed, the social media use of several of these organisations underwent a rapid development process as the emergency unfolded; this is best illustrated using the example of the official Facebook and Twitter accounts of the Queensland Police Service (QPS). Initially, QPS had mainly shared its own advisories and news updates through its Facebook page, with messages automatically crossposted to Twitter. This was problematic for a number of reasons, however: first, the lower 140 character limit for messages on Twitter, compared to Facebook, caused several of these crossposted messages to be truncated and thus unusable (especially when embedded hyperlinks were broken in the process); additionally, this also meant that users on Twitter may first have had to navigate from Twitter to Facebook, to see the full, original message, and then to follow any embedded links to their eventual destination; and even this may only have been possible for users who already had Facebook accounts.

Further, for reasons of site design, Facebook messages are more difficult to share with a larger number of users than those on Twitter, where a simple click of the ‘retweet’ button passes on an incoming message to all of one’s followers; and similarly, ongoing conversations are more difficult to manage on Facebook – where the amount of commentary attached to each of the QPS’s posts was rapidly swamping important information – than on Twitter; indeed, Facebook knows no equivalent to the concept of the hashtag, which allows a large number of users to conduct an open, ongoing, public discussion centred around a common topic. These shortcomings were quickly (and courteously) explained to the QPS media staff by a number of vocal Twitter users, and the QPS used its @QPSmedia Twitter account prominently throughout the rest of the flood crisis.

I have also heard Shayne Adamski, the Senior Manager of Digital Engagement Public Affairs Division, Office of External Affairs at FEMA speak several times and mention that they too craft messages specifically for each platform, for a myriad of reasons. He graciously agreed to an interview and in a follow-up email he stated:

“When it comes to using social media sites to communicate and have a conversation, we don’t write one message and then post it on both Twitter and Facebook.  We write our message for the platform we’re using.  On Twitter, we use any appropriate hashtags that will add value to the message and when appropriate, we cross-link to other Twitter accounts.  On Facebook, because the character limit is much higher than 140 characters, we take the time and write a longer message to take advantage of the fact that we have more room to work with, and when appropriate, we cross-link to other Facebook accounts.  We will also RT messages on Twitter and Share content on Facebook, so it appears in our respective timelines.”

Shayne provided  examples of messages  tailored to the respective platforms. The first pic is of a post to their Facebook account about severe weather. The second is the same day, with the same concept, but the post looks completely different on Twitter.

Shayne went on to state:

“Obviously, during a response, your time is even more limited compared to steady state and you’re being pulled in multiple directions, but there is value in writing the message for the platform you’re using.  And just like anything, practice makes perfect, so utilize the time you have during steady state to practice and get in the habit of writing for the platform.”

From my perspective, I think it is important to also note that different social platforms have different audiences, and the ability to tailor content to target these different groups is one of the great advantages of using social tools. Furthermore, Twitter and Facebook have really different “languages.” I’ve seen organizations post content on their Facebook page so that it reads well on Twitter, including hashtags and acronyms. For those people who are not also on Twitter, this cannot only be #confusing, but also extremely #annoying. Just because something is easier to do doesn’t necessarily make it the right thing to do.
Tell me if you think I’m off track here!
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What role does a volunteer “CrisisMapper” play?

Posted on February 9, 2012 | 2 Comments
JAROSLAV VALUCH / Standby Task Force

JAROSLAV VALUCH / Standby Task Force (Photo credit: SHAREconference)

Post by: Kim Stephens

It seems there has been a lot of conversations on the #SMEM (or Social Media and Emergency Management) twitter hashtag about using volunteers to help response organizations deal with the huge volume of information that comes from social networks during a crisis. (One conversation was this recent chat.)  Organizing those volunteers into a group with set expectations of what they will provide, and then integrating their work into the response effort,  are the logical next steps.

One organization doing just that is the Standby Task Force (SBTF).  They have set out to “…[turn] the adhoc groups of tech-savy mapping volunteers that emerge around crises into a flexible, trained and prepared network ready to deploy. The SBTF is a volunteer-based network that represents the first wave in Online Community Emergency Response Teams.”

The SBTF  was tasked by the United Nations in March-April, 2011 to provide sense-making to social media data during the ongoing crisis in Libya. Jen Ziemke posted this video to the Crisis Mapper’s blog of Helena Puig from SBTF discussing the  deployment during the ICCM conference .  I thought it really provided some great insights into what went well and what could be improved.

Another great resource, for those interested in the topic, is this google doc: Standby Task Force UN OCHA.  It is their After Action Report of the Libyan effort.

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Why use Social Media? Chief Boyd tells us!

Posted on January 18, 2012 | 2 Comments

Post by: Kim Stephens

Gerald Baron’s company “Agincourt Strategies” is a social media consulting firm that has put together another great video that addresses this question: Why it is important for public safety agencies to use social media? The first video featured Gerald himself. This segment comes from the point of view of Fire Chief Bill Boyd–who also has a blog called “Not My Emergency”.  Chief Boyd is one of those early adopters that “gets” it. In this video he tells a compelling story that illustrates the importance of getting information to the public as quickly as possible–which can be done using social media from mobile platforms right from the scene of the event.

Pass this along to skeptical Fire Chiefs!

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