by Nedra Weinreich | Apr 27, 2007 | Blog, Social Media
I put together a resource list related to the Next Generation Social Marketing Seminar I did in DC last month and thought I’d share it with you. The first part of the presentation included an overview of the social media revolution, with examples of how these tools are being used around health and social issues. I’ve uploaded the PowerPoint slides to SlideShare, and you can view the slideshow above. The second half of the training was more hands-on, where we applied and practiced using social media like blogs, tagging and RSS.
The presentation is built around the general categories of social media activities. Somehow when I was brainstorming the categories, they all ended up starting with the letter C, so of course they have to be called “The Ten Cs of Social Media.” I’m sure I’m not the first to come up with this conceit.
So, what can you do with social media?
- Communicate
- Connect
- Collaborate/Co-Create
- Collect/Categorize
- Collective Wisdom
- Customization
- Conversation
- Community
And in social marketing, these can all lead to the Big C – CHANGE.
If you look at the slideshow, you’ll see how I categorized different social media tools under each heading, with social marketing examples of each. Of course, most tools could fit under more than one category, but for the purposes of the presentation, I divided them out in a way that makes sense.
Here is a list of resources that were mentioned during the seminar or linked to the presentation (but is by no means a comprehensive list of what’s out there):
My lists of social marketing-related blogs and bookmarks:
Resources for getting up to speed on details of Web 2.0 for nonprofits/social marketers:
RSS Readers:
Blogging + examples:
Podcasts:
Video/Photo Sharing:
Social Networks:
Wikis:
Searching/Bookmarking/Tagging:
Collective Wisdom:
Virtual Worlds/Avatars:
Comment/Meme Trackers:
This is just a “get you started” list. For more details on how to jump in and join the party, you can explore the resources at the top of the list. Feel free to add your favorites in the comments.
Technorati Tags: social marketing, social media, ten cs
by Nedra Weinreich | Mar 1, 2007 | Blog, Social Media
There are some things I take for granted. One of those is that if, God forbid, I should ever have to call 911, there will be someone on the other end to help. I never thought much beyond that, other than that somehow my information would be conveyed and an ambulance or fire truck would magically appear at my doorstep. Thanks to the very kind invitation of Brian Humphrey of the Los Angeles Fire Department, last week I got to see firsthand what actually happens at the LAFD dispatch center.
Upon arriving at City Hall and taking the elevator four floors underground, Brian met me and showed me around. His phone kept ringing with various news stations looking for blood and guts to feature during sweeps week. He showed me that his phone has buttons with direct access to various local and national media, the governor and the White House. As the LAFD spokesman, he is a regular guest on television and radio news programs, and I see him quoted in the local papers all the time.
From his desk, Brian has access to information on all of the current incidents that the LAFD is responding to around the city. He looked up my address and found a medical emergency happening not too far from my house. He also showed me all of the information stored in the computer system about my house — things like the cross streets, number of bedrooms and bathrooms, the year it was built, where the nearest hydrant is (which he said was a really strong one).
I had the opportunity to go out onto the dispatch floor, where a dozen highly trained men and women handle the emergency calls that come in. All 911 calls initially go through the LA Police Department, and as soon as they determine it is a fire or medical emergency, they direct it to the LAFD’s dispatch center. I got to sit with one of the dispatchers and listen in on some of the calls that came through. While they all have experience out in the field and know how to handle any emergency situation that comes up, they have to follow a specific protocol for how they ask questions and respond to the callers. Once they establish what type of emergency it is, they flip to the appropriate section in their guide and ask a series of questions to which the only answers can be ‘yes,’ ‘no’ or ‘I don’t know.’ This makes sure that there is a certain level of quality control and that nothing is missed.
This attention to collecting detailed information, however, does not delay the arrival of assistance. As soon as the dispatcher has the address and nature of the emergency, the nearest fire station is notified and a fire truck or ambulance is sent out within a minute or two of the receipt of the call. In the meantime, the dispatcher stays on the line with the caller and provides instructions and reassurance until the crew arrives on the scene.
I heard some interesting calls. One was a woman who spoke only Spanish, whose 3-month old baby kept turning blue. She had the baby lying on his stomach while she made the call, and when the dispatcher had her pick up and hold the baby upright, his color improved. As the dispatcher said to me afterward, it’s kind of hard to breathe when you are lying on your stomach. During that call, I was also half-listening to the dispatcher on the other side of me trying to calm down a woman whose child had gone into convulsions.
Another call came in from the LAPD, who had received a report from a woman somewhere on the East Coast that a man in LA was suffering from a drug overdose. When the dispatcher called the number she provided, the man answered, sounded perfectly fine, and became distraught when he found out the police and paramedics were on their way. Turns out he had told his mother he was going to swallow a bottle of aspirin, and she believed him, though he told us he did not actually do it. I’m sure that will be the last time he makes that threat.
Other calls included a report of shots fired and possible victims, a suspect under arrest who had scraped up his elbow in the process, and a person with AIDS who needed medical attention (though they are not allowed to note the presence of the disease to the responding paramedics due to privacy issues). Also, upon looking at the list of current incidents, I noticed a familiar address, which was my old high school. Apparently a student there had a seizure and was being treated. Drama is one thing not in short supply in that room.
I was so impressed with the calm and competent way the dispatchers handled the calls. What for the people on the other end of the phone was (hopefully) a once in a lifetime major emergency, was just another call to be dealt with efficiently and effectively so that the dispatcher could move on to the next caller who needed him. It must be incredibly draining to do that type of work. If there is ever a major emergency, the dispatch center can instantly double in capacity by bringing in the people on the next shift who are not on duty but are always available onsite.
Over lunch in the communal dining room (sweetly made to order for me while the other guys ate massive burgers), Brian told me a wonderful story about how he had decided to become a firefighter. When he was a young boy, his father brought him to work with him one day in Van Nuys (a part of LA in the San Fernando Valley). It turned out that the local fire station had an open house that day, and so they went and got a tour. The firefighter who showed them around made such an impression on Brian that he decided that he wanted to be a fireman. He obsessed about it for a while, but ended up moving on to other typical childhood career aspirations. When he got older, he decided that he actually did want to be a firefighter and eventually was accepted into the LAFD’s training program — what he felt was the best department in the country. On the day he found out to which of the more than 100 neighborhood fire stations in the city he would be posted, he was told that he would be at the very same fire station in Van Nuys that he had visited as a boy. Not only that, but he would be working alongside the same firefighter who had given him the tour twenty years earlier. Wow – love that story!
Brian’s enthusiasm for the department has certainly not waned since that time. I am struck by the pride he and the others I met have in the LAFD, and, as he often reminds me, it is MY fire department as well. He typifies the ethos — so often missing in public agencies — that the department exists to serve, and belongs to, the citizens of Los Angeles.
Sadly, that means that the department is woefully underfunded and is not able to do much beyond the core services such as firefighting, emergency medical services and rescue operations. Brian’s blogging and social media activities are not officially funded, and he must fit them in as he can around his other duties. He is grateful to have received gifts from the local blogging community to help him in his work, including some podcasting equipment and a training manual. The lack of funding and the lean staff of three positions doing media outreach and public relations also means that the department is not able to do much proactive public education around prevention. I wonder whether there are foundations or federal/state agencies that fund grants to local fire departments for social marketing campaigns around safety, fire prevention or disaster preparedness. Any takers out there?
Not too long ago, I wrote about the importance of the “face” of your organization — the frontline staff with whom the public interacts and forms the basis of its opinion about you. With Brian and the emergency dispatchers as its public face, the LAFD is looking very good indeed.
Technorati Tags: lafd, 911, emergency
by Nedra Weinreich | Feb 26, 2007 | Blog, Social Media
I have unilaterally appointed myself as the president of the Brian Humphrey Fan Club. Brian is the Los Angeles Fire Department spokesman, currently one of two firefighters covering all of the department’s media and public relations activities around the clock (on different shifts). More importantly (for our purposes here), Brian started the LAFD News & Information blog, and in so doing has set the bar for other public agencies to follow in using social media to serve their communities.
While his colleagues help to contribute posts to the blog when he is off duty, the blog is really his baby. The posts are most often summaries of incident reports, describing a recent firefighting or rescue operation in vivid detail (and they are sometimes used verbatim in local news reports). Other times he talks about timely safety issues, helpful resources or upcoming LAFD events.
Anyone who reads blogs about the city of Los Angeles (e.g., LA Observed, Metroblogging LA) has likely seen comments from Brian on posts related to the LAFD or safety issues, written in his usual friendly and helpful style (and always with his signature sign-off, “Respectfully Yours in Safety and Service, Brian Humphrey”). Even when people are griping or downright nasty on his or other blogs, Brian always responds with good humor, sympathy and a genuine desire to be of assistance.
I am definitely not Brian’s only fan. He was recently named the LA City Nerd’s Citizen of the Year, and when he recently announced that he had to put the blog on temporary hiatus in order to catch up with a backlog of reports due to a staff shortage, a sampling of the many comments that were posted demonstrate how valuable people find the blog (which gets more than 500,000 direct visitors a year, not counting those tapping the feed):
- I look forward to the speedy return of this resource, one of the best direct information outlets in the entire city. I have written about the LAFD blog in my blog, as have many others and it is seen as a great, respected resource by many.
- Please bring the blog back soon, I feel closer to my community and Los Angeles with this blog, and have never felt so before. If there is anything we citizens can do to make it happen, I am there to help!
- As a LAFD CERT [Ed. – Community Emergency Response Team] Member, I too love reading this blog which keeps us in the loop of what is going around the city. At a recent CERT meeting other members were also bummed out to hear about the blog hiatus….It’s a great source of information.
I got in touch with the very busy Brian to ask him some questions about what he has been doing with the blog and other social media, and he was kind enough to find some time to answer my questions.
Can you tell me about what your role is at the LAFD? What was the professional path you took to get where you are (i.e., did you start as a firefighter, public information professional or something completely different)?
I am a Paramedic-trained Firefighter and 21 year veteran of the LAFD. At our agency, it is expected that each member will at one time or another volunteer to serve in the handful of ‘special duty’ positions that support our mission. Most LAFD special duty assignments last no more than two years. I’ve been asked to serve in a media and public relations role for the past thirteen, and will continue to do so at the pleasure of the Fire Chief. Though all of my training has been on the job, I’m proud to say that I’ve been well mentored.
How did you become the LAFD blogger? Whose idea was it to start the blog?
To most of my colleagues and our constituents, my fire helmet hides the fact that I am a genuine ‘propeller-head’ who enjoys technology, especially when it can be leveraged to alert, inform and reassure the public in times of duress. My many years of on-line work in support of our LAFD.ORG website and my genuine desire to focus on content rather than design brought forth the increasingly popular ‘LAFD News & Information’ blog, which I started in late 2004.
What do you see as the primary purposes of the blog?
While the purpose of our blog has become malleable, the key goal remains to offer timely and accurate information in an appealing manner that can help people lead safer, healthier and more productive lives.
How are you using other social media besides the blog to get the word out about the LAFD, like Flickr, YouTube, MySpace or other applications?
We have developed quite a following at Flickr, with more than a third-of-a-million image views this year. Our established LAFD YouTube Channel, LAFD BlogTalkRadio and *countless* other Web 2.0 projects merely await the staff time necessary to become equally successful. We’d love to take them all to their full potential, and consider them wonderful investments, but it will take more staff to make that happen.
How widespread within the LAFD or other Los Angeles City agencies is knowledge and interest in blogs and other social media?
Until last year, most members of our Department – like those they serve, merely saw our LAFD News & Information blog (which is seamlessly attached to our LAFD.ORG website), as routinely updated web content.
With the advent of RSS and the ability to syndicate or mashup our offerings, more and more Firefighters understand the principles and power of the blog. Sadly, many City of Los Angeles agencies have been late in formally adopting blogs and social media, as they have shunned my most loudly applauded admonition: “We can no longer afford to work at the speed of government!”
Are there others you are working with in the department, or are you the primary person responsible for these activities?
The LAFD has only three persons permanently assigned to the Public and Media Relations desk to provide service around the clock, every day of the year. We each cover a 56-hour minimum work week identical to our colleagues at Neighborhood Fire Stations. Like the crews at the Fire Station, we each have our specialties, mine being the blog – but my colleagues pitch in with content when I’m gone. Our primary roles though, are informing the public, the news and entertainment industries, academia, allied agencies and our own members about the workings of our Department and vocation on a daily basis. For every blog post you might see, we’ve done a hundred or more interviews for radio, television and print media around the globe.
How much of your time do you devote to this part of your job?
Do I have to answer that question? Let me say that I rarely spend less than 19 hours of my tour of duty at the desk multitasking. And yes, given the nature of our work, it is a passion that is both energizing and exhausting.
Some of your posts read like the plot of a TV show, with a level of detail that make it easy to visualize the scenes (like your post on the helicopter crews).
Thanks for your kind words regarding our endeavors. I say ‘our’ because in the Fire Service, it’s all about teamwork. If I do something correctly I must rightfully share the credit. If we do something wrong, I must be willing to take the blame. It may not be my fault, but as a Firefighter it becomes my problem to solve.
I sadly wasn’t able to afford a formal education, so I read everything I can get my hands on, and I think that helps. In our vocation, co-workers never hold back on criticism or compliments, so I get the benefit of continuous feedback that I always put to use.
How do you get the stories you post on? Do you go out in the field, listen to the radio communications, read the written reports?
All of the above. Though I hold the lowest rank in the Department, those who skillfully lead our agency understand the importance of effective internal and external communications, and work outside the our typical Chain of Command to see that I get what I need in a timely and efficient manner. Thinking of the old film and television series M*A*S*H, I’m sort of the ‘Radar O’Reilly’ character played so effectively by actor Gary Burghoff. I may exist and at times speak among the Colonels, but I’m just the Company Clerk helping to make things happen.
Are you deliberately crafting the posts to get that emotional connection from the reader or to convey a safety message within the story?
Our most effective messages are real world examples that resonate strongly in both the heart and mind. It is indeed these rare but memorable missives – sometimes offered in the context of a calamity, that help people towards safer, healthier and more productive lives.
Do you work at all with writers on TV shows or screenwriters to help them portray the work of firefighters accurately?
Oh do I! I’d say that at least five full hours a week are spent on the phone, e-mail and sometimes in person helping the myriad of entertainment industry professionals from writers to costumers accurately portray our vocation, which in itself is quite complex. And its not just TV and film. A typical week will have us working with everyone from film students to romance novel writers, all of whom seem to have at least a passing interest in the work that we do.
What other PR or marketing strategies does the LAFD use to try to persuade the public to take action for safety, disaster preparedness and fire prevention?
To a person, members of our Department realize that we are not judged merely by our admirable emergency response efforts, but also by our daily encounters with those who must know we’ll be there for them, should the need arise. While we have developed many excellent programs right here in Los Angeles, such as the Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) program, which is now the global standard for community self-reliance and disaster preparedness – much needs to be done for our formal marketing and outreach strategies that continue to languish in this information age.
How much resistance have you encountered from the bureaucracy to sharing information about the LAFD’s activities through the blog?
Thankfully, our Fire Chiefs past and present have been supportive, and we always welcome feedback from the public and our colleagues. We’re always accountable for what we do, and they have yet to say stop.
Have you run up against any legal issues or concerns about making certain kinds of information public? Are there other challenges you’ve faced as a blogger for a public agency?
Sadly, there is no access to any manner of ‘new media’ savvy legal and technical help within our realm. We have however, been blessed with plenty of advice and expertise from members of LA’s well-established blogging community.
One of the things I am most impressed with is how you have become part of the blogging community here in LA, leaving comments on other people’s blogs and responding to comments on your blog. What has been the response of other bloggers and blog readers to your posts and comments?
Delving into the blogoshere (there, I used the word!) has allowed us not to merely speak to others more effectively and efficiently, but most importantly it has allowed to better listen. It never ceases to amaze me how few public agencies realize the importance and potential of listening while atop the mountain, rather than just being there to make noise.
Do you know of other public agencies in LA or elsewhere that are also trailblazers in using social media? Are there any firefighters who blog about their jobs in an unofficial capacity?
I have to offer a tip o’ the LAFD helmet to Los Angeles City Council President Eric Garcetti, who has embraced and supported our efforts while leading us by the example of his own blogging. As for Fire Departments, I find precious few. On the other hand, there are a few Firefighters who post on blogs.
How do you see blogging fitting into a public agency’s overall outreach strategy?
If you want to be successful in fulfilling your agency mission, you have to communicate. Blogging tools make it among the most affordable and productive mediums for communication. Trust me.
For people at other public agencies who may be considering starting a blog, what advice would you offer?
Lurk for at least six months before you blog, then get your team together, and make it happen. People want access and transparency, and they ultimately come to understand that a blog is a work in progress. They will become both your mentors and your apostles if you let them.
Are you ready to join the fan club now too? Meetings will be every Wednesday at noon at a different firehouse each week. 🙂
Brian invited me to come visit him in the LAFD’s bunker four floors underground in City Hall to see the dispatch center where the City’s fire and medical 911 calls are handled. I don’t want this to get too long, so I will continue the story of my LAFD field trip in a separate post soon, with more on Brian and the other amazing people he works with, some interesting tidbits on what I learned about how the 911 system works, and a few pictures.
UPDATE (3/1/07): Here is my look behind the scenes at LAFD.
Technorati Tags: lafd, los angeles, fire department, blogging, blog, government, marketing
by Nedra Weinreich | Feb 13, 2007 | Blog, Marketing, Social Media
I read a couple of recent posts that I wanted to share that both touch on the idea of influence, but in different ways.
In the first by John Bell, who is currently traveling through Asia for his work with Ogilvy, he shares their very useful model for rating “influence” among bloggers.
The elements include:
- Affiliation of blog writer(s)
- Number of links to the blog
- Number of feed subscriptions
- Search engine results position for relevant keyword searches
- Last update
- Industry mentions/lists of top blogs
- Inclusion in Technorati Blog Directory and other online directories
- Discussion Analysis – true discussion or bantering
In English-language, US-centric content, we can generally start the process of identifying potential candidates via search; usually either Technorati, Google or Google Blogs. Then we can refine down into highly linked sites (“most authority” in Technorati lingo).
According to a digital marketing agency, the list would be quite helpful in identifying appropriate bloggers to include in a PR campaign with a social media component. Any one of the indicators of blogger influence by itself would not necessarily provide a full enough picture of whom to target when you need to narrow down what can be resource-intensive outreach. But combine two or more (or all) of these and you will see the degree of influence become clearer.
I would also add to the list the appearance of the blog on other influential bloggers’ blogrolls beyond links within posts, and the numbers of comments left on other people’s blogs.
They do not include any indicators that measure the amount of traffic to the blog, perhaps for a few reasons: First, the current publicly available ways of measuring traffic (i.e., Alexa) are not entirely reliable, though they can at least give an idea of the scale of traffic (e.g., rank of 1,000,000 vs. 100,000 vs. 1,000). Another reason is that the blogger may be may be influential for a very specific niche of people that is too small to be measured accurately by traffic but still desirable from a particular organization’s point of view. Finally, the number of feed subscribers is a better indicator of loyal and interested readers than the traffic numbers, which can vary wildly based upon the spread of just one post.
The other interesting post on influence was by Chris Sandberg, and touches on the idea of social proof. This is the notion that people judge the value of something based on how they see other people respond (and is the reason behind the use of laugh tracks in sitcoms; when others are laughing, it makes the show seem funnier). Chris shares his experience at a basketball game, where Albertsons grocery store ran a contest only available to people who waved their Albertsons club card around at one point in the game. When people who did not have one saw how many others did have a card, they may have started wondering whether they were missing out on something.
Chris explains the concept’s usefulness in marketing:
Social proof can be a powerful marketing tool. If you can get your customers to vouch for your product (or at least make it look like they are) and find a way to advertise it to your potential customers your job as a marketer becomes a lot easier. People don’t want to feel left out and often look to others when making decisions they are unsure of. By being aware of social proof and taking actions to leverage it you can be there when people are looking around to others when trying make a purchase decision.
To bring this back to the discussion on influential bloggers, social proof plays a big role in how topics are covered in the blogosphere. When one or more influential bloggers writes about a particular news story or issue, that often sets off a flurry of other posts because the topic has been validated as being important. One influential blogger can provide the social proof that an idea or product has merit, paving the way for many others to adopt it as well.
Technorati Tags: blogging, PR
Nedra helps nonprofits and public agencies create positive change on health and social issues through social marketing and transmedia storytelling strategies at Weinreich Communications since founding the company in 1995. She helps organizations make a difference for the populations they serve by strategically designing programs that draw on state-of-the-art behavior change techniques, digital media approaches and the power of stories. 
