11 predictions for local government comms in 2015

A look at what comms may mean for local government in 2015.

by Dan Slee

A look at what comms may mean for local government in 2015.

For the last few years too stuffed with mince pies I’ve blogged some predictions on local government comms. It’s all about jet packs and Robot butlers. 

Here’s a look at last year and what I got right and wrong.

What did I get right?

Comms teams overall have got smaller although a minority have grown. A survey comms2point0 ran for LGComms showed 57 per cent working in teams that have shrunk since 2008.  Anecdotally, there have been fewer heads of comms as the duties are shared for cost saving. Better evaluation remains to be needed. Local government comms has become become the poor relation of public sector PR. It looks on with envy at others’ budgets. Digital comms has continued to go mainstream but there is lipservice to it. Many teams have been outsripped by the pace of change. 

Anecdotally, poor internal comms remains.

What did I get wrong?

Digital comms has not stepped-up a gear from simply tweeting press releases to tackling the really thorny problems. That’s a source of real worry. Elsewhere, social media remains a frontline task but the pace of change here has slowed. There was no major emergency where social media shone.

Too early to say?

Comms teams still need content creators although this hasn’t happened. There will be more shared comms teams. People will look at how this can work across a geographical area and also between authorities.

So here are 11 more for 2015

Some councils will no longer have a meaningful comms function. Cut to the bone, they will do little more than answer the phone and answer media queries.

Social media will stall. After early innovation, the time and space to experiment as part of the day job has gone. The door has closed. Twitter and Facebook will be it.

New platforms continue to go untouched. As new platforms grow and develop like SnapChat, Instagram and WhatsApp there will be no capacity to experiment with them leading to a section of the population disenfranchised.

Evaluation will become a case of do or die. With budgets being cut, the comms team needs to justify what it does before it is cut. Unless they can look finance in the eye and demonstrate why they should live they will go.

People who bang the table and say ‘no’ will stand a chance. Those who don’t won’t. There has never been a more important time to say ‘no’to meaningless fire-and-forget blunderbus comms. But this argument needs to be one had strategically as budgets tighten. Comms teams can deliver real change at a time of problems. But they need to fight their corner.

There will be fewer press releases written for fewer newspapers. An easy one. At some point someone will notice and ask what the point of comms teams are. The window where people can get their story straight is about to end.

It will get more fractured. Content tailored for those keen on one country park or a care home needs to be created and be more sharable. This is where comms teams can help and enable service areas.

Video gets more important. But the skills need to be learned.

Social media accounts need to be reviewed and closed. That arts centre that played their face for a Twitter account and then updated it three months ago? It needs to be taken down. There is too much bad digital in local government.

Customer services, social media and comms need to become best friends. At present, this is happening sporadically. This needs to be hapening everywhere… and six months ago.

Facebook pages will become pointless unless supported by a budget for ads. This is the reality which many are struggling to catch-up with.

EDIT: Plus two more.

LinkedIn will become as important as Twitter for comms people for building networks and sharing knowledge.

It doesn't have to be this way. You can change any of the above by constantly learning, striving, adapting, changing, challanging, doing and thinking. It's in your gift to write your own rulebook more than ever before. So, as Dr Seuss once said, 'what are you waiting for?'

Dan Slee is co-founder of comms2point0.