why google+ is now part of the comms landscape

Look, I'm busy enough with Twitter and Facebook. Isn't that the social web? Actually no. It's a big part of it. But you also need to be aware of Google+ that's getting more and more important.

Ladies and gentlemen, I admit it. Google+ is starting to become a contender for comms people. 

Yes, it’s true that it has only a percentage of the users that Facebook has. But when the bottom line of that percentage is 230 million that’s a significant figure.

It’s also true that some people have been evangelising about what Google+  can do for a long time. For a quick catch-up try Stephen Waddington here, here and here.

As someone who dodged the hype of the ill-feted Google Wave I hung back when Google+ was launched as a local government comms person. A couple of things have made me re-think things.

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local authority....

Some people really get the social web, what the web can do and what it can do for organisations. One of those is Euan Semple. His book 'Organisations Don't Tweet People Do' is one of the few social media books that take space on our bookshelf. We urge you to buy it. In this post he asks some key questions of local government.

by Euan Semple

The problem is in the title isn’t it? Being an authority in a time when authority is being called into question by so many people in so many ways isn’t easy.

Authority used to rely on information asymmetry. You were either in the know or you weren’t. You either had access to controlled information or you didn’t.

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who should we really be talking to?

It's never been more important to base our communications activities on sound intelligence about who our residents and customers are. And checking that that evidence is up to date is also vital.

by Julie Waddicor

Who sets your comms priorities? Your councillors, your boss, your residents? I imagine that, in most local government organisations, it is a bit of all three. That’s fair enough (to an extent), but a lack of focus on residents and their issues, in the right proportions, could mean a lot of our efforts go to waste.

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holding a press conference - virtually

We all find reasons for not delivering things from time to time. And technology is often blamed as a barrier. So how would you fancy running a press conference from Orkney, Shetland and the Western Isles: virtually...

by Kirsty Groundwater

Scotland’s island councils celebrated the the successful launch of the ‘Our Islands – Our Future’ campaign via the notoriously challenging method of video conferencing.

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what would basil clarke the father of the british pr make of today's industry?

Public relations emerged in Britain in the first world war. But what would the pioneer of the field make of comms today?

by Richard Evans

The media landscape of today could hardly be more different to the one Basil Clarke faced when he became the UK’s first public relations officer in 1917.

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five challenges that face the dvla

Everyone knows the DVLA. They're the Swansea-based bit of government that looks after your driving licence. A simple comms task? No, far from it...

by Victoria Ford

Here at the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) we deal with over 130 million customer transactions a year, 67 million of them digitally.

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future govcomms: training, trust and re-training ministers

Alex Aiken, the UK Government's most senior comms practitioner, through The Guardian asked what the future of government comms should look like. Here's one view.

by Dan Slee

So, what should the future of government communications look like? If you think it's tweeting press releases wearing a One Direction t-shirt you're wrong.

Refreshingly, the UK government has stood up and on The Guardian website admitted it had a good idea. But not a definitive one.

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learning to fly as a solo pr

We like Jo Smith. She's one of life's great people who really knows her stuff. So nine months into her career as a solo public relations operator in the West of Scotland here are some things that have struck her. 

by Jo Smith

It’s nine months since I put years as a full time public sector desk-jockey behind me and set up as a freelance PR consultant.

Going solo isn’t for everyone. But it seems to be working for me. Here’s what I’ve discovered so far...

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help! a pr system wish list

Hello. Can you hear us? We work in pr and we've been waiting for a decent system to evaluate. We've been waiting for some time so we've decided to come up with our own. Okay with you?

by Kate Reynolds

There has long been an understanding in the PR industry that we need to evaluate our achievements and impact. We get this. We know it's critical to evaluate to help us learn and improve, demonstrate our value to our internal stakeholders and report back how investment has made a difference to business objectives. We also know there isn’t one single measure that will do this for us but a balanced scorecard approach looking at our performance over a range of metrics is the way to go. (Check out the Barcelona Principles for background on this.)

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what google+ can offer

After taking a toe-hold of the social market Google+ continues to grow steadily. But what is it? What can it offer?

by Phil Rumens

Around a year ago, I had a discussion about Google+ over lunch. I remember saying that I couldn’t work out what it was for. It didn’t have the simplicity of Twitter, nor did it have the sharing functionality of Facebook, so where did it fit? I didn’t really rate it and couldn’t see the point of the platform.

Since then my opinion has changed.

Google+ has evolved and added what are probably its two best features. The first is Communities, the ability to create open or closed interest groups. The latter has great potential for sharing non-sensitive information (you’d probably want something a bit more secure for personal data) over a wide network based anywhere in the world.

The second is Hangouts, which you can use as an impromptu video chat room or set up as an event and invite people to attend. I’ve done this with LocalGov Digital colleagues and it really fits in with the “Digital by Design” agenda, having a face-to-face chat with people all over the country, without leaving the room. Of course this is nothing new, but it just seems a lot easier to do than other platforms.

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where have all the snotty press officers gone?

Oh, the withering put down and the verbal jousts over minor issues. It seems to one experienced reporter that press officers are changing. That's when he can find one...

by Iain Robinson 

As a junior reporter, I remember there were four words I used to dread hearing tumble down the phone line from antagonistic press officers: “That’s not a story”.

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new newspaper websites fail to impress - shock

There has been a makeover for regional newspaper websites under the Local World banner. That's the part of the industry owned by an organisation formed earlier this year between Northcliffe and Iliffe Media. It's fair to say that not everyone has been bowled over. Here's one comms officer's take...

by Theresa Knight

One of the first jobs of the day (after making the coffee) is to check out what’s been happening by browsing the local newspaper’s website to see what they’ve done with that press enquiry.

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lessons from the LGcomms Academy

Now that the dust has settled on a very successful LGcomms Academy in Cardiff it's a good time to reflect on the many lessons to spin out of a packed second day.

by Emma Rodgers

DAY 2 at the LGCommunications conference brought sunshine and even more quality speakers. Some attendees argued it was even better than day 1 and with a diverse agenda ranging from measles, moving to your next comms job to a slot from the top man in government communications Alex Aiken, it was a pretty good mix. 

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a brand new day

The LGcomms Academy is the premier event for local government comms folk. This thoughtful post aims to help to make it even better in 2014, and beyond.

by Eddie Coates-Madden

It's very bad manners to criticise people who invite you to their party, so I wish I'd been able to say some of this during the event, at the unconference group seeking feedback on the event, but I had to head for Hull, so I'll preface what I'm about to say with words of sincerely meant praise.

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up for the cup: may's top posts

Well the weather may have been pretty ropey in May - the coldest for a million years or so - but on comms2point0 there were posts galore to warm the cockles of every comms person's heart.

by Darren Caveney

As you know, we invest heavily in little plastic cups to award to the most read post each month and excitement always grows prior to the big monthly announcement.

So without any further messing or flannel from me, here's goes...

At 5 was last month's top post by Eddie Coates-Madden - PR is dead... and just for good measure newspapers are dead too.

In at 4 was Why gov.uk is the best sight on the web by debut contributor Dave Thackeray.

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