the weird and wonderful watching habits of the comms and digital community

The Twitter community is one of the greatest research resources in the world. If you need to know something, just ask Twitter. The results never cease to amaze.

by Darren Caveney

I have watched a lot of TV in my life. And I mean a lot. I don’t mean the middle of the road twaddle that gets served up in the name of entertainment and puts me off ever checking the TV listings. No, what I mean are the real quality TV shows whose watching via ‘boxsets’ has become a bona fide pastime.

I have seen all of the classics. But now I am adrift and in need of something new to get into.

So I was after some recommendations and what better way than to ask the rather marvellous comms2point0 followers to chip in. And boy did you respond, with over 40 suggestions emerging.

And if you also fancy checking out something new this is a pretty great list from which to choose.

So what did we learn?

Well we learned that Paul Masterman’s favourite shows are Bullseye and Nogin the Nog. Well, “you can’t beat a bit of bully”.

Seeing the Brummie classic, Crossroads, on the list was a tad unexpected.

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coping with political change as a communicator

The impending election for a new leader of the Labour Party is perhaps a timely reminder that change comes in many forms.

by Andy Carter

If you’re a public sector communicator, it’s likely that your organisation is going through some kind of change right now.

I’ll hazard a guess that it’s probably because of financial pressures caused by budget cuts.

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my best piece of advice to someone working in digital comms in 2015

Advice. It's maybe something we should all ask for more of. So asking the comms and digital community for their best piece of digital advice seemed a good place to begin.

by Dan Slee

The best advice about falling, Chevy Chase once said, is never to land.

Wise words from the star of ‘Spies Like Us’ but does it apply to the landscape of digital comms? Maybe. Maybe not. So, we decided to ask some people we rate for their best piece of advice.

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from local gov to the nhs: comparing comms across the sectors

Plenty of folks have switched sectors in their careers, and many more follow. In this fascinating post we learn all about the differences, and similarities, in communications in local government and the NHS from one of the best comms pros around.

By GUEST EDITOR Ross Wigham

Hello and welcome from your friend in the North.

I’ve been a long time reader and occasional contributor to comms2point0 so it’s a real treat to be guest editing and a genuine honour to be asked.

Having moved to work in a hospital, after spending the last seven years at various councils the thing I’m most commonly asked is what’s the biggest difference? Clearly, that’s about as boring as asking how many times Newcastle United will concede more than four goals this season, but I do see some interesting parallels between the NHS as a whole and the average public sector comms team.

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influence needs context: lissted & and a top 250 twitter list

Everyone loves a list. A regional newspaper published a list of the most influential Twitterers. We're in it. Woohoo! But what were the metrics? And what was the behind-the-scenes story?

by Adam Parker

Last week the Birmingham Mail and its sister titles published a list created for them by us at Lissted of the Top 250 West Midlanders* on Twitter based on their significance to the rest of the UK.

Reaction to the list has been great, with lots of people getting involved, highlighting the appearance of people they know, or sometimes a bit of self promotion! The list has also generated a number of questions from people about the rankings and who’s on the list and who isn’t.

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more popular than eastenders: a university graduation week

What was more popular than EastEnders? The University of Warwick’s graduation week on social media. It is a landmark week in the life of a student. It's a landmark week for a University too. Their acclaimed social media officer lifts the lid on how they did it.

by Dave Musson from University of Warwick

Working at a University, there are plenty of great things going on all year round, but arguably the best time to be on campus is during graduation week. There’s an almost magical buzz in the atmosphere, with happy graduates, proud parents and flying mortarboards in every direction you look.

But what about transposing that buzz from real life to online? Here’s how we did at the University of Warwick, armed with little more than a hashtag, some mobile phones and plenty of enthusiasm.

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what makes a great post? learning the lessons from four years of comms2point0

We know that writing for the web is different. But what helps to make a blog post fly? Here are five simple tips to help you write your next masterpiece.

by Darren Caveney

We’ve put up over 700 posts on comms2point0 over the past four years and leaned an awful lot along the way.

They cover a wealth learning, ideas, campaigns and case studies from colleagues across the communications and digital community

I have read every single one of them.

I have also monitored each one to assess what works best in terms of views, comments and shares, as well as what doesn’t work so well.

So if you’re writing with a digital audience in mind here are five simple lessons that may help you along the way to writing your next post…

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we need to reboot twitter events

Back in the day the 24-hour Twitter event was groundbreaking. But have they moved on? And what do they need to do?

by Dan Slee

I’ve been thinking for a while that 24-hour Twitter events have driven up a bit of a cul-de-sac.

You know the sort of thing. An organisation tweets what it is doing for 24-hours and shines a light on unsung heroes. You learn things you didn’t know and then the timeline moves on.

Back in 2011, I was part of an award-winning team at Walsall Council that ran this first one in local government called #walsall24. We encouraged teams from across the council from 6am to join in. There was a countryside ranger talking about what she was doing, scheduled road repairs and events at libraries.

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our survey said: ‘almost half comms people don’t switch off on holiday.’

That week in the sun. That stretch in the tent. It’s supposed to be downtime from the busy day job. We thought we’d stage a survey just to see how many people really do disconnect.

By Dan Slee

If you are on the beach checking your work emails the chances are you are not alone.

In fact, for comms, digital or PR people the out-of-office doesn’t mean out-of-range.

We thought we'd stage a quick snap unscientific survey to test out the theory and see how many people would admit to working while not working.

In our survey a whopping 45 per cent of people said the checked work emails, phone messages or did work.

Worst offenders were those who checked their work mobile several times a day – 22 per cent put their hand up to this.

Survey answers

Switch off entired 56 per cent

Take my work laptop on holiday - use once a day - 11 per cent

Take my work laptop on holiday - use once a week - 3 per cent

Take my work laptop on holiday - use several times a day 3 per cent

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NEW: comms2point0 skills workshop: essential media law for social media and communications

If you work in comms, PR, HR and legal you need to know there are new media laws which will affect how you do your job. That's why we are staging a new workshop with acclaimed media law expert David Banks.

by Dan Slee

It seems that every aspect of society is being disrupted by the internet and other changes and the field of media law is no exception.

A raft of changes are in the offing and we thought it would be a bright idea to offer you a workshop with one of the brightest brains in the field to help you make sense of them.

David Banks is a highly experienced figure in the arena of media law. He has co-authored recent editions of McNae's Essential Law for Journalists, he trains national newspaper groups and has worked extensively in local government and the public sector. In short, he is the 'go-to' man in the UK in the field.

We'd love to see you there. Our previous workshops have sold out and we expect the same for David's session so do be quick. 

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using buzzfeed to create a buzzing community

Buzzfeed is one of the world's largest social news websites and one of the most shared on Facebook. It's known for pioneering 'listicles' which are lists of facts more easily digested and shared on the web. However, it also allows you to create your own content. Here's what happened when one comms officer did so.

by Karen Jeal

It’s that time of year again at Gravesham where we get all green fingered and the town looks blooming marvellous as part of our efforts to scoop the top prize for Gravesham in Bloom.

Although this year is different. The stakes and stems, for that matter, are higher. We won Gold last year so expectations are at an absolute max to grow for gold once more.

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my favourite app: 45 of the best from 16 people

Apps. There's thousands of them. But which ones are worth looking at? We asked some bright people what their favourites were. Here they are. Some for work and some for life away from work.

by Dan Slee

A good app can be a real help so we thought it would be a good idea to ask our community for some of their favourites.

There's a real range and what's striking is the range and variety that people swear by.

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12 things I learnt from the comms2point0’s essential video skills workshop

It's always good when a workshop really works. Our essential video skills session has been tweaked and improved and we think really delivering the goods. So it's good to see a delegate to a session write a post on what he learned. More info on the next workshops here.

by Kacem Jlidi

You’ll probably have heard by now that video is the next big thing on the internet but not sure what to do about it and how to start incorporating it in your communication plans effectively without going bankrupt.

I was there until I luckily got myself a seat on one of the Essential Video Skills Workshops run by comms2point0 and Film Cafe.   

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the hidden secret to digital transformation

Every organisation is looking to transform what they are doing. There's a major role for good internal comms. Did you know?

by Kane Simms 

There’s one thing that’ll guarantee digital transformation success… and it’s not what you think.

It’s not the:

• Digital design
• Integration
• User centricity
• UX design
• Data and analysis
• Agile methodology
• Lean processing
• And so on

Long lasting digital transformation hinges, like everything else in life, on people. It depends on your staff.

Your staff have the service area expertise needed to design epic digital services and their enthusiasm and involvement is critical to solutions being adopted. Without your staff’s investment, you’ll be short-cutting back to old habits quicker than Paul Gascoigne leaving rehab.

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being the clip art and comic sans police. and why it matters.

Brand identity is hugely important and many comms folk will relate to this post on the subject. It's an instant classic. Print it out and put it on your office wall today...

by GUEST EDITOR Ben Capper

comms2point0 is one of my favourite websites.

There are loads of interesting ideas and a great community. There’s stuff on here that helps me to find solutions to issues on a daily basis.

Not very colourful though is it?

Don’t know about you, but sometimes I think it’s crying out for a bright splash of pink, maybe with some orange writing on it.

And that typeface. It’s OK for some people I guess, but surely something friendlier, some more hand-writing-ish would make it look, you know, just a bit nicer.

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