Attended Social Media Summit held by American Learning Institute a couple of weeks ago with 50-70 others from all walks of industry and agencies. Great primer on philosophy of social media as well as some great tips and ideas passed along from presenters from social media industries.
Here are some short takes and lessons learned from the summit:
Think big; start small; scale up
The dialogue about our organization is out there happening- we can choose to be a part of it or we can stick our head in the sand.
If the USFS doesn’t participate it will not stay relevant in today’s or tomorrow’s discussions.
Candor is expected & respected
Blogs should contain insight not found in other locations- don’t just regurgitate info.
Don’t wait for crisis to start participating- build credibility (earn your way in).
It’s all about people to people communications- blogs build relationships
Don’t be dissuaded by the current content of blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other social media. Look through that to what the tools can accomplish if used in a business sense.
Leadership must become comfortable with multi-directional cross influencing. Past information flow was usually top down or bottom up- today’s information is crossing all lines as well as flowing up and down. Makes most traditional leaders uncomfortable- apparent loss of control of messaging. Orgs must cede levels of control in order to credibly participate in the conversation.
In persuading leadership:
Focus on benefits, not technology or risks- most won’t understand technology and
will be risk averse.
Don’t position this as something completely new- fear of the radical change.
We’ve moved through e-mail, Blackberries, etc.- this is just the next step.
Use betas and move quickly- deploy beta and let it loose on the users. They’ll let
you know whether or not it’s any good & what needs changing.
Don’t get hung up on measurement- these tools are inexpensive and easy to
change; if it takes off, the users will make the business case.
Create blog policy before beginning internal or external blogging
Sun Microsystems policy: (1) Be interesting
(2) Don’t be stupid
(3) We will not back you in a lawsuit
Politeness rules: No sex, religion, politics or profanity
Leadership writes their own blogs- no ghost writing! If they don’t have the time or
capability- don’t blog!!
Blog on a regular schedule & be up front, casual & conversational.
Gain a champion within the FS- Kimbell ??
Monitor your own blogs, not just the blogs talking about you. Thank bloggers when they get info right about your organization.
Use blogs to drive readers to value-rich content.
Gotchas: Legal
Corporate culture
Review processes (legal, PAO, line officers)
Recognizing where this technology doesn’t fit
Control the employee bloggers, not the posts!!
Find great bloggers that have: (1) personality
(2) motivation
(3) skills
and I’ll add: TIME
Builds Word of Mouth: (1) Give people and interesting topic
(2) Use Social Media tools
No matter what you think the FS is, it is what our users see/get/experience.
Blogs/social media are a permanent record.
If you want to view some of the presentations from the summit:
http://ali2007socialmedia.wordpress.com/
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2 comments:
Thanks for posting these notes. They really capture the benefits of social media. I look forward to viewing the presentation from the summit. I also hope that more Forest Service folks will attend future social media conferences.
Very helpful notes! I especially appreciate the consideration of leaderships needs.
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