social media for economic development and community marketing
DESCRIPTION
This presentation is how a City utilizes social media in general. It was part of an economic development and tourism somed seminar conducted by the Lower Colorado River Authority.TRANSCRIPT
City of Round Rock’sSocial Media Success Story
What We’ve Learned In Our Extensive 3.5-Year Journey
Our Goals
• Provide additional channels of input for citizens and other potentially-affected interests
• Increase the transparency of the City's decision-making process
• Facilitate a sense of community• Reach new audiences with City
messages and information
Our Social Media Toolkit
• Launched Community Conversations blog in July 2007– 14 blogs, 491 posts, 339 comments
• Created Facebook Page in July 2008– 2,286 fans/likes
• Started Twitter account in June 2008– 2,161 followers
• Flickr group launched in 2007– 135 members, 1,181 photos
• YouTube channel opened in 2007
The Blog
• Community Conversations blog– Comments are moderated– A good Terms of Use is vital!– Best use is for extended planning
projects like General Plan, Downtown Master Plan because it creates historical record
– Tend to see more activity at beginning of process, with interest tapering off as project/plan progresses
• Facebook– Fed by blog, we often get more
comments on FB page than on blog site– Be sure administrator is “friendly” and
can tag people in videos, pictures– Don’t be afraid to allow posts to your
wall, or you’ll miss stuff like this …
High Praise
You Love Us! You Really Love Us!
You Love Us! You Really Love Us!
Digital Concierge
How We Use Flickr
• We moderate uploads• As a community builder• As a resource for free pictures – our
Terms of Use allows us to use submitted photos in City promotional materials. In return, we give credit to photographer
• We auto-feed it news releases from our website
• Set up automatic searches for “Round Rock” and “City of Round Rock” and respond as needed
• As Communication Director, I use it to monitor local media outlets
YouTube
• Took a while to get a Government Partner Account to post videos longer than 10 minutes …
• Now we use it to feed all online video outlets: City website, Facebook, web widget
Successful?
• Provide additional channels of input for citizens and other potentially-affected interests
• Increase the transparency of the City's decision-making process
• Facilitate a sense of community• Reach new audiences with City
messages and information