Social Strategy for Municipal Organizations

October 1, 2019

With the wide reach and instant communication afforded through channels such as Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn, social media is of growing interest for local governments as they search for new and better ways to promote transparency, enhance engagement, and foster collaboration.

WHAT CAN SOCIAL MEDIA DO FOR LOCAL GOVERNMENT?

  • General Outreach and Greater Community Engagement – Share information regularly and efficiently
  • Improved Communication – Keep the public better informed with these direct channels
  • Establishing Leadership – Transparency inspires trust and confidence in your municipality
  • Economic Benefits – Social media use can result in cost savings and revenue generation.

SOCIAL MEDIA SERVICES

Facebook – The largest social media site, geared toward connecting you with people you know or with whom you share common interests.

Twitter – A microblogging service, which allows messages of 140 or fewer characters to be transmitted quickly to followers.

YouTube – Video messages from municipalities, highlights of activities, and image-building are potential subjects for such videos.

Instagram – A photo sharing platform can be used to share a different side of your organization.

DEVELOPING A CONTENT CALENDAR

Use this desk calendar to facilitate social content creation. This calendar has over 365 daily content ideas. Your organization likely has a abundance of unique content that is also worth of social content. Fill in this calendar with your unique dates.

Pro Tips:

  • Plan in advance – spend one day a week creating your social content  for the next week and schedule your content to automatically post to your social calendars
  • Photography/Imagery – When possible always use original photography
  • Crowdsource – Repost relevant content provided by your audience
  • Engagement – Ask your audience to engage and share your content AND interact with your audience
  • Follow – Follow other municipalities in your region