Facing the Tweets: Interview with @kcnews

by @johnharveyirwin

(This is the first of a series of interviews that put a face with the “@”behind the Tweets for companies and organizations.)

Meet Sabra Schneider(@sabrak), Webmaster and Tweeter for King County, Washington (@kcnews).  Seattle is in King County, which is located on Puget Sound in Washington State, and covering 2,134 square miles. With more than 1.8 million people, it ranks as the 13th most populous county in the nation.

Former King County Executive, Ron Sims, was an early adopter and the first King County government official to catch the Twitter bug approximately a year and a half ago. The business of King County government began Tweeting in November 2008 and Sabra is the primary tweeter. Below is my interview with Sabra.

1. Are you the main Tweeter for @kcnews?
   Yes, although we have approximately 10 public information officers who have access and regularly contribute. I work closely with the Executive Office Communications team.
2. What is the main goal for King County using Twitter?
   To augment existing communication channels and reach and talk with our residents directly. We once asked our followers on Twitter why they though it was important for governments to be there and the answers were compelling. People liked direct access to government, the use of free/cheap tools and the two-way conversation.
3. How are you measuring the value of Tweeting?
   We monitor in many of the usual ways such as number of followers, number of direct messages, number of retweets. We use bit.ly for our links, which allows us to track how many people are clicking the links. In addition, I look at the following tools:
 Klout, twInfluence, Twitter Analyzer, TweetEffect and tweetreach.One of my favorite twitter stories involves a hamster. We had an orange one (ala the dancing hamster of early Internet days ) who was waiting for a home at a King County animal shelter who had been left on a metro bus. I tweeted about our own dancing hamster and the next day received a message from a resident (and the hamster’s new papa) that he adopted Z the hamster. It all happened in less than 14 hours.
4. What advice do you have for other organizations and businesses using Twitter or thinking of using it?
   Don’t be afraid to have fun with it. Treat it as a two-way conversation. Add value to your existing communication. Maintain it and be active. Lose government speak, you don’t have enough space. It’s also rewarding to connect directly with the residents and or customers, and don’t be afraid of direct feedback.
5. What are some mechanics behind Tweeting? Do you have a Tweet editorial calendar?
   No. We don’t have a calendar specifically for Twitter, although we do aim for at least four tweets a day. Tweets might include anything from concert information in our parks to schedule for the mobile hazardous waste collection. I generally tweet when we have something interesting happening or to highlight one of our services or services from other government agencies.
6. How many hours a day do you spend Tweeting?
   Probably the average day is an hour. And that’s a few minutes here, and a few minutes there. Not a solid block of time although it’s more time in an emergency event.
7. Any interesting or unique customer stories related to @kcnew Tweets?
   Last winter, King County experienced flooding in many of the rural cities in our County and we used Twitter to help get information out to residents about river levels and safety concerns.  We worked closely with emergency management, media and residents to get accurate word out and to follow up quickly. I like how easy it is to work collaboratively with residents and media on Twitter. The online transparency and partnership is unique.
8. Do you have a favorite “follow”?
   I geek out a lot on what’s going on with government and social media. The Washington Department of Transportation (@wsdot) and their various Twitter accounts is a role model for social media in government. Alaska Air (@alaskaair) and PCC (@PCC) are doing a great job, too on the corporate side. Personally I enjoy @westseattleblog, @grist, @levyj413, @friendsseattle and @moniguzman. That said, I enjoy everyone I follow!
9. What are some future ideas/uses for social media for King County?
   We’ve had requests to break out from our general account @kcnews into topic specific accounts. We’ve recently introduced @kcpets, which focuses on getting adoptable animals into forever homes.  We’re also in the midst of emergency planning for winter season and will soon debut @kcalerts. We want to augment current communication efforts and find ways to reach less  connected residents too.

Reputation Management in the Blogosphere: Did Whitepages.com Take it on the Chin?

Information today moves in nanoseconds. And a company’s reputation can be damaged or elevated in a matter of minutes or hours with the ubiquity of bloggers and the influence and speed of information distributed over the blogosphere.  There are many fairly current examples of companies not paying attention what the blogosphere was saying until negative sentiment had been solidified and some damage has been done to the brand and company’s reputation.

Last week, the Seattle-based people search company, Whitepages.com announced its “$2.5 million” brand and website redesign. What happened after Seattle Times tech writer John Cook ran a post in his Techflash blog, and what didn’t happen is interesting.

Approximately 74% of the 27 comments posted about Whitepages on Techflash were negative. With stinging critics about:

• The amount spent on the redesign. “Hilarious! 2.5 millions FOR THAT?!,” or “$2.5m????? thats (sp) ridiculous. Someone needs to be fired over there.”
• To the technology used. “Ruby has traditional been shown is just about every major benchmark to be 2-3 times slower than Perl, PHP and Python which are the leading scripting languages.”
• To John Lusk’s Facebook reference. “Facebook comment, wow, how clueless. Boy, if that tiny upstart makes it big, boy.”

Comments good or bad is what the conversation intrinsic to blogs is all about. What’s surprises me though is that Whitepages didn’t respond to any of the comments. So that prompted me to create a list of five things to do to help companies manage reputation in the blogosphere. The principles and strategies of reputation management are really the same as in the offline world, which includes a bit of patience and common sense.

Top 5 Actions to Reputation Management in the Blogosphere

1. Monitor the blogosphere – There are many tools, some free, to monitor conversations in social media that includes blogs, Twitter and others. Simple and free tools include Google Alerts, search.twitter.com and other more analytics-based tools include SM2 (just acquired by Alterian) and Trackur.
2. Respond quickly – Not in haste, mind you. But as quickly as can. Today, the absence of a rebuttal to criticism is close to admitting fault. It makes the company seem as if they are hiding something and some trust is potentially lost.
3. Be nice, don’t flame, ever!–If you are upset, push away from your computer and take a few deep breaths. Once you are cooled down, craft a response and maybe ask for some internal feedback before posting. And don’t forget to thank the person who posted. Remember, you are glad to have people talking about your company or product.
4. Share more. Be more transparent–If facts were misstated or misinterpreted, clarify. In Whitepages case, the $2.5 million was not actually a fee they paid agencies. Rather it was a number spliced together based on the value of internal effort and resources. My PR experience would tell me that to throw out that large figure in a headline, when it requires further explanation, is risky and misleading.
5. Befriend the bloggers –If the posts or comments are from bloggers you don’t currently follow, then make sure you subscribe to their blogs and participate. The power of conversation can turn potential enemies into friends.

CompuServe RIP: 1979-2009

After 30 years in business, CompuServe, one of the pioneering companies in Internet technology closed its doors on Monday. Or, rather, AOL shut it down. Nevertheless, it’s an interesting note, at least for me, to remember there was a time of dial-up 2800-56K modems and browser wars. (According to the source in Tom Krazit’s CNET story, “Only 7 percent of U.S. residents still use a dial-up service to access the Internet, according to a recent survey by the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project.”) I lived and worked through that era which moved at a breakneck speed and was filled with innovation. Hum, similar to now with all the social media and Web 2.0.

I worked at a Seattle Internet start-up called Spry, which was bought by CompuServe for $100 million in 1996. As the PR manager, I took a position with the newly renamed CompuServe Internet Division. But CompuServe was a conflicted company. Here was a technology company based in Columbus, OH and, at the time, a subsidiary of H&R Block, the parent company.  Because of their traditional corporate culture established by H&R Block, they never had the management or leadership to foresee and make CompuServe a player beyond the dial-up market.  I remember the suits that came to Seattle to start the transition. They seemed so uncomfortable in this new, fast-moving khakis and Polo-shirt environment. They tried, but finally sold off to rival AOL that has kept the company on a respirator for many years.

Still, CompuServe was ahead of its time in the late 80’s and 90’s and should be remembered as one of the early innovators in building Internet communication so communities (they called them Forums) could form and thrive. Hum, similar to where we are now, except with a new set of clothes and a bit more speed!

Dex is a Litterbug

Likely people all over the Seattle area are walking out there front doors today and finding 6.5 pounds of trash in the form of paper telephone directories from Qwest. Thanks, Dex! You’re a jerk.

I know I opted out years ago, yet I still get litter delivered to my doorstep. So I thought I’d be proactive and find out why I’m still getting this trash. I called the customer service number 1-800-422-1234 listed by the publisher of DEX, R.H. Donnelley. The woman I spoke with from this Nebraska call center said I had to opt-out through her, even though I said I had opted-out online years ago. Although it felt quite futile, I gave her my address and during our conversation she told me they were “required by law” to deliver these phonebooks. When I asked what law, she didn’t know.

I called the PR folks at R.H. Donnelley and Pete Larmey said some cities do require the delivery of a White Page directory, but not the Yellow Pages. I told him I had opted-out years ago from the Yellow Pages Do Not Deliver Registry website and I didn’t understand why I was still getting these books. Interestingly, he said, “Publishers don’t endorse this site.” Hum, so this site is a waste of time? (I’ll update this post on YPDND response once I hear back from them.)

Pete did walk me through how to opt-out. It’s not intuitive, which to me is a bit misleading, but here’s how it works. Go to Select Your Dex webpage >enter your zip code>proceed to your Dex>fill out form entering zeros from the drop down menu>Submit>.

I received an email confirmation of the quantity (0) of books I wanted. Of course this doesn’t help me now since the books have already been delivered this year. Pete thinks a zero-delivery request will be valid for two years.

The Yellow Page Do Not Deliver Registry website does have a page that list urls and phone numbers of publishers to opt-out that seems to have current information.

Still, I feel publishers of the Yellow Pages and other directories are snubbing their noses at any obvious, consumer-friendly opt-out program. According to the Associated Press last year, the paid advertising in these directories is a $17 billion-a-year industry. So what these publishers are doing is focusing there messaging on how to recycle the books and grand partnerships with recycling programs. Whatever. Don’t print, produce, and deliver directories that people don’t want. Why can’t it be an opt-IN program?

If you want to help others opt-out, please cut and paste this article url and send to friends. 8ja4m3dkfe

Cookie Recall: Check Your Voicemail

Don't Eat This Cookie!

The business of planning, communicating, and physically executing on product recalls must be a growing and well-paid business. Today’s recall of Nestle Toll House refrigerated cookie dough reminded me of the speed and sophistication at which recalls are now happening. And I’m not even talking Twitter’s influence!

First, I read the recall headline on my mobile device when I woke up this morning. My girlfriend emailed me later with the story, as she’s seen this same cookie dough in my refrigerator, remarking that it was interesting that I had never told her I harbored such guilty pleasures, or willingness to share the pleasure. Then, about an hour later, I get an 800 number voicemail on my mobile. I picked up and listened to a recorded voice telling me about the recall. In Costco’s customer database, they matched up that I was a Toll House cookie dough buyer (guilty) and my phone number. Here is a great use of my personal Costco customer information helping me.

If anyone knows companies or vendors who provide recall services, I would very interested to get more information about the industry, interesting strategies and tactics.  Post a comment or email me directly. Thanks!