One of the things on my Christmas to-do list was to write a quick blog entry about PWGSC’s internal newsletter called “Within Reach”. Why you may ask? It is perhaps the most informative piece of text on the subject of digital marketing to ever come out of the federal government. Every government employee involved in any aspect of marketing and/or communications should be reading this newsletter. It features an easy-to-read, well organized layout that is pleasing to the eye, but above all, it has useful CONTENT.
The latest edition features great informative articles on how to build traffic to your website, how to measure ROI effectively, the importance of the Official Languages Act, new contracting tools, and that’s just the beginning! Here is a sample screenshot of what it looks like (first page only), you can download the full latest PDF copy here (English or French).
Now, because it is internal to the government, please e-mail me if you wish to be added to the mailing list (I will let the authors know ASAP). I believe the newsletter is sent out on a quarterly basis.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts and comments throughout the year. Each and every little contribution to the millions of conversations going on out there pushes this new and evolving field of Social Media Marketing one step further.
I will be re-charging my batteries over the next few days since the Jan-March period will be busy beyond belief (here at CEPSM) with some major national marketing strategies (including a recruitment strategy for the Department of National Defence) that I will be able to tell you more about when we receive the contracts. You can rest assured that we will be making some serious recommendations involving social media.
Even when I put my personal thoughts about Rogers as a company aside (not so great in case you’re wondering), I find this proposed move absolutely appalling. Rogers Cable is prepping a technology that puts its own content on the homepage of Google and other sites its broadband customers visit. This completely defeats the purpose of “net neutrality“. For examples of the potential implications of such a move, read the full Wired Magazine article.
In their defense, Rogers has stated that they will be carefully monitoring customer reactions during the testing phase early next year. I hope that Canadians will be smart enough to protest this move and see it as a serious invasion of their “neutral” web experience.
A very important message came out today via YouTube from Google’s CTO Sergey Brin with an aim to shift focus from the non-existent gPhone to a much larger and important innovation dubbed “Android”. What the heck is Android? Essentially it’s Google’s new open-source mobile platform which will very likely revolutionize and completely democratize the mobile world. Google is following in GoldCorp’s successful “GoldCorp Challenge” initiative by launching the Android Developer Challenge, which will provide $10 million in awards — no strings attached — for great mobile applications built on the Android platform. That’s right, Google’s R&D department now encompasses all the programmers in the world.
Marketers start your engines! If you haven’t considered mobile channels yet, now is the time.
I usually try to avoid any kind of work related promotion on this blog, however seeing as how my work and personal passions (leveraging social media marketing to improve society) are fully intertwined, I thought it would be a good opportunity to mention that the Centre of Excellence for Public Sector Marketing finally has a new website. Please browse around and let me know if we’re missing any key components. Or better yet , fill out our quick usability survey. I have integrated numerous rss feeds into the site (including a CEPSM newsfeed), so that content is continually updated and can be viewed on various platforms and devices. If you know of any good links to public sector marketing resources, please let me know so that I can add them to our “community” section. Finally, if you haven’t done so already, please join the Public Sector Marketing Society to stay in touch and network with others in the field. For those of you that speak French, please note that our equivalent French site should be up in the next few weeks.
This is a great snapshot of the modern undergraduate classroom in college/university. Even though the video tries to blame technology to a certain degree, I think it’s ironic how its “technology” that to a large extent, has facilitated the distribution of this video via the web in order to better promote the core underlying message, which I understand as: Society has CHANGED, it’s time for TRADITIONAL beliefs and systems to adapt to this new DIGITAL society.
Implications for marketers in the public sector:
Students are not reading your textbook pamphlets and brochures
Students don’t have time to watch TV during regular hours
Most “leisure time” at home is spent on the web
If you think students are in the library, think again.
Mobile is THE NEXT BIG THING in terms of getting your message across
Online Social Networks are HUGE (just don’t abuse them using traditional push-advertising)
Students are smarter than you think, don’t tell them what to do, join into their conversation instead.
A great article just came out in the Wall Street journal on some of the new applications coming out on Facebook. Here is a list of some interesting new ones that were mentioned along with others that caught my own eye. Note that only the first two are from the public sector.
Causes - Lets you start and join the causes you care about. Donations to causes can benefit over a million registered 501(c)(3) non-profits.
Ripple - This is essentially a way of donating to a charity without spending any of your own money. Simply, ad sponsors give money to ripple for any ads viewed. Ripple donates 100% of that money to charity (we hope).
Neighborhoods-This application uses the founding company’s broker-defined neighborhood system to help Facebook members meet other people who live near them and share local information and photos. It also shows properties for sale in the neighborhood from any of Point2’s broker and agent members, which the company says number about 140,000 in 86 countries.
MyStyle - Lets Facebook’s fashionistas place on their profile pages pictures of items they like from the retailer’s site, such as Oscar de la Renta dresses.
Trips- Provides a place where groups can set travel dates, create itineraries and post messages to each other. Less than two weeks ago, SideStep added a search box to its application, which, the company says, now drives 2,000 visits to its site each day — where people can search for airplane tickets, hotels and rental cars. SideStep plans to enhance the application and, eventually, show some targeted ads.
Visual Bookshelf - Helps Facebook members find new books to read by getting recommendations and reading reviews written by their friends.
Upon first glance, none of these bring anything drastically new to the table. However, what is interesting is that the barriers to entry in developing them were significantly reduced. Why? No proprietary software was needed, promotional costs were drastically reduced and community was formed overnight thanks to the power of social media.
As a public sector marketing consultant , (trying to desperately get government to start adopting web 2.0/social media) I find the recent Ontario government decision to ban Facebook on provincial public servant computers absolutely ridiculous, yet not at all surprising.
The decision comes as a result of the fact that public servants had supposedly been wasting time “socializing” on the popular social networking site during work hours…
Well why don’t we ban work telephones then? how about e-mail? why not put shackles on all employees while we are at it?
The fact is, employees that want to waste time will always waste time. Instead of banning Facebook, the Ontario government should have looked into how it can leverage it as a tool to engage its employees and increase productivity. I see Facebook as an ideal tool to get rid of government silos and increase horizontal cooperation within departments.
Mark my words. This decision will be reversed sooner or later. The government can’t keep running away, social media is here to stay.
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Public Sector Marketing | Tagged: digital marketing, marketing, public sector, PWGSC, Within Reach newsletter | 
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Posted by mikekujawski
