Deepend presents

REINVENTING GOVERNMENTCUSTOMER SERVICEDeepend is a digital communications and innovation consultancy. We specialise in creatively driven, strategic, business and marketing solutions.

about usSo you might be wondering what we do at Deepend. Well, quite simply, we make ideas happen - we innovate.

At our core, we are leaders in innovation and have built our reputation on our ability to achieve our clients goals and objectives with award winning digital work. follow us on

about meHaving spent the first 10 years of my career working in State and Federal government Departments, I joined the Deepend team as Strategy Director at the start of 2012.

I spend my days working with some of Australia’s most well known brands helping them transform their digital presence and build greater relationships with their audience. find me on

IT’S ALL ABOUT PERCEPTION.And we have a perception problem.

“Old school, disconnected, out of touch...”The perception across the board is that “Government” are generally good at talking about things but terrible at doing them. We’ve all heard the endless rhetoric that pretty much consists of “They made me fill in all these forms and wait for two hours and then told me I’d filled in the wrong form and waited in the wrong line at the wrong office...” But we also know that this rhetoric is out of date.

For the most part, Governments have adapted and have embraced new technologies and have invested significantly over the past decade to build a meaningful digital presence to engage with their citizens.

And as they should, because not doing so doesn’t just create discontent and frustration among the masses - the consequences can be much dire.

INSERT CLIP

Communication can save livesAs someone who worked for the Department of Justice as a supposed ‘communication expert’ for the years leading up to and following the Black Saturday bushfires it was personally devastating when the Royal Commission into the 2009 bushfires highlighted that one of major factors that contributed to the death and destruction of these fires was a fundamental lack of clear communication and community education.

RECOMMENDATION #2

“The State revise the approach to community bushfire safety education...”

PICK YOURSELF UP.DUST YOURSELF OFF.

Start again.

Reinvention isn’t easy...When people talk about throwing out the rule book, that is literally what we did. The past approach to bushfire communication, community education and campaigns was forever gone and as communicators we were faced with the realisation that not only were we dealing with a bereaved community who were still struggling to come to terms with what had happened, but those who had survived were incredibly confused. And I wonder why...?

Stay or go?Code Red and CatastrophicFire Safety WarningsNeighbourhood Safer PlacesTownship Protection PlansEmergency Alert WarningsPrepare. Act. Survive.

but it is possible.

“Positive long-term behaviour change”

And so became oursingle minded proposition:

THE ART OF BEINGEverything to everyone

Rule 1. Be everywhereHow we consume information has shisted rapidly over the past decade, and it is fundamental that Government’s follow if they intend to have impact. When I started my career in Government communications, our channels primarily consisted of print, events and PR. For large scale campaigns we upped the ante and included television, outdoor and radio advertising. Fast forward a relatively short amount of time and we were doing major digital campaigns that included social media, building apps, branded content, blogs and the list goes on.

The problem is that while the number of channels increase and move, Governments need to be everywhere. Ignoring the new channels will not make them go away, and unfortunately it will only increase the gap between you and your audience.

Rule 2. Be mobileAustralian’s love smartphones. And in fact arguably we love them more then any other country, given we have the second highest penetration of smartphones in the world. And we don’t just use them to make calls and send messages.

Close to 70% of Australians use their smartphones to access the internet multiple times a day. And the mobile trend isn’t slow moving by any means, in fact it’s more like an avalanche. Across the board we are seeing significant rises how osten, how much, what for and whereabouts we use them.

Most of our clients at Deepend are now seeing that close to a third of all website traffic is coming from a mobile device, almost double that of what it was just one year ago.

FireReady mobile campaign

Rule 3. Be socialPersonally I believe that social media is the greatest gist ever to be given to Governments. For literally hundreds of years politicians and public servants alike spent their time trying to ascertain exactly what it was that their citizens wanted. And we have now entered an age where it has been handed to us on a silver platter.

At its core, being social allows you to create true two-way communication between you and your audience. It allows you to disseminate information quickly and with impact. It can generate change and bring communities together.

But like all beautiful things, social media can be dangerous if not used properly, which is why investing in it properly is fundamental to its success.

FireReady Challenge

Rule 4. Be innovativeThink about every time as public servants that you’ve been told “We can’t do that”. Even if you’re not a public servant, chances are you’ve been told this in your job. But as public servants there are a plethora of rules and regulation and red tape that make doing something for the first time a seemingly impossible task.

But we have to move away from this mindset that just because something hasn’t been done before doesn’t mean it can’t happen now.

Keep it Safe

Rule 5. Be braveAt the end of the day, reinvention of any kind requires you to be brave. It requires you to not be afraid of making mistakes. It requires you to be bold and to take risks. From every corner of the globe we are seeing Governments taking giant steps forward and connecting with their citizens in new ways.

Last year, New York City Mayor, Michael Bloomberg, invited his citizens to reinvent the cities 11,000+ payphones that had become obsolete since the rise of mobile phones. The submissions were incredible and should stand as a constant reminder of what is possible when Governments open their minds and connect with the masses.

reinventpayphones.splashthat.com

“How can New York City reinvent payphones to make our city more accessible, safer, healthier, greener and better informed?”

thank youdeepend.com.au