Government Communication Service
Anthony SimonHead of Digital Communications, 10 Downing Street and Cabinet Office
June 2014
What does GCS do?1. We base our government campaigns on research and evidence and use this to
inform our campaigns and segment audiences
2. We are clear about the story our government agency is trying to tell, and can express it in a way that makes sense to citizens
3. We have the confidence of our political and/or organisational leaders
4. All our major communication activities that they have a defined strategy and outcomes (approach, messages, audience, milestones)
5. We run campaigns on government and public service priorities that have milestones and use multiple but integrated media channels including social media
6. We routinely evaluate and measure our work and can identify the change in awareness, understanding and behaviour that has resulted from our work
7. Government departments and agencies works together to achieve these goals
Membership
Each government communicator automatically becomes a member of the Government Communication Service Core – Any professional civil servant communicator Associate – A non-professional civil servant communicator in
a communications role Affiliate member – All public service communicators not
working in central government
Decreasing trust in the EU, national government, and political parties
4Source: Eurobarometer
Decreasing trust in media, including the internet
Sep-0
6
Dec-0
6
Mar
-07
Jun-
07
Sep-0
7
Dec-0
7
Mar
-08
Jun-
08
Sep-0
8
Dec-0
8
Mar
-09
Jun-
09
Sep-0
9
Dec-0
9
Mar
-10
Jun-
10
Sep-1
0
Dec-1
0
Mar
-11
Jun-
11
Sep-1
1
Dec-1
1
Mar
-12
Jun-
12
Sep-1
2
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
The internet
TV
Radio
The press
I would like to ask you a question about how much trust you have in certain institutions. For each of the following institutions, please tell me if you tend to trust it or tend not to trust it?
EU % of ‘tend to trust’
Trust in…
Source: Eurobarometer
Trust in online comment is high – especially trust in friends’ comments
Source: TNS digital life
Poland Italy Spain UK Germany France Netherlands Romania0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
58
47
55 55
43
50
56
51
46 45
40 41
33
41
35 36
Friends
Strangers
% internet users who trust comments people write about brands
ABC of communications1. It’s about the Audience not the organisation
2. Brevity and impact in the moments that matter are necessary to be heard in the conversation
3. It’s a conversation where Content is king. It is no longer good enough to broadcast material.
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Great campaigns
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EVALUATION: Breast Cancer: saves 70 lives pa. Identified need, creative implementation and robust evaluation
OBJECTIVE: Blood Donors: Generates many thousands of blood donors, at a campaign cost of £4.60 per donor
IMPLEMENTATION: Pub Loo Shocker. Drink Drive campaign. Video because target audience watch YouTube, 11 million views
INSIGHT: Potential recruits search from their mobile so we know where they are. We learn that most recruits come from areas with a naval history or know someone in the services
STRATEGY: Brilliant, bold images to sell GREAT Britain
Setting objectives
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Campaigns should move audiences from awareness of an issue through understanding that it matters to them to changing their behaviour to address the objective of the campaign
The Government Communications Plan for 2014/15: what’s different?
For the first time this year’s plan takes a pan-Government view of communications
Together building a strong economy, a fair society and a secure country
Economic Confidence
Fairness and aspiration
Britain in the World
Three cross-government campaigns
EconomyThemed weeks• Infrastructure – “We’re
#BuildingBritain”• Employment –
#GetBritainWorking• Plus, events like Budget
Economy dashboard• top themes discussed by
peaks and volume• compare to previous activity
– Budget 2013• pre-defined list of influencers
to check if our messages featured
• most read and shared owned content and assets – looking for our content to appear in top 10
#BuildingBritain
• A week-long campaign from No10 highlight infrastructure projects up and down the country.
Those involved in infrastructure projects were invited to tweet/send pictures from on site with the slogan ‘We’re #BuildingBritain’
• Influential contributors from construction companies such as Skanska, BalfourBeatty, Kier and industry professional bodies, like RICS and the Institute of Civil Engineers
• 3,900 tweets from 2,260 contributors
• Tumblr blog featuring photos from the activity
The photos
The results
Numerous construction firms, major projects, and industry bodies joined the conversation, including:
3,870 - #BuildingBritain tweets8,420,000 - people who could have seen the hashtag
2,260 - different people who joined conversation1,200 – visits to We are #BuildingBritain Tumblr (1,910 page views)
550 – shares of the two flooding Vines online
Analytics and evaluationFollows: 44,500Unfollows: 12,100Mentions: 13,400Total 2,546,549 +31,542
New likes: 1,359Unlikes: 300Follows: 204,003+1,059
Case study - economy core narrative Determine the extent of use and pick-up of the government’s core narrative on the economy
Search core phrases across• Government – are depts
using the narrative on web and social?
What’s the pick-up?• Local media• Economists• Financial journalists• Lobby Journalists
Dementia campaign
Identify advocates
Life sciences
Actionable insight
Monday
Tuesd
ay
Wed
nesday
Thursd
ayFri
day
Saturd
ay
Sunday
39,00035,000 36,000 36,500 34,000
41,00046,700
10 Downing Street Facebook page
People reached Average post reach
FacebookReach• Status posts reach double
number of people than a photo or a link post
• On average, posts on Sunday reach 27% more people than on a weekday – schedule more posts at weekends
• Engagement also higher at weekend – more time to click, read and comment?
• Shorter messages= increased engagement.
Actionable insightWebsite - SEOMake it easier for people to find your contentChange page name and URL for main page on economy from ‘Economic growth’ to ‘UK economy’ to reflect higher volumes of search traffic.
Result: search traffic to page up 50% since change made
Used data from:• Google Adwords – search volumes• Google Trends – interest over time• Hitwise – UK specific search data
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