Category: Social Media

New Facebook Stats for Page Admins

Facebook have rolled out another update to pages. But unlike the last one that I feel may have  hindered engagement this one seems to have been given a little more thought and actually, to page owners, could prove quite useful. It’s to their page insights, the analytics panel available to all admins running pages with over 30 “likes”.

The WV11 page I run has had the new insights made available to us today, and on first appearances I’m like what I’m seeing, It’s obviously geared up to encouraging you to “boost” or promote posts (pay for more people to see them) BUT in saying that it’s not too intrusive. The data it offers you is quite insightful and I can see it being really helpful to brands or organisations trying to maximize their reach – It has really good comparison graphs for trends and long range interactions and individual break down of stats for each post.

Here’s a grab of the currents stats from a photo album we created Saturday of images from the Summer Fun Day – You can click on it to open it large to see what I mean.

Fun Day Stats

Clear and concise figures easy to read at a glance and all still exportable – although I haven’t yet tried to see how clear they are in CSV format – but I’m hoping they can’t be any harder to decipher than with the last insights update!

I need to play more to see what else it has to offer but on first glance it looks good!!

Can I video my local council meetings?

 

It is often very helpful for local community groups or hyperlocal blogs to be able to record what happens at council meetings. It allows them to capture and share a record of what was agreed – and hold politicians to account in the future.  It can also help them celebrate success and show good local government in practice.

Some local council’s have had problems with this and today the Department for Communities and Local Government have clarified things for us all.

many councils across the country are still refusing to allow people to film public council meetings. In some episodes of TV programme Grand Designs, viewers have been perplexed at cameras being stopped from filming meetings of the planning committee considering the self-build projects.

The new guidance explicitly states that councillors and council officers can be filmed at council meetings, and corrects misconceptions that the Data Protection Act somehow prohibits this.

The Health and Safety Executive has also shot down the suggestion that ‘health and safety ‘regulations’ also bar filming, which Wirral Council used to justify a filming ban last year.

The new rules do not apply to Wales, as they have not been introduced by the Welsh government who have devolved responsibility. This led to the situation of a blogger being arrested and handcuffed by the police for filming a council meeting in Carmarthenshire. Wrexham council also banned a journalist from the Daily Post from tweeting a council meeting. Eric Pickles has today challenged Welsh ministers to introduce the new rights in Wales too.

Here’s the document and any and all active citizens and local bloggers should keep this in their back pocket.

BloggeYour council’s cabinet: going to its meetings, seeing how it works – a guide for local peoplers and V…

Be considerate, don’t disrupt, get those cameras out, share what you shoot.

So the short answer is yes.  hat tip Will Perrin and Talk About Local.

 

Lorna Wills – How attending Social Media Surgeries helped me find my place in my community

I first met Lorna Wills at the Low Hill Social Media Surgery in January. Recently I caught up with her again to see what had prompted her to come to a surgery in the first place and what she’s done with her new skills since then.

Lorna Willis

Lorna moved into the area 2 years ago and didn’t know that many people near where she lived, so she came along to the surgery wanting to learn how to use the internet to find out what things were going in her area. Things  that she could get involved with.  She had been attending her local neighbourhood watch meetings, but when the group tailed off she realised she wasn’t sure what she could get involved with next.

” I first found out about the surgeries only just in time to attend the last session in Low Hill but the people there were lovely and welcoming. I sat with someone and they showed me how to use twitter. They knew there were lots of people and groups using it locally and that I could use it to find out what was on going on in my area ….

…I’ve since joined the local Crimestoppers group as a voluntary member. I talked to Mac the organiser on twitter and went along to a meeting to find out more.

I’ve since traveled to Rugby for my induction and to the Crimestoppers conference in Warwickshire, which is where I met Chief Constable Andy Parker. Talking to Andy we discovered we had a mutual acquaintance, we got back in touch I’m now arranging to meet him too!

Those conversations on twitter have been a catalyst for all this. I have met some lovely people and improved my social life. 

I was feeling dissatisfied in the area, it didn’t seem that friendly, I found it was hard to make new friends in a new place. I think I’d come to realise you have to stay somewhere  couple of years to find your community but I just couldn’t meet people I could relate to before but now I have both at the surgery and people I’ve met by going online.

I used Twitter to find out about events locally, which I’ve attended and now I’m even helping to arrange our own event on Low Hill for local groups to a showcase their organisations. The surgeries played a big part in my taking part in all this, it has boasted my confidence, I’ve always been active but in my own and now I’ve met some lovely people to be active with.”

 

Using Social Media to Improve Perceptions of Saftey

At the moment we are in the middle of a project working with the South Birmingham Safety Partnership. This involves running social media surgeries across communities in South Birmingham to improve civic conversations in those areas, get the communities and local partners talking to each other talking to each and getting their news online and hopefully by doing so positively changing their perceptions of safety.

Yesterday we had our second session in the Kings Norton. Jo Burrows, senior youth worker at the Three Estates Youth Project came along. Jo, by her own admission was a complete novice when it came to social media – she didn’t trust it – and this came through her lack of understanding of the tools that were available. After just one Social Media Surgery with us we managed to change some of those misgivings and set her up with her own blog for the Project.  Here’s what she had to say :