Mayor Engages His Community Through Twitter

Donna Papacosta presents a great example of how Twitter can be used to support real communication goals. In her Trafcom News podcast, she recently interviewed the mayor of Oakville, Canada. Mayor Rob Burton wants to be the “most accessible and engaging mayor in the history of Oakville.” And he is genuinely looking for opportunities to do just that. Some tactics have worked better or gained more traction than others. But the key is, he’s not afraid to try something new.

Listen to the interview in Trafcom News Podcast 88.

Resources for Learning about Podcasting

Here is some information about new resources available about podcasting.

Trafcom News Podcast 79: The Podcaster's Toolkit
Donna Papacosta’s latest podcast episode outlines the “podcaster’s toolkit” in less than 20 minutes. Her web site includes links to all the resources she mentions in the podcast.

Podcasting 101: How to connect with targeted, passionate listeners
Shel Holtz will be leading a 90-minute webinar on podcasting on January 27. An earlier webinar he led is what helped me get IDRA’s Classnotes started. I recommend it. There is a fee of $209, and the session is sponsored by Ragan Communications.

Big Ideas, Small Budget – Podcast Online for Non-Profit Communicators

Roughly a quarter of the registrants at our PRSA luncheon today represent non-profit organizations. Thus, I want to let you know about a podcast that went online a few days ago. Donna Papacosta of Trafalgar Communications held a conference call recently about non-profit communications, particularly related to social media. She has turned that conversation into her latest podcast episode, Big Ideas, Small Budget. (Disclosure: The voice with a drawl is mine.)

This is my 20th year working in the non-profit sector. In that environment, it’s easy to get used to thinking small. Ironically, while big businesses are struggling to understand the social change we are currently going through that limits the effectiveness of one way mass communications, many of us in the non-profit world have long understood the value of dialog directly with stakeholders. This wasn’t because we were ahead of the game or anything. We just couldn’t afford to keep up with the big guys.

But the world is changing. Social media tools open doors to us to communicate more effectively with small budgets. But perhaps this is also our time to step up and provide some leadership by sharing knowledge about building relationships based on trust and mutual listening.