Four Things I Learned About Government PR

The four things I learned from Ric Cantrell about Government PR

1. To engage with your audience you must get them to do one of the following: Laugh, think, engage, or cry.

        Our goal was to help the public realize that the Utah Senate is made up by people. Ric would always say to me how important and crucial it is that we "humanize," the Senate. 

2. Inclusion and open doors build trust with the public.

        Ric explained to me when he first started working with the Utah Senate that there were a lot of boundaries and red tape that he had to deal with. However, he told me that over time he was able to build trust within the organization to get clearance from the President of the Senate to execute and exercise engagement using communication tools with the public. Ric would always remind me how important our job is to stay true to the senate and to be non-partisan when relaying information to the public.

      The first step Ric made to opening the doors of trust with the public was putting a webcam inside the Senate President's office. He said that the president was cool with it, and they put in a video (no audio) camera in his office and let the public control the camera, via internet 24/7. He said that this tactic helped the public feel like nothing secretive was happening in the Utah Senate because they could see for themselves what the Senate President was up to, whenever they wanted.

3. When posting from the Utah Senate account, never use exclamation point unless you have a good reason (which is rare.) I was told, one exclamation point maximum per day.

      I love exclamation points! I think it's the girl in me, however this is probably one of the best tips of advice anyone could ever give me. I know it's simple, but it's really important to not go too overboard and crazy on the exclamation points, it can be perceived as a bit unprofessional, however for my Twitter account, it's fair game

4. Deal with problems the moment it happens.

      At the beginning of the legislative session last semester there was an "incident." The incident was that the Senate President was asked an jokingly written question from the audience at an event they were at about which Senator they would date. Practically all of the Senators are married and President Niederhauser jokingly laughed and asked Senator Henderson if she would answer the question and passed the question over to her. Instantly this event blew up on Twitter, and we were aware of this the moment it happened. 

     Ric did an amazing job, to deal with the situation he talked to the Senate President and Senator Henderson one on one about what had happened,  he then met with them together. And within an hour, they had internally addressed the issue by Senator President Niederhauser apologizing to Senator Henderson and Senator Henderson accepting the apology. 

    In return, the media didn't have much of a story to write about because the situation had already been resolved, Senator Henderson was not offended and she had already accepted a personally issued apology.

See the news report here.