On the phone with the CEO of http://www.objectivemarketer.com/ I'll add them to the list once my blog is up. 3 hrs ago
«
»
Comments

Diagram: How the Air Force Response to Blogs

Categories: Social MediaPosted on December 31st, 2008

The Airforce has created a process flow diagram that indicates very succinctly how the Air Force can and should respond to blog posts, there’s a lot to learn from here, and for the most part, I try to follow these similar rules. The Airforce, well all military units across the globe come across criticism, so establishing a clear sense of communication guidelines.

Thanks to Joey DeVilla for posting this, who learned of this from David Meerman Scott who was in contact with Capt. Faggard who’s involved with the Airforce’s social media team: Twitter, and a blogspot blog, (I’m surprised they don’t have their own blog on the airforce websites, so we’re going off David’s word that this is authentic)

There’s a lot to be learned from this military diagram that can be applied to corporations or even your personal blogging efforts.

Air Force Blog Assessment

On a personal note, my Grandfather was a decorated Lieutenant in General Patton’s 9th Army AirForce station in Europe in WW2, he flew a P47 Thunderbolt, and was one of the very few Chinese American pilots in the war. You can see clippings of an article that featured him (the beautiful lady is my Grandmother). The plane? He named it after his hometown here in Silicon Valley the “San Mateo Belle”.

Share This Post:
  • Digg
  • del.icio.us
  • Facebook
  • Google Bookmarks
  • Reddit
  • Technorati
  • LinkedIn
  • FriendFeed
  • StumbleUpon
  • Twitter

This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 31st, 2008 at 9:45 am and is filed under Social Media. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Comments
  • Jeremiah, this is an excellent flowchart. I agree wholeheartedly with just monitoring "Trolls" and "Ragers."

    BTW, if it wasn't for your tweet tonight I would have never found this gem. Thanks!
  • JohnRCarlisle
    Great post Jeremiah. We adopted the Air Force Guidelines here at the John R. Carlisle Institute. We thought, why reinvent the wheel? They seemed like such a great model already.

    John R. Carlisle
  • Hello Jeremiah. Another excellent piece of shared knowledge. Thank you. I've taken the liberty of translating it to Swedish, with some changes - making it a bit more general: helps and tips for responding to any comments about your company/organisation on the net. Of course I've cited the source in all representations of the diagram. Cheers.
  • lpaul
    What I find interesting is the whole assessment/flow-chart approach. I've never been in the military but I imagine that similar decision trees are used for other types of decision making/situations that require a reaction/response (of course, those decisions and thought processes probably occur in a matter of a split second). I believe the idea is to have a guide and then the reaction or next step decision should start to become second nature and if appropriate, maybe a little "shooting from the hip" (within the military-communication protocols). Citizen journalism and more loose communication methods can be uncomfortable for certain organizations.
  • A fascinating tool, maybe a bit one sided though. But well, it was done by a military organization.
  • This is a great guideline. Thanks for posting.
  • Tom
    As the minister in the UK government responsible for digital engagement, this is a fantastically helpful post - thank you!
  • Thanks Jeremiah ...

    This is very cool to see. I'm sure there are plenty of these types of things out there, but i've not seen any diagramed out this well.

    It's a perfect example and helps answer a ton of common questions ... like "How do we 'control' what's being said about us out there?"

    There are obviously many more elements to social media, but this is a nice practical way to guide peoples thinking and allow organizations to have a starting point.

    --
    http://twitter.com/franswaa
  • I don't have much to add to the comments and builds on this document but I will say that what impresses me here is that this is great information design. So many times you see guidelines (and to Joe's point - these should be understood as guidelines NOT fixed policy) written in dry text that ensures no one will read it, much less follow it. These guidelines are designed to be immediately intelligible.

    All told, there is a lot of information here - including educational info about the culture of the blogosphere (trolls etc.). Yet it is immediately accessible, understandable and actionable. It is not enough to create guidelines within a large organization... you need to organize the information so that it is meaningful... Nice work.
  • interesting piece about your grandpa. love the pinup shot :)
  • That's really smart. Especially how many big organizations don't know or have a real strategy on responding to negative post/feedback. Don't want to feed those trolls or raging people.
  • I'd recommend that USAF invest and fundamentally support a social media strategist to assess their social media engagement on both a immediate, intermediate and long-term plan. I think immediately, it's to communicate more (besides throwing images up on a blogger page...).

    Perhaps taking their critiques and responding to them instead of merely silencing bloggers by feeding them a comment to quell their views.

    Understand that my critique is not necessarily aimed toward you or the USAF. It's directed for your readers who printed this out and who might follow it religiously.

    I find this is a great start; but should be cautioned that it's an outline but doesn't cover every circumstance for which the USAF participates social media. People need to hold this diagram with respect to the fact the USAF is extremely guarded with information release and disclosure. It's good, but shouldn't be posted in every office. ;-)

    ~Joe
  • Joe

    You're right, each of these boxes has additional weight that has be measured, nothing is really black or white.

    The important thing to remember is that having this process diagram is better than not having it as a resource.

    It's a step forward.

    What would make this process work best? If there was a centralized group within the airforce that bloggers or commenters could go to at anytime for advice.
  • "...Focus on the most influential blogs that relate to ..."

    I have another critique on this diagram.
    Every blog deserves the same amount of respect for a response. I don't care if it's on the Huffington Post or blog on MySpace, people are people and they all deserve the same respect, regardless of their "influence."

    My point is that every person can influence and cite change
  • Sally thanks! Yes, please connect me with them, that's interesting to me.

    David, thanks for the clarification, I always am skeptical now a days, after the Janet fiasco.
  • While I think it's good to put a process together for companies who don't get social media; I think this flowchart questions the very purpose of social media.

    Social media is more than just a "positive" or "negative" perspective on blogs. I see nothing on there to elevate feedback throughout the organization, nothing on effecting change, nothing on proactively sharing information, nothing on engaging with the online community.

    This diagram is a cheat-sheet for old-school PR folks who rely on process flows, rather than just being themselves and having a genuine human interest in the conversation. Social media is not a process, a checklist, or a Venn diagram. It's a culture change.

    ~Joe
  • Hey Jeremiah,

    I did indeed have a conversation with Capt. Faggard about everything he's up to at the Air Force (and reported it on my blog). I was thrilled to have had a chance to speak with him. Yes, the assessment tool is legit and he gave me permission to post if.

    Take care, David
  • nice piece Jeremiah! Dow Jones works with the PR agency, RMG Connect, that put the social media strategy in place for the Marine Corps Recruting effort. If you wish to learn more, I can connect you to my contact. We have been working with this account for three years and find it an evolving strategy to mirror the change in landscape in social media(and hence the conversation) with the MCRC efforts.
    We are in the process of publishing an ebook on the subject and I will be happy to send a link to you when it is ready for primetime.
    Happy New Year!
    Sally
  • Fascinating piece, thanks for posting!
  • I particularly like the transparency and sourcing considerations.

    The only thing I would change is "Has someone discovered..." to "Have you discovered...".

    That might not work for the Air Force where mission confidentiality is an issue, but for most companies any employee should be able to speak up on behalf or their organisation.

    It doesn't always need to come from a PR department.
blog comments powered by Disqus
site design by studionashvegas proudly powered by WordPress