The first thing Rob Quigley, New Media Director for Arnold Schwarzenegger, did when he moved to the Governor’s office was to move the web site from IT to Communications. That very move eliminated a firewall between Communications and IT. Web sites are not digital archives, Quigley explained. “They are very strategic communications tools, and they need to be real time.”
The job, says Quigley, is to drive people to your web site and he does that through social media like Twitter, You Tube, Facebook, and Flickr. Quigley also has a room of people who monitor social and traditional media day and night. The Governor does his own tweeting (his fingers are actually too big to hit the keys so he has someone type his tweets for him); and the Governor’s staff checks to see what Arnold is saying, what legislators are saying, and how people are responding. “We can and do update our web site at all hours of the day and night, depending on what needs to be communicated.”
In the past, communications people had to go through the media to get their messages out. Now, because of social media, it’s a different world. The Governor – and companies — can have conversations with their constituents directly without the media interpreting what each side is saying.
Quigley has photographers and videographers on staff. They will cover an event, come back to the office in Sacramento, and have photos or a video on the web within a few hours. Just as important is to have someone at the event take a photo or video with his or her iPhone or Blackberry and post it on Twitter, You Tube and Facebook – with a link to the web site — within minutes.
By training, Quigley is a technical person with a background in web development, but first and foremost, he is a communications person. The common problem in many organizations is that there is a chief technical officer and IT department who oversees a web site. Communications has to send a request to change or add something to the site.
Quigley said his most frustrating example of the old paradigm was the day Ronald Reagan died. “We wanted to update the Governor’s web site to acknowledge Reagan but it was a Saturday. We were told it would have to wait until Monday when the staff came in.”
Thanks to Jan Burch, PR wizard and vice president of Placemaking Group’s Sacramento Office, for the conversation with Rob.
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This post was mentioned on Twitter by GetFamousNow: Get control of your web site out of IT and into communications http://bit.ly/b6tTrO…
This whole blog is a goldmine for someone like me who’s launching a new brand specifically using new media. I was pretty savvy using traditional medias, but its a whole new ballgame these days. This is definitely bookmarked.
Great article, this is something I’ve always fought about with web developers. IT people are used to having control over content, when and how it gets added to a site. I’ve always felt that being able quickly and regularly update a site was of extreme importance.
If I had all the tools available now, when I was running El Rauncho Records in the ’70s, we could have ruled the world! But seriously, the various social media sites have been a boon to many of my recent ventures.