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Newsletter | March 2009 Is Web 2.0 the End of Government-to-Citizen Email Communication? To many, email communications seems like "yesterday’s news." However, by most measures email is one of the most effective communication channels in history. Over 80% of citizen online time in the U.S. is spent using email (Jupiter Research). Email has established an important place in the lives of citizens as it is the preferred form of messaging by all ages except for young teens, who utilize text messages for social communication. Even as social media applications become more popular, nearly all of them are fundamentally dependent on email. If someone requests you as a friend on Facebook® or leaves a comment on your wall, you’ll receive an email notification. If someone makes a connection on LinkedIn®, an email will alert you to this change. If someone chooses to follow you on Twitter®, you will receive yet another email. Citizens cannot remain logged into these applications all day, so services like Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter recognize the value of email in keeping their audiences engaged. So, given email's continued prominence, it should be viewed as one of the key building blocks to creating an audience for your content that you can further engage through a broad range of Web 2.0 and social media tools. Social media and email are actually highly complementary channels with each filling a uniquely different role in engaging citizens. For more information, follow these links to the recent Reach The Public blog posts:
Government Organizations Send Record Email Communications GovDelivery, the world's leading email and digital subscription services provider for the public sector, announced that government organizations sent 118 million emails to the public using the GovDelivery platform in the first month of 2009. This milestone represents a nearly 300% email sending increase since Q1 of 2008. GovDelivery estimates that government will send more than 1.5 billion emails on topics ranging from community events to national health alerts through GovDelivery in 2009. To read the full press release, click here.
Federal News Radio on Leveraging Web 2.0 Technologies in Government-to-Citizen Communication
Click here and scroll to the 2nd story, or stream the audio here.
NEWS & ANALYSIS: Social Butterflies
To read the full article, click here.
GovDelivery CEO Scott Burns Named to Federal Computer Week's Federal 100 List
Read Scott Burns featured profile "Messages through many paths" here. Read the GovDelivery press release announcing the award here. To read the announcement on DorobeInsider.com, click here.
U.S. Food & Drug Administration Relies on Email for Critical Communications
Not just one email though. Up to 5.5 million in a day! Over the course February 2009, the U.S. Food & Drug Administration sent more than 45 million emails through GovDelivery's email and digital subscription management solution. The system confirmed its status as a critical tool for the administration as it was leveraged to keep hundreds of thousands of citizens abreast on new recall information in addition to promoting its recall widget to health related agencies across the country.
Since launching GovDelivery's Email and Digital Subscription Management solution in November 2007, the Food & Drug Administration has achieved a total of 352,000+ subscribers and sent more than 170.3 million emails. For more information on how the FDA handled the peanut recall and the associated increase in website traffic, click here. To read "The peanut recall: From start to end" published in The Star Tribune, click here. Follow this link to sign up for email updates from the U.S. FDA.
Oakland County, MI Launches Email Subscription Service and Offers to Its 61 Municipalities Oakland County, Mich., is now offering email and digital subscription services free of charge to its municipalities to improve communication with its 1.2 million residents and businesses. This first-of-its-kind collaboration was announced by Oakland County Executive L. Brooks Patterson during his State of the County address on Feb. 3, 2009. This service works across all levels of local government and enhances collaboration for better information sharing with the public.
Oakland County is committed to serving its people and communities. Its progressive leadership has vowed to utilize technology in innovative ways to better serve its residents. Included in this mission is to fully leverage www.Oakgov.com to provide better and more efficient government services to its residents. In 2007, the Oakland County website welcomed more than two and a half million visitors, serving approximately nineteen million page views. With so many residents desiring information and county services, Oakland County redesigned its website for a uniform 'look and feel' with standardized websites across all agencies and departments, providing residents with a 'one stop' location for all up-to-date county information and services. Oakland County launched GovDelivery's email and digital subscription management solution on www.Oakgov.com in May 2008 as a way to ensure its residents receive the relevant information they desire. The County has since sent more than 80,000 email notifications of updated information to over 22,500 individual residents. In addition to improved communication with residents, Oakland County has saved an estimated $268,000 on printing & postage costs alone! To read the full press release announcing the County’s expanded partnership with GovDelivery, click here. To read about the unique ways that Oakland County is using GovDelivery, click here. To read a full case study on Oakland County, click here. Oakland County invites you to visit visit their subscription page here to learn more about how the County is using GovDelivery and promoting the service to its municipalities.
New Way to Receive Washington DOT News: GovDelivery
Currently WSDOT is offering more than 145 topics for subscription including news releases, Pierce County traffic news, mountain pass conditions, construction reports and regional monthly updates. The department launched the GovDelivery solution in November 2008 and has since sent more than 1.8 million email updates to nearly 31,500 subscribers. For more information on WSDOT’s implementation of GovDelivery, click here. To sign up for the free service, visit www.wsdot.wa.gov and click on the "Email Updates" link. |
The Federal 100 recognizes individuals from government, industry and academia who significantly influenced how the federal government buys, uses or manages information technology. Federal 100 winners are recognized for their risk-taking, vision and pioneering spirit in the federal IT community.
Hosted by the Wisconsin Chapter of the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials (APCO).
On March 16, 2009 GovDelivery CEO and Co-Founder Scott Burns was a featured guest on Federal News Radio's Daily Debrief with Chris Dorobek as a part of the Meet the Innovators series. Burns discusses the progress that federal government has made in terms of embracing Web 2.0 technologies and how GovDelivery is tracking such trends and adapting its product to allow its clients to capitalize on these technologies. Burns highlights the success that “cutting edge” clients like the CDC and DHS have experienced in fulfilling communication needs by using GovDelivery to leverage multiple communication channels.
A recent article titled Social Butterflies, published by 
The Federal 100 recognizes individuals from government, industry and academia who significantly influenced how the federal government buys, uses or manages information technology. Burns was recognized by FCW's Federal 100 for his leadership in the launch of 
For more information on the award and to view the full list of winners, click 
In February 2009 began one of the largest and most complicated food recalls in recent memory. In fact, within the month more than 3,200 products believed to contain contaminated peanuts had been recalled by more than 280 companies (The Star Tribune). And to think it all began with an email. 
Public communications must be relevant, timely and highly targeted. In response to this reality Washington Department of Transportation (WSDOT) has launched an email and digital subscription service that allows users to choose the information they want to receive. The GovDelivery system has proved an effective solution for managing the more than 70 independent email distribution lists operating prior to launch. It also provides the added benefits of mobile support through short text messages and a personalized subscriber profile, allowing users to change or cancel subscription options at any time.GovDelivery |
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