1. Just do it! Facebook for community engagement
Tom Gaskin, Senior Resident Engagement Advisor

2. Paper Mill Yard Facebook group
 New build, mixture of privately owned/rented, general needs and shared
ownership
 Limited opportunities to form relationships with residents
 Lots of shared problems e.g. parking, poor TV reception, vandalism,
cleaning, security etc
 Third party managing agent weren't very responsive
 Setup a community Facebook group
 Informal alternative to residents’ association
 Communicate with residents and share experiences – ‘moans and groans’
 Setup in an hour, promoted with flyers
 Within 3 days, group had over 40 members representing 23% of the
development

4. Discussions
 Parking
 Poor TV reception
 Anti social behavior
 Bike theft
 Drug dealing
 Service charges
 Flexible
 Comment at any
time
 Regular
contributors / lurkers

6. Multimedia – high impact / evidence

8. Lobbying tool

9. Missed opportunity
 Staff observed discussions but didn’t engage
 Residents began to get frustrated with lack of progress
 Organisations requested summaries of key issues
 Dealt with through traditional methods
 Very time consuming
 Meetings with housing association and managing agent
 Report back to residents via group

10. Community benefits

11. Outcomes
 Managing agent went into administration
 New agent appointed
 Facebook group helped raise awareness of key issues
 Issues promptly resolved e.g. new security measures, parking policy
 Much nicer place to live
 Rebuilding the development’s reputation
 Requests to delete group - Group went private
 Facebook changes meant residents had to rejoin
 Less moans… less conversations

12. Key learning
 Go to where your residents are and adapt – don’t try and move them
 Engage on their terms – online outreach
 Need organisational buy in, policy, strategy, staff training
 Support residents to manage online communities – develop skills and
promote resources available e.g. funding for promotional materials, meeting
venues
 Consider adapting processes – customer feedback, complaints, repair
requests
 Conversations wouldn’t have worked on a corporate / organisational page
 Joint approach - Engage partners and internal teams e.g. neighbourhoods,
communications

13. Larner Road Regeneration

14. Larner Road
 622 flats, almost all in tower blocks
 Poor local reputation, partly justified
 Difficult and expensive to manage
Approach
 Move everyone out
 Demolish
 Rebuild –mainly family homes
 Build a sense of pride
 Let everyone else know – Larner
Road is changing
© Copyright Nigel Cox and licensed for reuse
under this Creative Commons Licence

15. Purpose
 Involve people who don’t come to meetings
 Share information
 Squash rumours
 Residents, neighbours and other community stakeholders
 Honesty and respect
 Building Trust
 Genuine dialogue
 Reduce any opposition
 Minimise distress
 Build positive enthusiasm and support

16. Options
Twitter
 Too abrupt for building relationships and showing empathy
Blog (Posterous)
 Orbit would have more control but would have to be more proactive with
content.
 Residents need to make the effort to find it
Facebook
 Residents are already using it daily.
 More democratic

17. Facebook page
 167 likes
 Basic design
 No custom URL
 Combination of page
and staff posts
Reach
 70% female
 Good age spread
 33% aged 25-34
 3% - aged 55-64

18. Practicalities
 Admins need professional Facebook accounts
 Don’t accept friends!
 Post as self
 Open or closed?
 Monitoring out of hours
 Which staff?
 Who would you send to address a resident meeting?
 Training and support
 Time – it may be more effective than meetings
 Executive support

19. Style
 It’s a conversation
 Good-humoured but not flippant
Like a resident meeting but
 It’s conducted in public
 There’s a record
 Press can see it
However
 There is time to think (use it)
 You can ignore people
 You can delete offensive posts

20. Etiquette
 Courtesy and respect
 You can complain
 You can’t insult individuals or be racist etc
 You should try to focus on what you want to happen
Why people are rude…
 Anxiety
 Inarticulacy
 Drink
 Playing to the audience

21. Dealing with inappropriate comments
 Empathy
 Modelling good humoured responses
 Challenging – suggesting alternatives (either in public or private)
 Deleting – always say you’ve deleted and why. Can invite to resubmit
another version
 Banning (last resort)
 Unless really offensive or a persistent offender, we tend not to delete. It
stands, with our response, as a example to other users of the standards we
expect

23. Orbit South Bexley Facebook page
 Neighbourhood area page
 Closed page
 Building staff confidence
 Community notice board
 Events, information and
advice
 Local courses
 Warm Home Discount
scheme
 Welfare reform
 Celebrating success –
granted Injunction

24. Debate
 How do you decide the best approach for your organisation and residents?
 How local can you go?
 How do you find and engage residents who are active online?
 How important are page likes? How do you measure success?
 Is it best to engage as the organisation or as an individual?
 How do you maintain professional boundaries?
 How can we share resources?

25. Contact
Tom Gaskin
Senior Resident Engagement Advisor, Orbit East and South
Tel: 01603 283326
Email tom.gaskin@orbit.org.uk
Twitter: @tomgaskin
Web:
www.orbiteast.org.uk www.orbitsouth.org.uk
Involved Residents’ blogs:
www.oeinvolvedresidents.org www.osinvolvedresidents.org