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Event ID: 2068454
Event Started: 1/9/2013 7:00:00 PM ----------
Please stand by for realtime captions. >> Good afternoon, everyone. We will be starting
shortly. If you're having technical difficulties, please called go to webinar, 1800 -- -- select
option two. Option one and then optionone.hen option one.
>> Please stand by for realtime captions. >> Hi, everyone and welcome to our session
of social media through Digital Gov University I am -- with GSA innovative technology. We
have what will be a fantastic webinar for you today. This is a continuation of our shorter
format. It is important that when you get a feedback card, please fill it out. Today
we are going to Social Media: You Still Need Plain Language. We know what much of the content
you do is socially accessible, many times people can write like a teenager. Shrinking
things, making it obscure and it hard to get your message out. We have today Katherine
Spivey who is working in plain language here at GSA. She was is an active member and trainer
for the plane action network also known as playing. She it teaches plain language courses.
She's going to go through the next 20 minutes and show you examples of how to write the
content the right way and also also tell you -- it is now the law. There is Katherine Spivey.
>> Think so much, Justin. This is a Katherine Spivey talking about plain language in social
media. What I am going to do is as you know, we have a big topic and lots of examples,
is go through principles and techniques. And start showing you slides pages like webpages
places I have seen plain language and action or sadly not in action. So again, here we
are, we are having a little difficulties with the page advancing. Okay.
>> I reminder before we get going that if you have questions which we hope that you
will, or comments, you can load them in their webinar and at the end we will get to as many
as we can. Once again here is Catherine. >> What we will be covering is how social
media in plain language intersect and why. If you are responsible for your social media,
you will get a quick update on plain writing principles, the best practices and strategies
and tactics for writing in plain language. To start with, the question is always, what
is plain language? Plain language is a style of writing that allows readers or viewers
to quickly find find what they need to understand what they read or hear and use what they read
to fulfill their needs the first time dead reader hears or what they read and hear because
one of the things social media channels for us and the government is You Tube. It's important
to get plain language into video as well. The techniques we will be covering today are
reader centric organization, design features, short sentences and paragraphs, using pronouns.
You, we, and others. Using active voicefocusing on verbs, not nouns. Using consistent terms
and not jargon or acronyms and using more common, everyday words. These are basic plain
language. Some things with Twitter, you don't have to worry about headers or tables or bullets.
And not all of these principles will apply to all essential media channels. These are
important basics to remember. What is -- why do we have plain language? The president signed
theplate rack -- the plain writing act of 2010 and that mandates that all new government
documents that meets criteria is democratic year it must be written in plain language
by October 13, 2011. The essence of this is is this external facing material material
that is destined for internal use, this does not affected by the plain writing act so -- -- documents
that provide information about federal benefits or services and documents that explain to
the public how to comply with the federal requirement. This applies to both paper and
electronic letters of the patients forms notices and instructions and since we are reaching
the public, the external public debt is citizens and other employees of the federal agencies,
it applies to social media. One of the first things to consider this by ider this by reducing
headings? I would like to flip over, I'm sorry I know this is going to be a lot of back and
forth and I will make sure that you don't get to see sick when I move back and forth.
These are just some of the items I found that worked. Here we go. And here. Here is one
of the GSGSA blogs. We have a couple of headers here. She is a sharesinitial lessons learned.
We have bullets, the top five ideas that really helps people to figure out where things are
going. Another similar blog and I should interject here that this is webinar will be recorded
and transcript and the PowerPoint deck placed on how to.gov in the next couple of days or
weeks. You don't have to be writing down everything were trying to capture the slides timesharing
or the links on sharing. This is another blog for showing headers, tables and bullets. What
we have is IT and change management. Yousee these headers, GSA balancing change and engagement,
allows you to scan. You don't have to read everything in the blog. That is very important
because we found that what people do on line tablets smart phones whatever, we can't guarantee
that they are going to focus on every particular page in particular line. Another thing that
I want to emphasize although it doesn't necessarily fall into the design features that is just
headers, bullets and headers, you notice in the bottom, where it says I will also be the
annual GSA training conference, that is a little note just to reinforce issue of engagement
to say I'm going to be there, try to touch base with me there. That is a very good thing
to try and do to get people notices of where you are going to be. Briefly back to the deck.
The nextthing is using lists. I show you some of the list and some of the blogs. It makes
it easier for people to to identify things that are working for example, use numbers
for stuff that is in the process. Some things that could be followed, use numbers for that.
And add blank space so people could read it so they are not trying to absorb everything
in one chunk. Another element is to use short paragraphs or sentences because it they are
easier to digest and scan and easier on the smart phone. We find more and people are accessing
social media on smart phones. Here are some of the things I had for that. One of these
are here is what we have -- what we have is something that is not follow the rules. Except
that these are presented as the 12 facts and who wants to count all the bullets to make
sure that the 12. Here are the 12 facts of HS PD -- 12. Inthe paragraphs aragraphs are
short. They are easy to scan and get all information leading to the information about the 12 facts
of HS PD 12. There's engagement also at the end like in the previous blog. New paragraph
begins while I think this would do very well as a holiday song, you know that is reaching
out to the reader say I am hoping this clarify some things. There's also going back to ITEN
change management, and the IT workplace in the federal workplace, we have shorter paragraphs
up at the top. They could be shorter.That is almost always a case. It is just a matter
of getting used to writing shorter paragraphs and sentences. I know people like to develop
thoughts, but they have to sort of adapt to the medium and that is certainly something
we are doing. Another element here inplain language. It's using shorter sentences. That
is one of the things that will reduce a lot of words in your social media. Also using
pronouns such as we, for the agency or I, those help speak directly to the readers.
Make sure you writing relevant requires a lot less work from your readers. It also helps
you -- what do all those things we want to do. Althoughsince we saw that is going back
to this particular one. This is the IT and change in the federal workplace, sorry, IT
and change management and the federal workplace. It starts out that now I asked when you're
in light writing the blog, it gives you personal tone and gives you a relationship with it,
she continues under benefits of workplace innovation, we are beginning another technology
change. There'snothing wrong with using pronouns in social media because it sort of a perfect
medium for it. You're trying to establish a relationship. Not trying to make it a press
release, you want people to read it. Using pronouns is allowed.Allows people to do that.
Incidentally, also easier to write and establishes a conversational tone we want in blogs and
other social media technologies. Anotherelements that we have is active for lease. And active
voice is clear, concise and direct. Assess voiceis a characteristic of bureaucratese
which we do that one tended website and we don't want in our social media. We are usingfrom
federal agency. And theperfect passive voice were mistakes were made. Nobody knows who
made them they sort of happened, who knows where they came from. And active and passive
voice, and passive voice the person doing the action follows the verb. Your readers
has disentangle each sentence and passive voice and figure out what's actually going
on. Avoiding passive voice is better here is a very good example that I found from homeland
security that talks about New York city one month after Sandy. This is a veryparticular
blog post that starts with, I'm a native New Yorker. I was born in New York City. Theseare
programs. Active voice. I am, I was, I grew up in the city, I am a proud New Yorker. I'm
honored to be in the team. That gives you a really straightforward story that you can
tell. That really helps the reader engage with everything. Also, our next point is -- rescuing
hit -- hitting birds. Don't on't sound bureaucratic. To limit jargon and macro to afternoon, use
acronyms and in everyday words. I would admit that I personally admit apostrophes if I'm
texting my friend. I'm always in real tweets. I'm very carefulto keep all those grammar
and points. I will abbreviate somethings like management of government, but I try to stay
grammatical because it can really affects people who -- One of the problems I've seen also is sometimes
jargon, -- see if I could find that that link again. One of the things I saw the recent
blog was something -- number 12. Please engage us in dialogue. That isjargon. It will be
better to have written, please contact us, please help us, get in touch with us, rather
than engage us in dialogue. That doesn't really take us particularly anywhere. Anothergood
focus on that on firms verbs and consistent terms right here, another DHS, cyber Monday
don't let the Grinch steal your holiday spirit or passwords. These are very verb, using a
lot of verbs. Protect your dollars, use a credit card check statement, check policies.
Keep your operatingsystem etc. up-to-date. Does all of those things are really good.
People need this information. This is -- that they understand. Theydon't think too hard
to follow it. Going back to the plain language principle. There's a difference between necessary
jargon that his audience words that the audience will understand and obscure or potential pretentious
language. Another way to sort of cut things and you would've seen this everywhere, in
all the examples, if you're going to talk about your agency, you are allowed to say
we. We might need to revise your style guide to include this. Don't use acronyms, abbreviations
or alphabet soup. You can try another style,try to make them pronounceable. You can use contractions.
They are perfectly grammatical. You mayhave to abbreviate it. Dealingwith Twitter 140
characters. They are shorter. They will give you the edge in social media that will give
you the space you need. It will help you be able to address people's expectations and
not only -- where they are, but speak the language what cut that -- that your customers
speak. We have a couple of things about Twitter. It's really hard to go to Long Island Twitter
because you have a limit of 140 characters. There are so many tweets per day, it is very
difficult to have your own tweet stand up. If you're trying to reinforce your brand,
it is a good idea to link if there's a call for action if you want people to do something.
Link to a webpage or a photo. So you can meet your readers expectations. Use hash tags.
And put your link early in the sentence to avoid losing people. For example, here are
some good tweets from GSA ITS. One problem is these are the two did having the link at
the end if you have the linked in and then you try to read re tweet, you might break
your link and people can go ahead and actually get to the page they do you want them to get.
One of the best practices is to put them up earlier in the page. That is a small point,
but it allows you to maximize the value that you have. Another one in Facebook. I'm not
sure if I can find an example on this. How long -- if you post something they will cut
you off at some point and say you have to get more or see more. If you can, keep it
short, add a link, add a video as you and your photos. Blogs, if your goal is engagement
and feedback and comments, keep it as short as possible and you might even want to follow
-- his blog models very short. Very short blog. Barely more than a paragraphor a couple
sentences. And YouTube, you are dealing with a question of people have to sit and listen
to everything, they want to get to the point and it will help with transcriptions and accessibility
and all those points. So we have resources, how t o.gov/training, on-demand webinars on
plain language and social media. You can look at the language.gov which is a website for
the plain language action and information network. We have any questions?
>> We do. Before we get that that was incredible, you were right at 20 minutes long. That was
perfect. Thank you so much for that info. We have over 250 people. We are getting to
this question, noticeably tentative question. The first thing is US geological survey makes
a point, -- if people -- -- and a Facebook post, use more.
>> Excellent, thank you so much Scott. Something to remember when creating content. We can
verify the number. The? We got to, from Scott, geological survey, is is there any effort
to build of -- plain language question. >> Is there an effort to put going to the
ATI or extension for Dreamweaver or word, so that some some language can be auto change
to plain language much like we spell check in word, but APL check.
>> Scott, I am honored with your question, believe me. That soundslike our hoops -- button
on the keyboard which will do the same thing, and simply language. I do not know if anything
in development, I will put that out it to my network to see if anyone knows if there
is. I think that sort of stuff -- suffering the same space it's a lot of software companies.
You actually have to know some things about writing in plain language before you can make
the decision. The software or the API, what have you, raises a question. A person still
needs to intervene. I would love there that to be a giant button on the keyboard that
has instant plain because I would be hammering that.
>> You have to have a button that says instant viral content as well. I would like that.
Thank you very much. Of course the idea and thought, Scott. You don't have any more questions
at this point. Take you again Catherine. It goes toshow that -- for everyone in the -- right
now we will be doing a blog post we recapping the post a recording of the webinar online
and we will let you know when that comes out. In the meantime, check out how to.gov and
visit their retraining and you will see a lot of material on plain language and all
the other social government stuff that is we have and have and as always, check out
the digital of blog that we haven't some of the programs, in the meantime thank you for
joining us remember to fill out the feedback forms. Have a great day.
>> Thanks so much. >> [ Event Concluded ]
>>