The term 'community managers' is used in this guide to refer to anyone acting in this capacity to moderate the NSW Government social media channels.
On this page:
- Expectations for Community Management
- Community Guidelines
- Escalation Guide
- Risk Impact
- When to engage, hide, delete or block
Purpose of this document
The purpose of this document is to provide guidance on community management for the NSW Government social media channels.
Tools
The NSW Government has three social media channels, Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn.
Expectations for Community Management
The NSW Government is legally responsible for all comments left on owned social media channels/posts under defamation law. This may expose us to liability for damages caused by comments made from the community, which is why every comment left on our posts or page must be reviewed in a timely manner.
All posts and ads published by the NSW Government require monitoring. A third-party program, Khoros Care, is used to pull all commentary through so the team can ensure:
- questions are responded to
- inappropriate comments or misinformation that do not meet our community rules are hidden or removed
- any emerging issues or trends are flagged with the relevant teams or agencies.
To do this, there are rules that the community manager must adhere to:
- we respond to all legitimate questions in a timely and tonally appropriate manner
- we try to respond as soon as we can, but the usual timeframe is within 1-3 business days
- we respond between 8am-8pm Monday-Friday
There are some questions that may not be appropriate for NSW Government to answer, including:
- questions regarding embargoed or sensitive issues
- questions of a political nature
- comments where users are venting, being sarcastic or directing questions to their friends.
The guidelines outlined above apply to community management, but there are some additional considerations:
- it is important to be sensitive to the needs of individuals when they ask questions. Do not dismiss a query before qualifying a response and ensure responses are tailored to the needs of the individual
- some people may be angry with the NSW Government or misunderstand the NSW Government’s role in issues. Being straightforward when managing queries and disgruntled citizens is important
- be authentic in the delivery with a human-centric focus
- ensure all community managers are familiar with Khoros Care to avoid missed comments or issues. Please reach out to the social media team who can provide a Khoros Care guides or training.
Community Guidelines
Our community guidelines exist to keep our community and community managers safe. The guidelines are publicly available on the NSW Government Instagram, Facebook and LinkedIn page.
Moderating Culturally Diverse and In-language Comments
People from culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) backgrounds, including newly arrived, long-standing communities, and refugees, are entitled to access their government, regardless of the language they speak.
That’s why agencies who run advertising campaigns on our channels are required to engage in-language moderators for all CALD ads on NSW Gov social channels. Ensure your campaign is prepared for CALD comments through:
- engaging an external agency such as OMD, or speaking with Multicultural NSW about working with NAATI (National Accreditation Authority for Translators and Interpreters) certified professionals
- having translated and approved FAQs, fact sheets, translated comments, and links to translated assets ready to anticipate questions from the community
- ensuring that all in-language moderators adhere to our Community Management guidelines such as checking social ads every business day and responding to all legitimate questions within 1-3 business days
- monitoring the engagement to see if you need to develop more assets and/or resources to respond to audiences
- being responsible as the go-to contact for in-language moderators to approve responses before they are translated
- avoiding using automation tools in your response without checking the translation past a certified professional.
This service will incur a cost. For some agencies this may be taken from their overall campaign budget.
You will need to advise the NSW Government social media team once this has been set up before CALD ads can run on the whole-of-government channels.
Tone of Voice
Responses to the community should be friendly, helpful and informative. The main goals are to provide transparency, a positive experience and build trust with our audience. The tone of voice on social media is:
- authoritative: We take an evidence-based approach, using facts and statistics where applicable to back up our decisions.
- transparent: We are reliable and informative, using open, honest language. We aim to be as helpful as possible by sourcing requested information from other gov agencies when necessary.
- inclusive: We are unbiased and apolitical, drawing our audience into the conversation by using active voice, their name and the first and second person (‘we’ and ‘you’, but not ‘I’). While we can have a persona and be personable, our social presence cannot be linked to an individual.
- encouraging: We are warm and inviting, using supportive, inspiring and simple language. We are invited to use emojis where appropriate.
Our key principles
- keep language simple and engaging
- use friendly, encouraging and supportive language
- establish an emotional connection with our audience
- use short, sharp sentences to create impact quickly
- use a combination of first-person plural (‘we’ and ‘our’) and second person singular (‘you’)
- use an active voice
- use contractions (‘that’s’, ‘where’d’, ‘you’re’, ‘can’t’)
- use colloquial expressions when appropriate (that will not offend) but avoid buzzwords and clichés
- use humour and have fun with language through puns, idioms or pop culture references where appropriate
- apply correct grammar and punctuation without being too formal (the use of an emoji can replace a period).
Do
- acknowledge the user by name
- respond in plain English (the response should be understood by anyone reading the comment, including children)
- be respectful, friendly and helpful
- provide a value-exchange
- engage with positive feedback or commentary with a react or response
- correct misinformation in your answers.
Don't
- be arrogant, sarcastic, disrespectful or unhelpful in your response
- link to PDFs or websites for people to find the answer themselves (always provide the answer, and you can link out to more info if necessary)
- hide or delete a comment or question just because it is negative (if it doesn't breach our community guidelines). We welcome all opinions on our page, including negative ones
- respond to questions that are antagonistic or someone trying to provoke a reaction
- use stats if they are not relevant or helpful
- block people or delete comments before checking with the Social Media team first
General structure of answers
- address by name
- address the comment/question the user made
- provide answer or consolation
- provide statistics/back up with justification
- conclusion – either link out (should be government websites only), provide a CTA or thank them for sharing with us.
Example:
Things we do respond to
- genuine questions
- some sarcastic questions/misinformation that we can correct/provide more info on
- complaints where we can address/provide more info
- positive comments
- funny comments (we can give witty answers or use clever gifs).
What we don’t address
- abusive/profane comments (hide)
- misinformation that we can’t address (hide)
- complaints that we have no answer to/advised not to respond by the lead agency
- simple negative answers such as 'no' or 'no thanks'
- friends tagging friends or addressing questions to others.
Emojis, GIFs, memes and humour
The use of emojis, GIFs, memes and humour is welcome where it’s appropriate to inject some personality and build community. Tone of voice and empathy should always be considered before responding.
Escalation Guide
Community Management Escalations
It’s important to remember that the NSW Government channels exists to serve the public, and as such should facilitate a safe, inclusive and open forum for community discussion. If a community manager sees a comment they're unsure about, ask one of our social media advisors for advice.
Mental Health
This is a difficult area of community management so there’s no expectation to moderate anything the community manager is uncomfortable with.
Escalate comments to the NSW Government Social Media team immediately that are deemed:
- self-harm in nature
- potentially dangerous to others.
It’s important to approach this topic with a sense of realistic expectations – ‘What can we do to help?’. Does the individual require support, are they frustrated by a previous experience or concerned for a family member or friend? Read the comment carefully, draft a response, making sure the reply is tailored to the individual.
Please check the drafted response past the NSW Government Social Media Team. When drafting a response, remember to consider:
- customers in distressing situations are typically looking for a quick and easy resolution. Community managers should show compassion and keep a positive position. Ensure language is kept simple and clear
- try to minimise the wait time or the need for a customer to search through our website for information (where possible do the back work for the customer). Communicate clear expectations and never set a deadline that cannot be fulfilled. Send a warm referral to the appropriate department (if needed) for immediate action.
Community managers are not likely to be doctors or qualified to provide mental health support; they can encourage the community to seek assistance that best suits their needs mentioned in their comment.
Complaints / Compliments
Complaints do not always need to be escalated and can be marked with the appropriate tag for reporting purposes. EG: complaints on a ‘Have your say’ post can be tagged with Consultation Feedback which is then picked up through monthly reports and shared. Compliments can be forwarded to the appropriate department, team member or manager via email. If unsure on the correct contact, raise the comment with a direct report or a social media team.
When to call Emergency Services
Please escalate comments the NSW Government Social Media Team that threatens the safety of the community manager and the community. Emergency services should be contacted when:
- a real threat has been made to the safety of a community manager, colleagues, or the community
- posts where illegal activity has been shared and can pose risk to the community
- comments suggesting a user is in real danger or life-threatening situation.
What to do in a real-life crisis
In the event of a siege or hostage situation, a mass outage of services or infrastructure, virus outbreak or an adverse weather event, please refer to the social media team for advice.
Risk Impact
Identifying potential risks is an important role of community management. It’s critical that community managers understand how risks are ranked and evaluated and who to escalate potential threats to.
The below table identifies the three types of impacts and provides examples for each severity level, from negligible to high. For low to high risk, best practice is to escalate to a social media advisor for guidance.
When to engage, hide, delete or block
All opinions are welcome on NSW Gov channels, including negative ones. In most cases, negative comments shouldn't be deleted or hidden. Instead, we should acknowledge the commenter and find opportunities to engage. However, it is the responsibility of the community manager to ensure a safe experience for the community. This means there are circumstances where comments should be hidden or deleted, including when there is a clear breach of our community guidelines, or when a community member should be banned from the NSW Gov channels.
When to engage
People are increasingly turning to social media as an accessible and transparent way to access information from the government. The community manager can provide easy to understand information, correct misinformation, bridge cultural and access barriers and build trust and relationships with the communities we serve.
The community managers will respond to legitimate questions, positive feedback or commentary and opportunities to correct misinformation, resolve problems or reinforce government values.
When not to engage
Not every comment or enquiry warrants a response. Many social media users turn to the comments section to vent frustrations, share opinions and tag friends. Unless an opportunity to correct misinformation or resolve a problem is identified, the community manager will not respond to:
- comments that breach community rules
- irrelevant or misguided comments or questions
- questions or comments of a political nature
- comments where users are venting, being sarcastic or directing questions at someone else.
When to hide
When a comment is hidden, the person who made the comment and their friends can still see it. Hiding a comment mitigates risk of agitating its author while keeping the community safe from potentially harmful or offensive content. Please keep in mind that it is possible for an author to find out their comment has been hidden (EG: if they have multiple accounts), so it must be done with care. Comments will not be hidden simply because they are negative or because the community manager doesn’t wish to respond. Comments will be hidden when they:
- breach community guidelines
- promote misinformation that may cause harm
- are duplicated
- are spam
- pose reputational risk to the department or NSW Government
- swearing and use of profanity, even when misspelt
If a customer needs assistance and their comment has been hidden for breaching the above criteria, please keep the comment hidden and still reply. The author of the comment will still be able to see the response.
Comments can only be hidden on Facebook; this feature is not available on Instagram and LinkedIn. This feature may not be available for all community managers, so please seek advice from the NSW Government Social Media Team if you think a comment needs to be hidden or deleted.
When to delete
Deleting comments is a last resort action when dealing with comments that breach the community guidelines. No comment should be removed without approval from the NSW Government Social Media Team.
Once a comment is deleted, it can’t be seen again. Prior to deleting the comments, make sure to record it and include the following details:
- a screenshot of the comment
- the date it was deleted
- link of the post the comment belonged to
- reason for deletion.
If a community member questions why their comment has been removed, the community manager is to respond honestly and explain the breach in community guidelines.
When to block
For the safety of the NSW Government community and the community management team, users who breach the community guidelines or threaten harmful behaviour more than once should be blocked. If a community manager deems someone should be blocked, please speak with the social media team about issuing a warning message to the community member or if blocking is required.
Need any more help?
If you have any questions, or require assistance with anything mentioned on this article, submit a request via the webform.