1. Lloyd D. Brown
Director of Communications
American Association of State
Highway and Transportation Officials
How Social Are State DOTs?
The evolution of state DOT social media usage
Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting
Washington, DC
January 13, 2013

2. What we’ll cover
• Overview of the survey
• New tools, old tools
• Changing approach to usage
• Challenges ahead

3. Social media tools
What’s so social about today’s media?
• Facebook
• Twitter
• YouTube
It’s all about the conversation!

5. History of the survey
• AASHTO’s first social media survey of
state DOTs published in 2010.
• 26 states were using Twitter – primarily
relaying road/traffic information
• 14 states used Facebook.
• 7 states had a blog
• 10 states used podcasting

6. It was 1-way outreach in 2010
• Survey respondents said social media was
effective way of reaching an audience
• Every state relied on news releases to
reach media.
• Only two states said they had reduced or
cut other activities to manage social
media.

7. In 2012, the world changes
Good bye old tools, Hello new tools
• 7 states use Pinterest, 4 states use Storify
• Linkedin use cut in half, just 16% use
podcasts
• 1/4th of states have staff dedicated to
social media full time
• 11 states give their employees access to
social media sites at work.

8. Most
used
Social Media Tool Usage social
media
tools

9. 2012 = Engagement
“We used to be very rigid and formal in all our responses.
Now, we're trying to humanize the feed. We post pictures of
ourselves and answer the feed as people (saying I and we)
instead of an agency (DOT says...). It has helped
tremendously and we've received really good public
feedback!”
“We're seeing a slow and steady gain in Twitter and Facebook
followers. We're seeing more and more people asking questions,
sharing comments or airing concerns via these two medium.”

10. Challenges Ahead
Too many tools, not enough time
“Already we are spread kind of thin, so I
anticipate we will have to make a choice at
some point: either we shrink our social
media presence and focus on the most
successful/useful tools, or we hire someone
to manage all of them full time.”

11. Challenges Ahead
Employee access
Does the policy allow employees
Does your organization have a agency wide to access social
social media policy? media sites and tools?
4.8%
2.4% 7.1%
26.2%
28.6%
66.7%
64.3%
Yes No Not Sure Yes No Not Sure No Response

12. Putting social media to work
2011 focus groups & interviews reported
state DOTs barriers to implementation:
• Organizational culture
• Budgets
• Legal concerns

13. Looking ahead at 2013
• Social media emerging as public
involvement tool.
• A social media is standard tool. Focus now
is on best practices, staffing, access to
tools.
• And …

14. In 2013 it’s all about MOBILE!
• 85% of U.S. adults own a
cell phone.
• At least 25% own tablets
(pre-holiday season)
This leads to:
 "Just in Time"
information searches
 Massive downloads of
data/apps

15. Where are the eyeballs?
‘Consumers downloaded a
record 1.76 billion apps
between Christmas and New
Year’s Eve 2012.’
http://gigaom.com/mobile/app-downloads-hit-record-1-76-billion-over-holiday-week/

16. Note the growth in
tablet computer
ownership

17. Conclusion
• State DOTs are actively using social
media tools
• The way in which those tools are used is
evolving
• There are challenges ahead
• Mobile media is significant influence on
the choice of tools and their application

18. How Social Are State DOTs?
The evolution of state DOT social media usage
Contact:
Lloyd D. Brown, Director of Communications
American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials
(202) 624-5802 office
(202) 677-5811 cell
lbrown@aashto.org
4/26/2012 18