Dorsetforyou

dorsetforyou.gov.uk consists of 7 separate councils and manages a total of 57 social accounts, covering everything from tourist information centres to corporate accounts. residents across dorset contact them via social media regarding a wide variety of topics. as this contact channel quickly grew, the dorsetforyou team began to feel the pressure of meeting increasing expectations. they were also unable to benchmark and refine their communications due to a lack of analytical data.

dorsetforyou had been managing their social channels using free tools and accessing accounts natively with shared logins, but this approach did not deliver the visibility, control and joined-up data they needed. susannah crossland, content designer at dorsetforyou, said, “i was having to respond to customer queries for our multiple councils, but from a central position – meaning it took me longer to provide informed responses as i didn’t have sight of what was going on at a local level. with resident’s expectations and enquiries continuing to grow, we all knew that we had to find a better way.”

susannah was charged with sourcing a new social media management tool, her main challenge was finding a solution that would enable individual councils access to their own social channels – while she still maintained central control and visibility. as dorsetforyou is a public body, they couldn’t risk any potential damage to their reputation, but in order to offer a better social customer service it was essential that local staff could communicate directly with residents. they needed to find a solution that would enable them to stay protected online, with clear audit trails and flexible permission settings. any tool must also provide them with a better way to manage their public relations and marketing efforts.

when evaluating various social media management platforms, susannah struggled to identify a solution that fitted all of their needs within their budget. susannah said, “when we first discovered Orlo we realised that it possessed several features that would really simplify our social customer service processes, such as the ability to assign social messages to other users or departments, and even email messages to staff members without access to the platform.

their platform had everything that we needed and we especially liked their partnership approach, ensuring that the platform constantly evolves based on our feedback. they are a young, passionate and energetic team who are very responsive to changing customer trends, which really appealed to us as we wanted a future-proofed solution that would adapt as technology progresses.”

since partnering with Orlo, dorsetforyou has been able to significantly grow their followers and reach, granting access to multiple councils and departments to dramatically improve their “local” social customer service. where customer services have taken over answering social enquiries they have seen response times fall from days to just 12 minutes. kelly polley, a customer service operations manager, said, “we now focus heavily on our digital channels and are increasing resources in this area, we have also restructured and renamed departments and roles in line with this.

this is enabling us to reduce contacts through traditional channels and increase contacts through digital channels, making savings for our organisation. we are establishing social media as more than just a communications outpost tool, but as a conversation tool. a way to build new friendships, strengthen current relationships and generate additional awareness around our activities and services.”