Best Use of Social for Community Experience – Thirteen Housing Group and Home Group
On 22 October 2025, this year’s Orlo Spotlight Awards were presented as part of our BIG Social event in Birmingham.
Orlo’s Spotlight Awards were created to honour best-in-class public sector teams across a range of categories. The Best Use of Social for Community Experience Award recognises organisations that have transformed their approach to customer contact across social and digital channels to deliver a positive community experience.
Nominated in this category were: Hyde Housing, Staffordshire Fire and Rescue Service, and Thirteen Housing Group and Home Group.
And the winner is… Thirteen Housing Group and Home Group. In a first for Orlo’s Spotlight Awards, Abi Boyd (Thirteen Group) and Aimee Cavener (Home Group) were named joint winners of this year’s coveted award.
Like many industries within the public sector, the housing industry has lost trust with its communities over the past few years. In the case of housing, this is largely due to the following reasons:
- Recent tragedies such as Grenfell and the case of Awaab Ishak, a two-year-old child who died as a result of being exposed to mould in his social housing accommodation.
- Closure of local housing offices.
- Poor maintenance and delayed repairs across the board, causing frustration among communities.
- Digital transformation causing a lack of human connection, coupled with AI scepticism among some residents.
- The wider context of the UK’s housing crisis.
As a sector, it was important to rebuild trust by focusing on transparency and by nurturing human interactions. The housing industry needed to foster a sense of community, and to achieve this it needed its own safe space for housing comms professionals to share both their challenges and wins.
The solution
In the light of this context, public sector digital comms professionals Abi Boyd (Thirteen Group) and Aimee Cavener (Home Group) took the bold decision to create the Digital Comms in Housing Network.
The aims of the network were:
- To unite housing associations to share best practices, address challenges, and enhance customer service through digital channels.
- To foster a supportive space where digital comms colleagues could connect, learn, and innovate together.
Abi and Aimee designed the network to include quarterly meetups, themed workshops, and active online discussions. Initially, the network only included housing associations based in the North of the UK.
The results
The Digital Comms in Housing Network has been a huge success, evidenced by:
- Positive member feedback.
- Impressive engagement metrics.
- Significant growth. It launched as an exclusively northern initiative, and has since expanded nationally. The network currently includes 20 active members from housing associations across the country.
More than “just” talk
The network has not only enabled open dialogue on urgent housing issues, but it has also inspired real community impact. The collaborative environment has empowered several housing associations to adapt and strengthen their digital strategies, resulting in more responsive, community-focused communications.
The network’s collective efforts to build trust and transparency online have boosted the customer voice, increased engagement on platforms across the estate of housing associations, and built trust among its online communities.
In fact, other comms professionals have reached out to Abi and Aimme for advice on establishing similar networks.
Through the Digital Comms in Housing Network, the entire public sector has been shown a fantastic example of how comms professionals can unite to transform digital comms into a tool for real community impact.
The Orlo Spotlight Awards judging panel praised both Abi and Aimee, stating: “Thirteen and Home Group have created a supportive, collaborative community that enables multiple improvements across multiple housing associations, which will lead to a more responsive community-focused approach and help thousands of residents”.
On winning the award, Abi said: “Absolutely thrilled to have won this award… I’m really proud of all our hard work so far, the fact that it’s been recognised is wonderful, a big thank you to all the housing associations that have helped build this network because without them it wouldn’t have been possible.”
Congratulations to Abi and Aimee – our very own ‘A’ Team!
Find out more about the work that Abi and Aimee are doing in their session from Orlo’s UK Tour in Newcastle. Watch their session on demand here.
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