Manuel's being what Manuel's is, I ran into City Councilman Kwanza Hall Monday night and was able to ask him some questions on how he uses Facebook. For those not in Atlanta, Manuel's is our local Democratic watering hole, a real institution here. Portraits of past politicians adorn the walls and you can very easily be there for a meeting any given night of the week, and run into other political friends who are there for another meeting.
Anyway, as noted at the end of an earlier post, Engage your Constituents - A Facebook Primer, I had planned on writing about Councilman Hall, but just hadn't gotten around to calling him. So running into him Monday night made it a tad easier.
I've been watching his Facebook activity with interest, and have even heard constituents comment on it. One that comes to mind was a friend who said to him, "I feel like I'm living vicariously through you, it's fun!"
And fun is the word that Councilman Hall used. When I talked to him Monday, he said that he was "just having fun, it's not official."
So what is he doing? Mostly he utilizes Facebook's Mobile Platform to upload photos of various events he's attending. You can see on this mini-feed that he posts photos pretty regularly:
Occasionally he'll also use his phone to give status updates. Here's an example of some Mobile status updates:
So why I'm I highlighting Councilman Hall? I think he's doing a good job of engaging his constituents (downtown Atlanta) via Facebook. In my earlier post, Engage your Constituents - A Facebook Primer, I talk about how you as a politician can set up your profile, but you should not stop there. Just having your profile available for people to friend does not utilize the power of Facebook and you'll fail at what you're trying to accomplish. You want to "connect" socially via this medium with people who will vote for you. The key to having people feel a connection to you is to have your name pop up in your friends' News Feed and you can't do that if you do not "do" anything on Facebook. A great way to accomplish this is to do what Councilman Hall is doing: mini-documenting his political activities using his cell phone.
To start sending photos, you'll need to first make sure your phone can send MMS texts. If it can, send a photo to mobile@facebook.com. You'll get a little snippet of code back. Go to http://www.facebook.com/mobile/?uploads and click on the link that says "Enter Confirmation a Code" and input what they sent. Now Facebook knows that photo came from you, so from here on out, when you snap a picture just send it to mobile@facebook.com (you won't have to do the code thing again) and it's instantly posted to your profile!
To update your status, follow the instructions here: http://www.facebook.com/mobile/?texts. Basically once Facebook has confirmed your cell, you can just send a text to FBOOK (32665) using the commands on that page. So if I wanted to update my status to "Angela Trigg is writing a blog topic on Kwanza Hall", all I'd have to do is send this:
@ is writing a blog topic on Kwanza Hall
to 32665. Notice I left my name out, as Facebook will put that in.
And keep this advice in mind from Councilman Hall: "Don't take it too seriously!"
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