The runaway campaign (part 1)

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Age Aid - four weeks later

 Joan, Chief Executive of Age Aid arrives at the fortnightly team meeting in a bad mood. "Have you all seen the headline of today's Millcaster Mercury? It says 'Swine Flu Panic Sweeps Millcaster' and they’re virtually accusing us of spreading paranoia!" Everyone in the meeting explodes with questions while Joan reads aloud the full article.

"Maybe they just wanted to stir things up a bit," suggests Pam. "Headlines about swine flu sell more papers than ‘Age Aid says Befriend the Elderly’. Swine flu is the big story at the moment." Everyone agrees. They are sure that they are doing the right thing despite the negative coverage.

Joan tries to get the meeting back ontrack. "It's been four weeks since we launched the befriending campaign, let's take stock of where we are. We know befriending is catching on. Elise and Grace at the luncheon club told Barbara that people in their streets have been making a special effort to pop in and see them. Raymond even reported that some local school children stopped to ask him about what he did in the war. It’s really helping build community.

"So, well done everyone. This was a team effort and I know that you all put in 110%. And the wonderful enewsletter and TV and radio coverage have really worked to get the message across."

Swine flu campaign

Joan continued, "as you all know, last week we agreed to change tack slightly. We have a duty of care to our older people during winter and it’s up to us to make sure they know about swine flu and swine flu friends. Gary, can you update us on the flu situation in Millcaster, please?", asks Joan.

"Right-o. No cases reported so far, just a couple of runny noses. But, the latest NHS advice is still that people should find 'flu friends'. So, us re-titling the befriending campaign to 'Find a Friend' is spot on. Get local people to check that their older neighbours are ok and if they should get swine flu, volunteer to be the person who will pick up medication and supplies for them.  He smiles. ‘Keep the swines out of Millcaster, mm?!"

"Er, yes, thanks Gary." Joan secretly thought that Gary was enjoying the drama of the pandemic a bit too much. "Emily, what are we doing to get the message out there?"

"Well, the usual stuff of leaflets and talking to people at the Centre. The helpline staff have been briefed and there is a page on our website. Some of the older people have buddies already and others are on the case. We just need to get the town to connect with them,’’ says Emily.

"The latest thing is something Will and Geoff, our IT trainer have set up. They've started a new online forum called MillChat where locals can talk to each other about swine flu and alert their friend if they need something. They've also set up a Twitter profile, @ageaidswine, to pass on the latest updates about the virus. It is going well so far. Local people are starting to use the forums and the old people are using both in their IT classes. It's really bringing people together."

"Great stuff," says Joan, who is new to social media and not convinced that her older people get it either. "But this is what the Mercury have jumped on. They're saying that we're spreading panic when actually all we're trying to do is get the message across. Have there been any problems with the forum? Who is 'doing twitter'? Are we sure we are passing on the right information? Has anyone heard anyone saying anything negative about what we're trying to do?" Joan was now becoming increasingly worried that indeed they might be making the situation worse, afterall. She has so many worries buzzing round her head.

"I have been keeping an eye on it with Will," says Emily, taking her usual role of reassuring her colleagues about IT. "On the forums people have been talking about vaccines, whether its ok to eat pork scratchings and whether they should cancel the jumble sale. Nothing surprising there. Oh, there was one unfortunate posting where 'WarHero' was making suggestive comments to 'GlamGran' about spreading the virus, but I removed that one. Our Twitter updates come directly from the NHS and the local GP is keeping an eye on discussions. We're doing all we can to make sure the right information is out there."

Joan looks relieved. She is confident that Emily knows what she is talking about, although is still concerned about fuelling the panic. The Mercury story really won't have helped.

Over the weekend

It is Sunday night and Emily gets ready to send her children to bed. They are giggling in the corner by the computer. As it is the school holidays they don't have homework to do so have been surfing on the internet. "What are you two doing?" They look up, "we're reading MillChat. We think it's really funny!"

Emily sends them upstairs and sits down to look at the computer. With a nervous feeling she looks at the forum. On Friday after the meeting Will had started a post called 'find a friend' telling people about Age Aid's campaign. They'd carefully  written some lines about the scheme telling people how they could connect with possible flu friends. Only now it looked like it had changed into something else entirely. GlamGran and WarHero had been joined by BitOfFun and BingoLinda and some 25 others. They seemed to be getting on very well, sharing descriptions of themselves and exactly what kind of friends they were looking for. The forum had certainly been active over the weekend but not in the way they'd planned.

"Oh no. Never mind swine flu panic, we seem to have started a dating site! How am I going to explain this to Joan?!"

Have your say

• Is this use of the website a problem? If so, what are the risks?
• How should Emily and Will handle this now? 
• How could Emily have protected against this happening?
• What (if anything) might they have done differently in setting it up?

Have your say on the Millcaster Tales forum.

Useful links

• Characteristics of successful online communities (lasa knowledgebase) - dos and don'ts of developing an online community.
• One in six older people embrace social networking (Age Concern press release - March 09). 
• Swine flu information.

Other episodes

Find out what happens next in the runaway campaign (part 2).

Catch up with past episodes.