[PAO] Is The Suggestion Box Open Part 2?

[Ken]

Hello folks some other things that come to mind as a former squadron PAO :

1.  CAP VOLUNTEER NOW WEBSITE (http://www.capvolunteernow.com/) COULD 
PRESENT INFORMATION DIFFERENTLY -- Since this IS the CAP news site 
National needs to ensure that all wings are appropriated covered at this 
website.   IF a particular wing hasn't been covered in 45 days I think 
National needs to be asking the wing why there's no articles.  Also I 
think on the web based submission form for the story releases the 
minimum number of words needs to be lowered.  I always found as a former 
PAO that I couldn't think up enough words to fill that in, so no news 
got reported to National.   Also I think for each wing there needs to be 
a specific index page/pages maintained either by the wing PAO or his/her 
designated person could upload stories to that area, so if someone was 
interested in a particular state they could easily see what that wing 
(and units within that wing) has accomplished.  NATIONAL could also 
decide what gets "front page" coverage.

2.  SOCIAL MEDIA EFFECTIVENESS NEEDS TO BE CAREFULLY EXAMINED ---  I 
think the jury is still out on what we really achieve with some of the 
social media methods.   Surely an up to date 
regions/wings/groups/squadrons website & public access facebook pages is 
IMHO primarily where the effort needs to be and with most volunteers 
having limited time to spend on too much social media (but frankly we've 
met some people that apparently that's all they do and showed up at a 
CAP activity just to meet some of our social media posters, with really 
no interest in the organization LOL !!!!).   Generally when anyone is 
considering joining a volunteer organization, they will checking out 
that organization's website/facebook site as well as doing a google news 
search to see what they come up with.   Many of the cadets we recruit 
are due to other cadets talking about the program to their peers in 
school versus any media sources.   Senior members will vary BUT most 
will look at websites etc.   I might add that its' important to ensure 
that old web sites/pages are taken down IF at all possible since 
sometimes the search engines find those pages.  The current CAP 
membership may not have any control or even know who originally had the 
website.  Might be a good "how to do (get old sites taken down)" article 
to post on the CAP PAO training site IF there's been success in website 
removal.

3.  EXTERNAL NEWSPAPERS/TV/RADIO IS STILL EFFECTIVE --  IMHO getting 
coverage via these sources is VERY important since it validates the 
organization's existence & it's more likely that those that could help 
CAP or recognize its' individual members are reading/watching/listening 
to these media (two of our squadron members were recognized via letters 
from our local state representative after an article was published about 
our annual awards dinner).  We compete with many other organizations for 
news space.  HOWEVER, the local community newspapers are always looking 
for stories (and in many instances I had to split a story to only cover 
the members that were from the towns/cities that the specific newspaper 
edition covered).  Some will have a paper, web (reduced number of 
stories), and also pdf archive.  Note:  IF it is primarily a printed/pdf 
type archive the search engine won't find all the time.   As far as TV 
media coverage, that is IMHO the most stressful for the PAO because 
there's always "if it bleeds it leads!" in the background and even a 
scheduled story (usually verified that same day by followup with the 
news director) might not get covered.  Also TV media have websites and a 
story on the evening news likely will be posted to the website and some 
archive up to two years including the video.   My understanding anything 
to do with veterans/military are hot interest items for our local media 
and the local "Wreaths Across America" ceremony at the veterans cemetery 
gets excellent TV coverage.   Also google has a news search function 
that will gather all stories for the day and email one the story links, 
which gives a good idea what is getting covered (and not covered).   
What I also liked about TV media is the chance to get to personally talk 
with some of the up and coming news reporters/TV anchors.   Also we had 
talked with one TV station about the possibility of providing them with 
video and the story details in case they weren't able to send a crew to 
cover the activity.  BTW some media outlets may not always list the 
organization's webpage address when the article gets edited for 
publication.  Radio wise we had copies of the older public service 
announcements and last year one of our members who works in the 
technical side of broadcast radio was able to get this placed with three 
major radio stations in our area and these will be running thru 2016  
(oh, BTW let me mention, the IG during our SUI was also told about this 
and even our wing commander had heard one of the PSA's while driving to 
work, yet NO mention in that SUI report.   I might add that likely we 
were the only unit in the wing that had accomplished this!).  Also it 
didn't appear to us that National had any interest in knowing how that 
volunteer provided professional voice PSAs were being utilized, since no 
reporting was required.

4.  PRE DETERMINED/AUTHORIZED RELEASES FOR MEDIA COVERAGE DURING CERTAIN 
MISSIONS --  I think we really need to get this worked out. After the 
last east coast hurricane/tropical storm we had a local CAP 
aircrew/aircraft that was going to fly to the coast to take some recon 
photos.   It just seemed to me that IF we had automatic permission to at 
the very least get some video footage (the plane taxiing away)  along 
with a prepared statement ..e.g. that units from x are supporting the x 
agency for disaster relief efforts by taking photos of the coastline 
(and if an example of an aerial photo is available provide it to us).   
TV news is based upon the immediate and not the deferred so a real good 
story got missed due to the hurdles of the requirements for a release 
for something so simple.  Google news showed no immediate stories but 
only one after the whole mission was complete there was one story in the 
printed media.  With the number of personnel participating in this there 
should have been significant local coverage throughout the northeast and 
even from outside the area for wings that were supporting the effort.

5.  MAKING APPROPRIATE COMMENT ABOUT CAP ON NEWS MEDIA WEBSITES IN 
RELATION TO THE SENSITIVITY TO THE NEWS STORY  --- Some media outlets 
allow the readers/viewers to comment on stories.  For awhile there was 
one CAP member that was basically just posting the CAP tag line in the 
comments area without any thought to what the story was about.   In one 
example a community very cherished parish priest flying his aircraft 
crashed and was killed.  CAP found the aircraft.   Perhaps a more 
personal crafted message, something along the lines of CAP was 
successful in finding the aircraft BUT were saddened that the pilot did 
not survive, might be more appropriate as the first line in the post and 
then a bit more about the organization.

6.  TRAINING PAO MORE ON LINE/ WEBINAR PRESENTATION ---  There's been 
lots of work put into the National PAO website, but perhaps more on line 
training opportunities or even prerecorded webinar presentations could 
help PAO's along their quest for becoming the best.

7.  THE CAP TV & RADIO CHANNEL -- Perhaps now with all the web streaming 
that can be done National should consider a TV & radio channel that 
produces video and/or voice with weekly programs. Similar to what was 
done with the recent National Commander's comments on the CAP status as 
an Auxiliary with the USAF being included in the total force definition.

Ken