Press Service of Public Authorities: Working in the Context of the Social Media Rise

Abstract

In the context of growing popularity of social networks, more and more government agencies are creating their own pages on one or more platforms. Such pages are becoming an additional tool for communicating with the population. Press services of government agencies use various approaches and strategies in their work. Despite the abundance of various data on the number of subscribers, publications, coverage, and other quantitative indicators, there are practically no studies of the nature and content of publications, the quality of the design of official pages. In this study, the author examines the principles of work in Russian government agencies’ social networks and compares them with the approaches pursued by similar departments in the USA and France in order to reveal the specifics of government press service activities in different countries using social networks. Using content analysis, the author examines publications in the accounts of the Ministry of Economic Development, the Federal Antimonopoly Service, the Social Fund of Russia, as well as publications of similar government agencies in the United States and France. The results reveal the dominance of the explanatory and educational strategy, interactive content, "personification" of government agencies and client-centricity in the work of contemporary press services of government agencies in social networks, both in Russia and abroad. The author finds similarities in the main approaches to the work of press services of the authorities of Russia, the USA and France in social networks. They make it possible to increase audience involvement, promptly respond to requests and comments, and receive feedback from users in social networks.