If anyone needed any reminder of how hard police officers work, just take a look at some of the incidents Woking officers have had to deal with in the last couple of days.
A police shooting, attempted rape, a collision this morning which meant a female motorist had to be cut free from her car and not forgetting a dead body being found in woodland. A busy week for Woking officers!
While such valiant work was being carried out by the town's coppers, the press office in Woking were struggling with social media.
Using Twitter, Facebook and Blogging for business or politics can be treacherous ground and we can only feel sorry for the staff of the Woking police press office for having to tweet this:
"There has NOT been a plane crash in #Byfleet #Woking one of our staff accidentally sent the wrong tweet from a list of options."
Responding to another Twitter user, the @WokingBeat account then tweeted:
"...Tweet has been deleted, we use automated tweets with a drop down bar to choose what we want to say."
Although there are lot of different platforms through which to use social media, "automated" tweets is a PR disaster waiting to happen, as the force ably demonstrated today.
Surrey Police should follow the example of Sussex Police who have come to our attention before with how well they use social media.
Avoid the pitfalls: If you want to use social media for business without the risk of such a blunder happening to you, get in touch with us today.
