Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/989894
COMMERCIAL IT 16 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 3 JUNE 2018 MITA'S primary role within Government is to deliver IT services which are used by Government itself and by citizens. Therefore, it is es- sential that once these servic- es have been developed and deployed, the Agency makes the required effort to create awareness and uses its mar- keting tools to advertise these products, so that the largest number of citizens use them and reap the benefits. Before the era of digital media, MITA was limited to using traditional media when divulging its different messages. These included broadcasts on television and radio, publishing of articles on newspapers and billboard advertising. This media was very effective when reaching the masses, and even today it is still being used a lot when targeting the wider general audience. However, there were in- stances when the agency needed to deliver explicit messages for targeted sec- tors from the audience. This required the use of specific media which would be more effective to attract that spe- cific audience. However, at that time, it was not possible to identify the best medium for this purpose as it was dif- ficult to collect information for metrics from traditional media. This was an issue for MI- TA, which required feedback from specific audiences when launching green papers and consultations to create an ef- fective product or service for specific segment of society. For this purpose, the Agency had to conduct one-to-one sessions with members from the audience or hold infor- mation sessions which possi- bly could be attended by the target audience. Another issue was the bar- rier to reach the internation- al community, for example when opening a call to recruit IT professionals or to se- lect potential suppliers. MI- TA would only use Maltese newspapers to advertise the vacant positions or requests for services, without having the possibility to publish the advert on an international level. Moreover, whenever MITA launched awareness campaigns, it would need to use leaflets and brochures so that citizens would be able to get more information about the campaign. No links, interactions and analytics If we fast forward to today, let us imagine the scenario of promoting a Government Service mobile app, such as myHealth, using only tradi- tional marketing tools like newspapers. There would be no links for more informa- tion, no interaction with the audience and no real-time analytics to analyse how the awareness campaign is pro- ceeding. In today's world, we have the opportunity of promot- ing our service to the right targeted audience and with just one click consumers can explore what the service is all about. And what about ana- lytics and insights? With the emerging digital marketing tools, we are now able to edit a marketing campaign while it is ongoing. By monitoring the digital campaign, we can check if the right target au- dience is being reached, and if not, we can make the nec- essary amendments accord- ingly. This feature lets our Agency deliver an optimised campaign to reach a larger audience, while keeping en- gaged, using dedicated con- tent for the specific audience. It's all about the money What about costings? As al- ready described, MITA's va- cancies and recruitment used to be published on newspa- pers, using traditional mar- keting tools. This resulted in high expenditure on advertis- ing, which sometimes failed to attract the right candi- dates. It was for this reason that in the last two years we have shifted completely our re- cruitment adverts to digital adverts on Social Media chan- nels, particularly on Linked- IN and Facebook. The result was that we have decreased the spending by half and we have improved considerably in reaching the right candi- dates. In return, this is also helping us to have better time consumption in respect to the number of interviews that we conduct. Content is key Social media and websites have also made it easier to refresh the content whenever we like. In this way, the au- dience can be kept engaged through continuous updates, while new followers can be targeted at the same time. Digital media are dynamic and new tools are continu- ously made available to im- prove the content and expand on the amount of people that are reachable. Such tools in- clude live videos, instant mes- saging, direct interactions, chat bots, hashtags, 360 im- ages, virtual reality and much more. `Considering that the attention span of followers has decreased to five seconds, it is important for organisa- tions to choose the best me- dia that keeps their audience engaged, while attracting new followers through good and relevant content. Another key area that we are exploring is email marketing, where through various soft- ware, we can track the clicks and the engagement with our audience when sending them an email. This medium is be- ing particularly explored in programmes like YouStartIT where we need to attract more startups and in the Stu- dent Placement Programme where we always want to reach out to more students. Perfectly balancing between traditional and digital media