EB Parish Council Communications Review

MB and NR, 05.11.2025

Goals
To give residents more information about what the parish council is doing
For that information to be clear, engaging, and inclusive
To encourage residents/other stakeholders to engage with the PC so that our improved
communications are two-way
To enhance the PCs reputation so we are seen as competent and approachable people.
To maximise the impact of resources we have already.
Note: This review is concerned with direct PC business/information only – not information from
other organisations that we are asked to share.

Internal Communication
We need to make sure that all available information that can be shared within the PC is
effectively shared. On issues of particular interest, we shouldn’t wait until council meetings to
share the information.
Recommendations:
1. Chair/Vice-Chair should give verbal (or written) reports to each PC meeting
2. There should always be group emails to all councillors, from Chair or Clerk, when
there is new information to share.

External Communication 1 – What information do we want to communicate
We need to give more thought to the information we want to share. There must be a robust
process for that to happen without error.
Recommendations:
3. Council meetings should end with a short discussion/agreement on the key
communication points/messages from that meeting that need to be publicised.
4. Committee chairs/councillors with particular interests or projects should take
responsibility for requesting updates/publicity for those interests or projects.
5. Requests for updates/publicity should go to the Clerk.
6. There are a number of key messages which should be permanently seen on all our
platforms. These are:
● The dates of council meeting
● A clear, friendly invitation to residents to attend council meetings
● The PC contact details, especially our website address

External Communication 2 – Platforms for communication (apart from Social Media)
To communicate with residents we have:
● Our website. This should be our key resource and we must do everything possible to
make sure it is up-to-date, easy to read, and used.

● Parish magazine – 400 words/month in the parish magazine – plus 3 longer articles each
year by Chair. We should make sure we maximise our profile in the parish magazine –
even when deadlines are tight.
● Parish Council noticeboard. We should make more/better use of this.
● Personal interaction from 13 councillors and council staff. This is a natural and easy form
of communication – and particularly important for raising issues and providing feedback.
Everyone must, however, be aware of the PCs Media and Social Media policy (12.09.24)
for any engagement with social media.

Recommendations:
7. Re-write some existing website copy so it is more engaging and inclusive
8. Clerk to manage website updates (see also recommendation 5)
9. Make sure we always submit 400 words to the parish magazine even if the
deadline can’t be extended to align with PC meeting dates
10. Ask Griers if we can have a bigger noticeboard
11. PC Councillors and staff to make sure they are aware of social media guidelines
contained in the PCs Media and Social Media policy document (12.09.24)

External Communication 3 – Social Media
We have Facebook, Instagram and Google Business – all run by our media consultant
NR aims to make each Parish Council (PC) post as engaging and accessible as possible,
balancing the need for clear information with a friendly tone that avoids “council jargon.”
Feedback suggests this approach works well.
Currently, each post is shared on the PC Facebook page, and the two main village groups
(Noticeboard and Bergholt Bulletin), as well as on Instagram and the PC’s Google Business
page (at time of writing: not working).
● Facebook: This is where we see the strongest engagement. (Particularly on the EB
Noticeboard page) Posts reach regular followers and a wider village audience when
shared into the local groups.
● Instagram: Engagement here is lower, but NR feels it is still worthwhile as it offers
visibility to younger residents who may not use Facebook.
● Google Business: This is valuable for residents who don’t use social media at all.
Updates appear on the right-hand side of search results, so information is still
accessible.
We are currently not using TikTok, Snapchat or Youtube – all of which are more video-based.
Regarding commenting on other people’s posts, or comments on the PC’s posts, we already
have guidance – the PCs Media and Social Media policy (12.09.24). The PC Chair very often
comments as do a few other councillors.

Recommendations:
12. Assistant Clerk to speak to Web Manager to get Google Business working again
13. Councillors who post on social media as councillors, should make it clear that
they are councillors. We can’t assume that everyone will know.

14. Keep our social media content under review so it is as engaging as possible – for
example, think about more use of reels (video content).

External Communication 4 – What channels of communication do residents/other stakeholders
prefer?
We know – from social media analytics – that Facebook is extremely important.
Nonetheless, bearing in mind those who don’t use social media, we should try and ask as many
groups in the village as possible about their preferred information channels. All councillors could
be involved in this.
Our feeling is that a more formal survey would be time-consuming and not necessarily
productive.
We need to find out if additional channels of communication such as a newsletter should be
considered. Our feeling is that our time/resources would be best spent on maximising the
potential of our existing methods – but we should still ask.

Recommendation:
15. Councillors/staff to speak to their existing networks/groups about preferred
communication channels and feedback information gained.

External Communication 5 – language
Our feeling is that – apart from our social media posts – some of our written material is currently
too formal, too complicated/hard to understand/too long. We feel the website is an obvious
starting point to address this (recommendation 7).

Evaluation
We need to try and evaluate the effectiveness of a new comms plan. Speaking to people is one
way and all councillors/staff should do that.
NR already provides social media analytics. We need to find out about website visits also.

Recommendation:
16. Ask Andy Pope about providing basic website visitor number data