Port of San Diego Wins Top Honor for Use of Social Media in Government

Thursday, 08 April 2010
Contact: Ronald W. Powell (619) 400-4789, (619) 665-2815

The Port of San Diego was named the winner in the category Best in Local Government/Politics/Education at the inaugural InfluenceSD Awards on Wednesday, April 7, 2010.

The Port was among five finalists in the category, including San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders, San Diego City Councilmen Todd Gloria and Carl Demaio, and the San Diego Convention & Visitors Bureau.

InfluenceSD is a San Diego-based awards event created to unite champions in new media.

"Our goal is to celebrate content creators and citizen journalists who are spreading their message in innovative ways," said Matt Browne and Mel Gordon, co-founders of the event. "These individuals have shown exceptional use of (new media) and most forms of digital communication."

Representatives from the Port's Communications and Community Services Department Web team were on hand to receive the award at the Anthology Restaurant and Entertainment venue in Little Italy.

Irene McCormack, the Port's Assistant Vice President for Communications & Government Affairs, was the driving force behind formation of the Port of San Diego's web/social media team.

McCormack said that given the dramatic changes in the way information is disseminated, she wanted to go beyond the traditional press release in reaching the public.  The use of social media allows the Communications Department to send out timely information and messages that bring public attention to the work of the Port District, the deals and specials offered by the Port's tenants on the Big Bay, the Port's community service, environmental efforts and maritime cargo business.

"We wanted to reach a broad spectrum of society, to reach all segments of the population, and the strategy for accomplishing that was through the use of Twitter, Facebook, video and other social media avenues," she said.

The Port was nominated by the public and became a finalist following a month-long online public voting. Winners were determined by a panel of five judges, including Aaron Roe Fulkerson, founder and CEO of MindTouch, Inc. Finalists were judged based upon their use of digital communications, including use of Twitter, Facebook, Email, search-engine optimization.

Winners in all categories automatically advance to a National Competition.

The sponsors of Influence SD include NBCSanDiego, Hewlett Packard, Lending Tree and Tech Zulu.

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