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Theoretical Background and research questions/hypothesis: The public increasingly turns to social media to seek and share information during emergencies. One tool that CDC uses to disseminate information is Twitter, and CDC’s @CDCemergency Twitter feed is the third largest in the federal government, with 1.5 million followers. CDC uses the Twitter feed to promote actions that followers can take to stay safe during emergencies. However, CDC had little baseline information to help guide its messages to meet followers’ information needs.
Methods: To fill this gap, CDC designed a survey to answer the following broad questions:
- Who are @CDCemergency’s followers/audience(s)?
- What kind of information do they want from @CDCemergency?
- How frequently do they want it?
- What are they doing with the information they have received?
Results: Demographics: Of the 200 respondents, 52 percent were female; 19 percent were public health professionals or emergency responders; and 18 percent were health care providers. We also asked respondents their age and if they had children under 18. More than half of respondents were between 40 and 59, and one third of respondents had children under 18. Information needs: CDC asked respondents how often they wanted information during a national public health emergency. The survey found that during emergencies, 68 percent of respondents wanted messages several times a day. Outside of emergencies most respondents wanted messages several times a week but not more than once per day. The majority of respondents said their most important reason for following @CDCemergency was to stay safe during an emergency; with local emergencies being the top area of concern and international emergencies being the lowest. Sharing information: Respondents stated they didn’t share messages that were not relevant to their situation or did not suggest an action to take. Specific audience differences: Public health responders checked Twitter often and wanted frequent updates. Health care providers checked Twitter less often, but retweeted @CDCemergency more often, and were more likely to share information with friends and family.
Conclusions: Based on the findings, CDC decided to maintain a schedule of several tweets or retweets a week outside of emergencies to keep the public engaged and following our feed. We also emphasize that messages must be actionable. Knowing the demographic makeup of respondents helps CDC anticipate questions (such as questions about how to protect children) and provides a baseline for future surveys. This baseline information also will help CDC further evaluate the channel whenever changes are made.
Implications for research and/or practice: Finding ways to evaluate the reach and effectiveness of social media remains a top priority among federal and state public health agencies that use social media to share health messages, during emergencies and at other times. This experience with a Twitter survey can help inform others who are considering similar ways to evaluate their own Twitter feeds.