While House and Senate offices say they use social media for broadcasting and better understanding constituent concerns, but traditional forms of communication are still their preferred medium for keeping constituents informed, according to a new report (.pdf) by the Congressional Management Foundation.

Senior and social media managers in congressional offices said email newsletters and franked mass mailings are still more important than social media such as Facebook, YouTube and Twitter. Still, the importance of paper newsletters may be dropping, as it appears less important than other, more traditional forms of outreach and ranks below Facebook and YouTube in importance.

Seventy-four percent of the senior managers and social media managers surveyed said Facebook is somewhat or very important for communicating their members' views. YouTube is a somewhat or very important mechanism for communication for 72 percent of responding congressional offices. 

Even so, congressional offices said in-person townhalls and telephone townhalls were more important than online townhalls.

Forty-five percent of respondents said both in-person and telephone town halls are "very important" to constituent communication, but only 11 percent said online town halls are "very important." Online townhalls also lagged in-person and telephone figures in the "somewhat important" category. 

The offices that do appear to be embracing technology for constituent interaction are more likely to see social media as a benefit to the office and to believe the Internet has improved the dialogue between citizens and Congress, find report authors. Eighty-eight percent of the staffers from early-adopter offices say it's helping the office reach new constituents, while only 54 percent of late-adopters agree with that statement. The majority, 72 percent, of early-adopter staffers also feel social media is a worthwhile investment.

The report is based on a survey of 260 congressional staffers, conducted between Oct. 12 and Dec. 13, 2010.

For more:
- see the report (.pdf)

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