Communication of Local Governments and the Population in Social Media: Regions of the Ural Federal District

Introduction. The relevance of the topic is determined by the need for a practical solution to the problem of communication assessment of local government bodies with the population in social media. The lack of an effective methodology for such an assessment and its results increases the importance of this work. The purpose of the article is to analyse the success of communication of the executive authorities of the municipal entities of the Ural Federal District with the population on the official pages of the social network “VKontakte” and to offer the success index. Materials and Methods. The authors used the database of official accounts of municipal, municipal district and municipal area administrations (n = 203) and heads of corresponding municipalities (n = 198) of the regions of the Urals Federal District in the social network “VKontakte”. The data were collected using the parsing tool Cerebro 3.0; the data were analyzed using both standard indicators of social network analysis and those proposed by the authors. The index method was used to summarize the data. This approach made it possible to systematize and aggregate heterogeneous information in order to compare the objects of analysis. Results. The authors have developed and tested on the materials of the regions of the Urals Federal District a methodology for calculating the index of success of communication between local governments and the population in the social network “VKontakte”. It has also been demonstrated that higher publication activity does not unequivocally lead to more successful communication outcomes. It is revealed that in most cases, municipalities with small populations are the most successful communicators. It is noted that subscriber engagement is higher in the accounts of heads of municipalities compared to the accounts of municipal administrations. Discussion and Conclusion. The authors’ proposed methodology for assessing the success of local government communications helps to identify the most successful practices, differentiate municipalities and regions. The index allows to go from evaluation of information openness to analysis of content published and recommendations on how to what content is needed to be more successful in communicating with the public. The results of the study will be useful for state and municipal employees involved in communication with the public.