Client: Department of Fire & Emergency Services
Client Location: Cockburn, WA
Project Date: 2016
Project Type: Digital Audit & Social Strategy
The Brief: DFES coordinates emergency services across WA for natural disasters and emergency incidents. Over 1,600 operational staff and corporate personnel. More than 27,000 volunteers. When something goes wrong, they need the public to hear them clearly and trust what they’re saying.
The brief was to audit their existing social media platforms, develop a digital strategy aligned to operational goals and provide platform-specific best practice guidance.
The Work: Coffey & Tea delivered a comprehensive audit of DFES’s social media performance and built a strategy around one core argument: in a crisis, social media isn’t a nice-to-have. It’s a direct line to the public, and it needs to work.
The strategy covered how to disseminate life-saving information quickly and clearly, how to refine their online voice so it felt trusted rather than bureaucratic, and how to optimise content for each platform without losing the weight of the message.
The work demonstrated that strategic communications could be creative and still cut through. Engagement and clarity aren’t in conflict, especially when the stakes are high.
