NAVY WINNING 'FANS' AND 'LIKES'

The Republic of Singapore Navy (RSN) has been winning fans in the social media scene, with its Facebook page ranked among the top 10 most popular of its kind in Singapore.

Scrolling through the RSN Facebook page, you can't help but notice that it is heavy on stories that tug at your heartstrings.

There is the post on sailors bidding a tearful farewell to their families and loved ones as they leave for their deployment to the Gulf of Aden, and then there is the story about the quiet heroism of sea soldiers who attended to the victims of a road accident.

Such human-interest posts resonated very well with Singaporeans, garnering hundreds and sometimes even thousands of "likes".

No wonder the RSN Facebook page is now the 10th most popular government/political Facebook page in Singapore, according to social media analytics firm Socialbakers. Since its creation in April 2013, the RSN Facebook page has attracted about 40,000 fans.

Right from the start, the Navy wanted its page to tell stories of all the different vocations such as naval chefs and engineers.

Lieutenant Colonel (LTC) Chew Chun Liang, Head of the Navy Information Centre (NIC), explained: "We want to show that the organisation is really about our servicemen, and each of them has a very powerful story to tell, and we bring that to life on our Facebook page."

Personal touch

Beyond telling people stories and scoring "likes", the Navy seeks to build personal relationships with its fans. When fans liked a post or left positive comments on Facebook, the serviceman featured in the post would log on to Facebook to thank the fans personally. The Navy also makes it a point to answer fans' questions.

"We engage them in a conversation, rather than just putting up a post and leaving everyone hanging there," said Mr Dylan Wang, who heads the New Media team in NIC.

The Navy has also created an Instagram account to better connect with youth who are 15 to 25 years old. Although it has only 800 fans at the moment, whenever a new photo is posted, over 100 likes are received, making it a highly interactive channel, said Mr Wang. "This is the habitat they are comfortable in; you can see the youth reacting on Instagram."

To reward "super fans" who are on the RSN social media channel regularly, NIC gives them perks such as exclusive tours at the Navy Open House and the Navy@Vivo event.

The latter is a new event started last year to bring the Navy closer to the public by docking a warship at VivoCity and opening it to visitors. Held twice last year with a Landing Ship Tank and a Frigate, the event has met with great success. Look out for more details on the RSN Facebook page about the upcoming Navy@Vivo this May.

Widening reach

Navy@Vivo was not only a platform for sailors to engage Singaporeans up close and personal, but also an avenue for the Navy to reach out to media personalities and bloggers who have huge followings.

Food bloggers, for instance, were invited to catch the naval chefs in action on board the ships and to try out their food. Through their blogposts, Singaporean foodies got to know more about the life of a naval chef in a ship's galley.

The initiative later led to prominent food writer KF Seetoh sailing on board frigate RSS Formidable for a feature on the naval chefs. His story, which was also published on Yahoo! Singapore, went viral with over 2,700 shares.

One of the Navy's biggest supporters is probably local film director Jack Neo. He was invited to the Navy Open House last year, and the experience whetted his appetite for Navy stuff.

Mr Neo later took the cast of his hit movie Ah Boys to Men to Navy@Vivo in November 2013 to allow these "army recruits" to find out more about sailing life. The Navy is currently looking into how the Singapore Armed Forces can assist in the production of Ah Boys to Frogmen, a movie based on the lives of naval divers.

Engaging the sailors

Besides its foray into social media, the Navy has also begun a revamp for its bi-monthly newsletter Navy News to better connect with its servicemen. The revamp, to be done in phases, started last December. Similar to its Facebook strategy, the newsletter will have more feature stories on the sailors, and a new photo-centric layout.

For instance, the April 2014 issue featured Military Expert 1 Chua Kwang Li, the Navy's only female Surface Independent Duty Corpsman. She had undergone specialised training in the United States which prepared her to provide advanced medical treatment in the absence of a doctor.

Said Navy News editor Clara Lock: "These are the sort of interesting stories that are going to entice the readers (to read our newsletter). We want to focus on our people on the ground, shift away from organisational news, and give it a creative spin."

She added that Navy News is looking to put up these stories on the RSN Facebook. And soon, social media fans out there will have more reasons to "like" it!