September is National Preparedness Month. Each year we recognize National Preparedness Month to promote family and community disaster and emergency planning. As posted in 2019 and 2020, cities should take the lead in getting the word out and informing citizens. This is exactly what Plymouth, Wisconsin has done with a series of social media posts.

September is National Preparedness Month
Week 1 September 1-4: Make A Plan

Talk to your friends and family about how you will communicate before, during, and after a disaster. Make sure to update your plan based on the CDC recommendations due to the coronavirus. pic.twitter.com/LawaaZskZh

— City of Plymouth (@plymouth_wi) September 1, 2021

This year’s theme is “Prepare to Protect“, with the basis of “Preparing for disasters is protecting everyone you love.” The theme is tugging on your heartstrings to be prepared for potential disasters with the reminder that you are not the only one that will be impacted when disaster hits.

Use What’s Available to You

The Ready.gov website has a number of resources to help your community conduct disaster and emergency planning. A variety of handouts, guides, public service announcements and a link to the FEMA app are all available through the website. There is even a social media toolkit that includes social media ready imagery like the one in Plymouth’s post above.

Although the Ready.gov website has helped make the National Preparedness Month campaign for Plymouth easier, the work still needs to be done. Thankfully, there are web applications like TweetDeck and Hootsuite that make this task easier. Even with the free, introductory accounts, social media blasts can be pre-programmed well ahead of when you want them posted. Take advantage of web applications like these to make campaigns easier.

National Preparedness Month
Week 2 September 5-11: Build A Kit

Gather supplies that will last for several days after a disaster for everyone living in your home. Don’t forget to consider the unique needs each person or pet may have in case you have to evacuate quickly. pic.twitter.com/43c0HTVfcJ

— City of Plymouth (@plymouth_wi) September 5, 2021

The City of Plymouth appears to have added some imagery beyond what is on the Ready.gov website to provide more visual interest. This is a great addition to their posts to draw they eye of those scrolling through the long list of posts on their feeds. Websites like Wikimedia and Freeimages can be a good source of images to help spruce up postings.

No Excuses

The social media toolkit on Ready.gov is relatively straight forward and easy to use. Overall, there’s just very little excuse not to do a National Preparedness Month campaign. Start early next year and look to the Ready.gov website in August to prepare your campaign.