You are currently browsing the daily Archive for March 3rd, 2011.
Jon DeNunzio, user engagement editor at the Washington Post, visited out COMM 361 class on March 3 to discuss the value of integrating social media into journalism.
Why use social media?
- Receive consumer feedback
- Reach broad audiences
- Increase interactivity; users/audiences want to be part of the news
- It’s where the users are – cannot expect they’ll go to your main site
- Assist journalist with reporting
- Builds relationship with users; users/audiences want to be talked to and to talk back
- It allows us to build relationship with users – want to talk to and talk back; can help bring trust back
Be social with users.
- Run a poll (SurveyGizmo or Twiigs)
- Pay attention to comments
- Ask for ideas (AllOurIdeas)
- Answer user questions
- Use the knowledge of the crowd, aka “crowd-sourcing”
There are many ways to connect with users/audiences.
- Tweet callouts/displays
- Twitter’s Blackbird Pie
- Storify – for fun, “talky” stories or hard news
- Intersect – tie together stories, time & location
- Mashable – a multimedia tool
- TechCrunch – a multimedia tool
- UMapper – build a map and put Tweets into it
Why college students should care.
- Very few people can contribute an idea about how they can really connect with users
- Journalism is constantly changing, especially on the digital side
