In the previous article Vol.18 – How Social PR in Web 2.0 World Should Be? possible methodologies of planning and executing social PR was discussed. The topic of this article is the ideal journalism and journalist, the primary stakeholder of PR representatives, in web 2.0 online world.
1. What do journalists need to know to succeed in Web 2.0 online world?
Journalist need to be aware of the drastically changing environment of journalism, and the paradigm shift in the business model of journalism. This is supported by Fisher’s article of 10 Industries That The Internet And Social Media Will Revolutionize (2009), which print media is #1, television is #3, and public relations is #9.
Journalists need to change their mindset. They need to know that the emergence of online content is not simply something additional to traditional content business. They also need to be fully aware that their stakeholder management is also changing.
2. How journalists need to become social to survive in Web 2.0 online world?
Journalist need to do the following and acquire skills and competencies necessary for them, in addition to fundamental journalism skills and systems/processes.
1) Be entrepreneurial and business savvy.
First, journalists need to know the value of content in the changing business environment and how their business model is changing. They cannot just be writers who collect materials and write articles, but instead, be business savvy.
In order to adapt and succeed in the new business environment, journalists also cannot be bureaucratic but be innovative, flexible and entrepreneurial. They need to cope with frequent update of news releases of companies and other online contents (news sites, blog etc.). Also, they need to be multi-skilled to be able to leverage multi-platform (traditional media platform and web/Internet platform). In addition, they need to be open and proactive to building relationship with bloggers and web audience/readers, in the online world there PR (public relations) has or is expected to truly become public and they as well as PR representatives of companies can directly reach bloggers and the public.
2) Leverage multi-platform and become multi-media storyteller.
Journalists need to leverage multi-platform in developing and delivering stories leveraging multi-media (print, TV, web/Internet etc.). This is one good way of making differentiation from bloggers, who primarily use only web/Internet.
Leveraging multi-media is, what the author calls, “media mix for online and offline synergy”, which is what marketers, communicators and PR representatives of companies need to do as well. For journalists, the biggest concern would be differentiation of print and online articles. In many cases, it seems that print articles are developed first and then the same articles are posted online, and it is quite natural that journalism business is shrinking and becoming unprofitable. They need to make re-define print and online articles, making differentiation. This needs further discussion and the author would like to do so in the next article.
3) Re-define and re-position journalism and journalists.
There are mainly 2 ways to re-define and re-position journalism and journalists.
(1) Make differentiation from bloggers as professional multi-media storyteller.
First way is to make differentiation from bloggers in re-positioning, and re-define themselves as multi-media professional storytellers. Key word is multi-media and professional. Meaning of multi-media is as mentioned above. Professional is about the high quality story and content.
Professional quality of content and story surpassing that of bloggers is one important factor for differentiation from majority of bloggers, and real-time reporting integration may well help further improve content quality and value. The importance of content quality including reliability (of source) is more than ever, with flood of information and contents in web 2.0 online world, in which everyone can be content developer/owner and quality rather than quantity of information really counts. As Defren (2009) say in his article Mainstream Media Relations: More Important Than Ever, bloggers cannot replace journalists, and mainstream media/journalism do have great value in web 2.0 online world as well.
(2) Become also curators and contextualizers.
Second way is radically change their standpoint and mindset, and re-define themselves as curators and contextulalizers. Journalists may well be annoyed by bloggers easily copying and pasting their articles, which is about copyright issue but cannot be eliminated. They may also well be annoyed with bloggers making links from their articles and excerpt their articles. With this kind of radical change in standpoint, it is better for them to re-define by positioning themselves as curators and contextualizers.
With their professional skills, curators and contextualizers is quite possible and ideal yet not easily imitated by bloggers and other web audiences, meaning this gives high value to their content and is of competitive advantage. Linking and exception is part of a dialogue with bloggers and web audiences, and chances of gaining loyal readers. Blog articles may well be good source of contextualizing. It would be far better for journalists to regard bloggers as people to collaborate with rather than compete with.
4) Become social journalist and make direct relationship with web audience (readers).
This is one big advantage that journalists can make most of in the new business environment. There are 3 KFS (Key Factors for Success) to become social journalists.
(1) Leverage social media ecosystem.
This is about leveraging multi-platform. Journalists themselves need to proactively leverage social media ecosystem (tools) mentioned in the previous article Vol.5 – What Social Media Ecosystem Does Web 2.0 Realize? In doing so, they first need to define objective of leveraging social media, which could be collecting sources, promoting their content, and/or building relationship with bloggers and web audience.
(2) Use social media everyday to make it a routine.
To leverage social media, journalists need to use the media everyday based on the objectives defined. Article of Betancourt The Journalist’s Guide to Maximizing Personal Social Media ROI (2009) introduces live examples of how social journalists use social media everyday as routine and summarizes 5 tips for building a social media routine as below.
a) Look at what web audience and sources already in use and meet them there.
b) Make time to connect to the people on social media platforms, and care about them.
c) Make social media tools one of the things journalists check several times a day.
d) Be willing to share expertise and knowledge.
e) Do not be afraid to involve web audience. Look for opportunities to enlist readers to tell story of journalists.
(3) Build community.
This is about the fifth tip of building a social media routine mentioned by Betancourt. Journalists need to be proactive in involving bloggers and web audiences to build online community by open and interactive conversation, remembering that they are representing company/organization. This enables public hearing and monitoring as well as winning their trust and engagement. This also helps journalists to be successful as curators and contextualizers.
Having briefly discussed ideal journalism/journalists in web 2.0 online world, in the next article, the author would like to touch on news media as the organization (i.e. employer of the journalists mentioned above) and their business.
References:-
Betancourt, Leah (2009) How Social Media is Radically Changing the Newsroom
http://mashable.com/2009/06/08/social-media-newsroom/
Betancourt, Leah (2009) The Journalist’s Guide to Maximizing Personal Social Media ROI
http://mashable.com/2009/12/02/personal-social-media-roi/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Mashable+%28Mashable%29
Defren, Todd (2009) Mainstream Media Relations: More Important Than Ever
http://www.pr-squared.com/index.php/2009/09/mainstream-media-relations-more-important-than-ever
Fisher, Lauren (2009) 10 Industries That The Internet And Social Media Will Revolutionize
http://www.simplyzesty.com/social-media/10-industries-internet-social-media-revolutionize/
Kim, Cindy (2009) Social Media reshaping journalism - how will you cope?
http://cindykimblog.wordpress.com/2009/09/15/social-media-reshaping-journalism-how-will-you-cope/
Lauby, Sharlyn (2009) 10 Must-Haves for Your Social Media Policy
http://mashable.com/2009/06/02/social-media-policy-musts/
Lavrusik, Vadim (2009) 12 Things Newspapers Should Do to Survive
http://mashable.com/2009/08/14/newspaper-survival/
Lavruski, Vadim (2009) 8 Must-Have Traits of Tomorrow’s Journalist
http://mashable.com/2009/12/09/future-journalist/
Lewis, Woody (2009) Social Journalism: Past, Present, and Future
http://mashable.com/2009/04/07/social-journalism/
Scott, David Meerman (2007), The New Rules of Marketing & PR. John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
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