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It is a commonly held belief in social media marketing that to reach your target audience via new media platforms, you must be willing to engage in conversation with them and portray your company as honest and transparent. This concept makes good sense in the business arena, where competing for customer dollars in a tight economy can be a brutal affair.

 

This is even more crucial when your target audience is the millennial generation — a group of young people who thrive in an always-“on” environment of mobile phones, iPods and laptops, where information and entertainment is instantaneous and where digital connectivity reigns supreme. College-age students are the most connected demographic group in the U.S. today, according to an eMarketer study. It is estimated that by 2013, 96.8 percent of college students will go online a minimum of one time per month.

For universities, which previously had to rely on promotional mailings and college fairs to distribute information, the rise of social media has opened new paths for connecting directly with prospective students. As Vadim Lavrusik writes on Mashable.com, social media enable universities to gather and share information about the school’s programs, as well as let prospective students hear directly from current students and faculty. In this way, universities can create a dialogue with students and help them feel involved and valued before they even reach campus.

 

Nationwide, university recruiters are working to become more familiar with new tools for communication and are utilizing them regularly. In fact, 95 percent of college admissions offices use at least one form of social media in reaching out to prospective students, reported the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth Center for Marketing Research.

 

At present, Wichita State University, Newman University and Butler Community College are three local institutions that recognize how highly connected the millennial generation is and how important it is to engage with potential students via online platforms. Though each school is considerably different in size and structure (Wichita State is a four-year public university, Newman is a private, Catholic institution and Butler is a two-year community college), social media level the playing field and give opportunities for each to showcase its uniquenesses.

Representatives from these three universities/colleges were interviewed to explore the specific ways in which social media have affected recruitment efforts, as well as the opportunities and challenges that arise with such platforms. These representatives (Bobby Gandu of Wichita State, Kelly Snedden of Newman and Ryan Entz of Butler) are pictured below.

Interestingly, though representatives from each college/university indicated different approaches to social media efforts, distinct themes, insights and takeaways emerged across all institutions:

 

·         Engagement is key in utilizing social media for student recruitment. 

·         Facebook is a popular and accessible tool with distinct pros and cons. 

·         Twitter is a PR/customer service tool and has strikingly different uses than other social sites.

·         Blogs are often used to give a glimpse into campus life.

·         Taking risks and trying new platforms is necessary.

·         Social media platforms are solutions, not saviors.

 

Each point is discussed in detail below.

 

Engagement is key 

Wichita State University, Newman University and Butler Community College demonstrate different ways social media platforms can be utilized in reaching key publics. From a recruitment perspective, Wichita State University (WSU) gears several sites solely to reaching prospective students, while Butler Community College focuses the majority of its social media sites on student retention with some recruitment mixed in. Newman, on the other hand, uses nearly all of its social media sites to target multiple publics: prospective, current and past students, as well as the community at large.

 

Regardless of how and where prospective students are targeted on social media platforms, spokespeople from all three universities stressed the importance of connecting with students and truly engaging with them. Their sentiments clearly echoed much of the existing literature about social media marketing — namely, that the social web is all about conversations. As Brian Solis writes in Engage (2010), failure to listen and interact may spell death for a business in this social landscape.

 

“The main thing is, [social media] change messages from monologue to dialogue,” said Ryan Entz, executive director of marketing communications at Butler Community College.

Kelly Snedden, director of communications at Newman University, said that while social media may seem like another good avenue to push content out, that old model of marketing doesn’t work in new media. Instead, it should be about creating dialogue and interactivity.

 

Facebook: Popularity often — but not always — reigns supreme

 

Ask any high school or college student which social media platform they use most, and many will likely give you one answer: Facebook. The popular social networking site, which was originally created for Harvard students, boasts a total of 500 million active users. Approximately 40 percent of those users are between the ages of 13 and 25, indicating Facebook may be an effective way of reaching teenagers and young adults looking to attend college for the first time.

As Solis (2010) writes, it is important to go where your target audience is and not where they are not. Where do they congregate and socialize? Where do they spend their time? That place, Solis contends, is where marketers need to concentrate their efforts. 

WSU, Newman and Butler smartly recognize the need to have a presence on Facebook, and each maintains its own fan page(s). Newman, in particular, utilizes an admissions fan page to reach out to prospective students and give them a taste of college life.

 

“We know where our target audience is, and that is Facebook,” Snedden said.

The university created this page separately from its central Facebook page because they knew things like visit days and orientations wouldn’t be appealing to the greater Newman community.

 

However, this kind of information is crucial to prospective and incoming students, and as such, needed a home base of its own.

Still, having a separate page for admissions is an exception to the rule, Snedden said. In Facebook’s earlier days, the thought in universities was to make fan pages for everything. But now, they’re finding it more effective to rope them in, selectively creating a handful of main pages to capture a bigger audience and maintain a more consistent voice.

 

While Butler does not have a separate Facebook fan page for admissions, their main Facebook page has proved helpful in initiating conversations with students, according to Entz. Butler frequently uses the platform to ask questions, such as, “[It’s] the Monday after spring break…what are you doing to renew your focus?” Such questions can facilitate more feedback and interactivity.

 

Entz also said that while Butler’s fan page doesn’t garner a significant amount of high school followers, advertising to prospective students through Facebook ads is something they’ve done in the past and may do again soon.

 

Representatives from all three schools agreed that while having a presence on Facebook is necessary, there’s a fine line between being interactive and being intrusive.

 

“Students feel that’s their territories, not ours,” Bobby Gandu, director of admissions at WSU, said. “The key with social media is, we want students to do what they’re comfortable with.”

 

For this reason, Gandu and his team don’t believe in doing anything too aggressive when it comes to Facebook. They leave control of the university’s main Facebook page to University Relations and contribute to it only on occasion.

 

Instead, the admissions office utilizes “Shockerville,” a social community similar to Facebook that is open only to newly admitted students. Shockerville has most of the same features as Facebook — message systems and the ability to share pictures and videos, for example — but its gated nature removes the riffraff of people who aren’t really interested in the school, Gandu said. Admitted students can make connections with each other before the school year begins and have opportunities to apply for additional scholarships and participate in contests. Additionally, while prospective students’ messages are not monitored or censored for things like cursing, the system does allow incoming students to interact with and ask questions of pre-selected student ambassadors.

Unlike Facebook, Shockerville costs the university money to maintain. According to Gandu, however, the gated community is worth the expense and currently leads the admissions office’s social media presence.

 

Twitter as PR/customer service tool

 

If Facebook is where prospective students are, then Twitter might be where they are not — at least, not in droves. According to Digital Buzz, just 17 percent of Twitter’s 106 million users are between the ages of 13 and 25.

 

All interviewed recognized that Twitter is not especially popular with teens and younger adults. Still, all agreed the platform played an important part in reaching out to the community and creating brand awareness, which — although not articulated by any of the interviewees — might ultimately have positive effects on student recruitment, a Cappex.com study shows.

 

Butler’s Entz said Twitter is a good tool for engaging and forming relationships with the media. The platform provides an unprecedented familiarity with others in the community, even when people have not officially met. This can eliminate cold calls to members of the press and allows the college to share information directly with the public.

 

Snedden, Newman’s communications director, responded similarly. She said the medium allows people to connect that wouldn’t normally be connected. As such, the university is able to engage with local businesses and may retweet local coupons and deals students find valuable. Newman’s admissions representatives are encouraged to tweet information on the university’s main account to appeal to prospective students, she said.

The admissions office at WSU takes a more unique approach to Twitter with its @wheatweet account. Instead of featuring a university logo or building for its profile picture, the page shows a headshot of admissions director Gandu; instead of a bio of the school, it displays a short tidbit about him. In every way, the profile reads like a personal account — except, the admissions Web site links to it as its own.

 

“That was definitely a cognizant choice we made,” said Gandu, whose team talked to students currently using Twitter and found they wanted the office to “put some life into it, put some personality into it.”

 

Generally speaking, Gandu doesn’t focus his tweets on things happening in the admissions office. Rather, he talks about general WSU happenings, like the Shockers’ recent NIT win and faculty accomplishments. This strategy is consistent with higher education marketing blogger Bob Johnson’s suggestion that you shouldn’t post only your own promotional content to Twitter but should recognize useful, relevant information in other areas.  

 

Blogs give a glimpse into campus life

 

Blogs can create a level of openness and transparency between prospective students and universities. Because of this, college admissions offices are adopting blogging at a rate that outpaces many Fortune 500 companies (Barnes & Mattson, 2009).

 

Of the universities studied, Newman University emerges as one of the most prolific when it comes to blogging. The university maintains five different blogs: One created by Newman student ambassadors, another by transfer students, and still others by adult students, the provost and the president. Though not all of these blogs are targeted to prospective students, each offers a distinct, birds-eye view of campus life that an incoming student may find valuable. Interestingly, Newman’s use of blogs confirms Barnes and Mattson’s (2009) finding that private universities tend to utilize blogs more than public ones.

Butler Community College added a Posterous news blog to its social media repertoire in January. The blog allows the college to take more control and influence over its messages, and in a sense, allows it to bypass the traditional news media in telling its story, Entz said.

 

Butler also uses student blogs to show what’s going on from a student perspective, as does WSU.

 

However, both Entz and Gandu admitted readership for student blogs has been low overall, and getting the audience to comment and engage has been difficult. Both asserted a willingness to continue trying different strategies to increase readership, but seemed at a loss for how exactly this might pan out in the future.

 

Taking risks and trying new platforms

 

Just as any marketing plan requires predetermined strategies and a lot of thought, engaging in social media platforms is no exception. Representatives from Butler, WSU and Newman seemed to recognize this for the most part, but their responses made it clear there’s a fine line between taking a risk and jumping in just for the sake of it.

 

As Gandu noted several times, social media are free and low maintenance. As such, there’s often no reason not to use them.

 

But he was also careful to point out that WSU conducts research before making decisions. Reading and focus groups were specific tactics Gandu mentioned in determining when and where to reach out on social media.

 

Though it’s best to only take calculated risks, Snedden’s comparison of social media to a laboratory experiment is fitting. Sometimes, you have to jump in and ride the wave to know if a tool will be effective.

 

“It’s really live and learn,” she said.

 

Here are some platforms where these universities are stepping out:

 

• Flickr – Both Butler and Newman are delving into the photostream site, claiming it’s a good way to store and organize pictures. Entz said the site gives the college more control over photos than Facebook. Plus, Flickr allows for larger albums that create a “visual directory” of what the college is like. 

 

• Chat/instant messaging – Prospective students can chat online with admissions representatives at WSU and Butler, though this method has been met with different results in these schools. WSU’s Gandu said the ease of monitoring chat messages and answering questions is easy and effective overall, while Butler’s Entz expressed how spotty Internet connections and busy representatives can lead to too much of a time delay in response. Butler is planning to utilize Twitter instead for customer service. 

 

• YouTube – All three universities in this study either have or plan to establish YouTube or similar online video channels. WSU, in particular, plans to roll out short vignette videos in the near future and show them on iPads to interested students during school visits. 

 

Social media: ‘Solution, not savior’

 

As an article in the Chronicle of Higher Education states, using social media in admissions is no longer a choice. Barnes and Mattson (2009) contend that as more and more young people spend increasing amounts of time connecting with others via new media platforms, an institutional presence will be mandatory.

 

Still, while social media will unquestioningly continue to be a part of the marketing mix for colleges, the tools are a “solution but not a savior,” Entz said.

 

That is, social media are not the be-all, end-all for college recruiters and admissions offices. In fact, of the three representatives interviewed, none could imagine a time when traditional methods (like direct mailings and campus visits) would be completely replaced by new media.

 

Letters and print brochures are more important than anything else for parents, according to Gandu. Research shows that high school students also want personalized messages, phone calls and e-mails — all specifically tailored to their interests and all with their name on it.

“[Social media] have enhanced what we can do with prospective students….There will continue to be a balance,” Gandu said.

 

 

Final thoughts

 

Gandu, Snedden and Entz’s words all echo much of what is frequently recognized in the marketing world: Social media are effective when they lead to two-way communication and interaction, and different platforms are more appropriate for reaching certain audiences. While a tweet or Facebook page will never be enough to convince a prospective student to study at a given university, a friendly tip or reminder via a new media site may shed a more favorable light on an institution. Though Wichita State, Newman and Butler utilize social media in slightly different ways and often appeal to multiple audiences rather than targeting prospective students alone, their online presences reveal the new ways universities can reach the millennial generation.

 

 

All the world’s a stage. OK, the phrase is so clichéd, it’s almost painful to write.

 

But here’s the thing. We’re living in the age of the Internet, in an age where new media prevail and social sharing becomes the currency of culture. And in this environment, the world really does become your stage, your chance to share information about who you are and who you hope to be.

 

Erving Goffman may not have lived to see this digital age, but I believe his theory on self presentation fits our current environment well. In Goffman’s 1959 work, The Presentations of Self in Everyday Life, he metaphorically compares the way communicators choose to present themselves with theatrical dramatization. He views everyday settings as a stage, where people are actors who perform to make a specific (and often strategic) impression on an audience. Self presentation is thus a matter of impression management.

Facebook, in particular, allows for this kind of self presentation and dramatization. It prompts you to enter all sorts of information about yourself, from your date of birth to your movie preferences to your political and religious affiliations. As such, Facebook gives you the tools to present yourself exactly as you want to be known. Whether this persona sticks in the offline world is another matter entirely, but the social networking site allows for at least a solid attempt at defining yourself and your relationships with others. This accounts, I think, for a large portion of Facebook’s overall success.

 

And Facebook is successful, indeed. According to a Washington Post article from December, Facebook became the most popular site on the Internet in 2010. It surpassed Google in all ways but revenue; Google remains a search giant with nearly $24 billion in sales last year.

 

Still, a survey by the Nielsen Co. found that Americans spent nearly 23 percent of their time online using social networks. The ever-successful Facebook leads the way in this new landscape, where the Web is becoming increasingly people-centric.

 

Being yourself on the world’s largest stage

 

If presenting yourself on Facebook is a good way to establish your identity and tell people who you are, then local restaurant owner Tanya Tandoc has it down pat. Tandoc, who will soon reopen Tanya’s Soup Kitchen after a seven-year hiatus, utilizes her personal Facebook page to promote her business and to tell people more about herself.

 

Tandoc recognizes the platform is inherently social, and as such, seems a good fit for her larger-than-life and fearless personality. She uses Facebook to share recipes, cross-promote things she likes and — most importantly — form relationships with other people.

 

“My whole thing is about having connections with people and being yourself….For the most part, people like it when you’re real,” said the chef.

Tandoc is no stranger to building her personal and professional brand through media outlets. When Tandoc first opened her original restaurant in Old Town, she realized her proximity to The Wichita Eagle would be a golden opportunity to meet reporters and establish relationships with them. As a result of her reaching out, her restaurant received more publicity, much of which was favorable (though Tandoc admits to still being bitter about the little that wasn’t).  She said forming connections with people who made the news was particularly essential in building her brand pre-Internet.

 

Now, Tandoc still values her relationships with the media but knows that new media tools open a world of possibilities when it comes to engaging with the community. With 2,409 Facebook friends and counting, Tandoc seems well on her way to reaching at least a portion of that community.

 

The future role of Facebook

 

So does the increasing popularity of Facebook mean it will play an inevitable role in the future of new media?

 

I’ve written before that I am a huge fan of Facebook. It was the first technological tool I remember being a part of right from the beginning, and as such, I’ve always considered it cool and a step above some of the other social networking sites in which I participate. Paul Levinson calls this the “first love syndrome,” contending that we most love what we first experience (New New Media, 2009).

 

If my obsessive checking of Facebook is any indication, Levinson is right.

 

So I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want Facebook to play a significant part in the future. Its ease, accessibility and uncluttered structure make it something worthwhile from my perspective as both a consumer and a communicator.

 

Here’s how I think it will play a role:

 

As the Washington Post article mentioned above indicates, our network of friends and connections seems to mean more to us when it comes to finding information than any of Google’s complicated algorithms. We trust information other people give us, not because we all believe our friends have an inherent hold on truth, but because we assume they are not out to manipulate us.

 

Google — or rather, the companies that feed it information — haven’t always proven worthy of this kind of trust. In 2010, after BP’s Deepwarter Horizon oil rig exploded in the Gulf and led to the worst oil spill in U.S. history, the company bought Google search terms in an effort to control what people found when they searched for the BP spill online. Many recognized immediately that their searches weren’t garnering organic results and argued BP’s move was nothing more than manipulative crisis management.

 

I speculate, then, that people will continue to use Facebook and social media tools as a means of instantaneous knowledge acquisition.

 

“When old media fail to keep us posted, and old-fashioned searches for information on the Web fail to give us answers, the new new media and its principle of readers becoming writers and providers of information sometimes can give us the answers we seek,” Levinson writes (p. 123).

 

Furthermore, Tandoc’s model of using personal pages to promote a business will likely become more prominent in this environment. Because people put more trust in peer-to-peer relationships, I wouldn’t be surprised if there is soon a backlash against company Facebook fan pages. Even if they’re utilized in a way that seems authentic, it may be hard to convince the public that such pages aren’t out to manipulate them or lie to them.

 

The dark side…

 

Throughout the course of the new media classes I’ve taken in the last year, I’ve come to realize the interactive and potentially wonderful opportunities that social media provide. The multi-faceted nature of new media is so intriguing, it keeps my mind buzzing long after class, as I write my blog and try to keep up with Twitter and do a myriad of things that arguably matter much and/or matter little in building my personal brand.

 

But one thing I’ve learned in the past year continually rears its ugly, unsettling head as my understanding of social media develops. This one thing constantly goes round in my mind and sometimes inhibits the things I choose to display about myself:

 

You are not in control.

 

Levinson confirms my point in New New Media (2009) when he writes that no matter how much we feel a new media system is ours because we can produce and self-project on it, the new medium is never ours completely.

 

As such, feeding nearly endless amounts of information to Facebook, a private company, could come back to haunt us. It seems safe now, but as the Washington Post points out, Facebook has been accused of allowing advertisers excessive access to users’ personal information. Just how vulnerable this makes users remains to be seen, but it’s an important reminder that you must pay attention to what you say about yourself and how you self-present.

 

Jane Wakefield, technology writer for the BBC, poses the possibility that 2010 was the year privacy died. As she says, Facebook’s increasingly complex privacy settings mean people are starting to give away more information to more people than they intend. Making the privacy controls easy to understand is just part of the problem.

And all of this is to say nothing of the potentially greater dangers that have lurked in the minds of Internet users for years. Does the anonymous nature of the Web foster more negative and threatening comments? Are users more vulnerable to senseless attacks from trolls?

 

Tandoc, the restaurant owner mentioned earlier, may be one of the first to answer yes. Tandoc said keeping her page positive and upbeat is difficult in a Web environment where anonymous people continuously “spew hateful comments.” What’s worse, Tandoc said she had a legitimate online stalker and has sought legal protection. (Her refusal to abandon social media after that scary situation is proof to me that Tandoc is one brave woman.)

 

In spite of it all

 

The ability of people to create their own unique identities and project themselves as they want to be known will be an enticing pull for many future Facebook users, as Goffman’s self-presentation theory suggests in a round-about way. As such, Facebook will likely continue to increase in popularity, at least for the time being. Businesses will increasingly be forced to use more personal methods to appeal to the public in human ways, as users rely on a more person-centric Web. In short, it looks like Facebook’s role in new media will continue. In fact, it may have only just begun.

 

Tune into any media outlet this weekend, and you’ll likely see or hear a thing or two about the bracket busters, buzzer beaters and highlight clips that are the craziness of the men’s and women’s NCAA basketball tournaments.

 

March Madness, which has become something of a springtime Christmas for die-hard fans, puts the spotlight on schools, players and coaches in a way few things can. It also generates a significant amount of publicity and revenue for the tournaments’ host towns and can be a big-time break for chosen arenas and venues. For a host city, the tournaments can lead to economic development as locals and visitors alike spend money at area eateries, businesses and hotels.

 

It’s safe to say, though, that the men’s games traditionally garner more attention from both the media and consumers. So how does an advertiser get locals pumped up about a women’s tournament that is, um, slightly less popular?

 

This was the question advertising agency Sullivan Higdon & Sink faced when they learned the first and second rounds of the women’s NCAA basketball tournament were coming to Wichita’s Intrust Bank Arena. The agency, whose “We Hate Sheep” slogan reflects its commitment to standing out from the flock, came up with some creative solutions.

 

They started out with a defined goal (to give the women’s NCAA basketball tournament a cool image) and conducted research to find out who the target audience was (fans) and where they gathered (bars). These steps allowed SHS to strategically develop inventive advertisements: One, a coaster with an augmented reality code which, when scanned with an iPhone, allowed users to “shoot basketballs” into a hoop printed on the coaster (the effect is similar to the one pictured below); another, a table topper game where bar patrons could flip bottle caps or token basketballs through a cardboard hoop.

One digital. One not. But both low-cost solutions to reaching a target audience.

 

Digital: Strategic process or pure creativity?

 

SHS’s March Madness campaign typifies what advertisers can do with new digital technologies. And while the augmented reality thing is cool (way cool), it’s not just the novelty that innovative agencies like SHS are after.

 

According to Lathi de Silva, vice president and director of brand reputation at SHS, employees are careful to address six strategic elements every time they create a new campaign for a client: 1) Expectations, 2) exploration, 3) enlightenment, 4) elaboration, 5) experience and 6) evaluation. In short, the process is about looking for the most relevant methods and times to target consumers, helping clients understand what success looks like and determining the degree digital strategies should be part of the creative solution.

 

Like a graduate student intent on putting together the perfect thesis, SHS researches every relevant aspect of the topic at hand. Many times, this includes conducting primary research on the desired audiences to understand their thoughts, feelings and habits. In this sense, planning is a key component of the process and makes even edgy campaigns a calculated risk.

 

“We don’t do anything just to do it. We have to make sure it’s going to work,” said Greg Standifer, SHS brand reputation manager.

 

For example, SHS recently worked on a campaign to launch an unknown branded natural beef product inside Super Targets nationwide. Because the agency was looking to target the natural food market, they had to learn more about consumers of natural food. It was only through a survey of 1,000 natural food consumers and 1,000 non-natural food consumers that the agency found some interesting facts about their target audience: 1) natural food consumers are more likely to use smartphones, and 2) natural food consumers are more engaged with brands and will research labels to determine if their claims of organic purity are true.

As a result, SHS was able to produce an experimental campaign in which mobile barcodes were placed on the back of beef packages. When scanned with a smartphone, the codes took consumers to a 20-second YouTube video about the product. Though seemingly chancy, the campaign was grounded in enough solid research to make the innovative strategy worth the risk.

 

The new media age is here: Get comfortable

 

As a recent PRSay blog post notes, reputations are at greater risk in this new environment where information (accurate or not) can spread like wildfire online and where the number of influencers companies need to connect with has skyrocketed.  Danielle Sacks of Fast Company aptly characterizes this environment as one that leaves many advertising execs at a loss for what to do and how to keep up.

 

“I feel like I’m standing here and there are a thousand baseballs dropping from the sky, and I don’t know which ones to catch,” confesses one executive in Sacks’ article.

 

SHS recognizes this fear and regularly works with clients to establish readiness before jumping into new media. In fact, the agency requires clients to take a ten-question quiz to gauge the company’s ability and willingness to share control, update digital content, respond quickly to customers and embrace authenticity.

 

The quiz serves as a great reality check and helps clients weigh risks and rewards, de Silva said. The process gets clients comfortable with social media, something that is strategically necessary.

 

This readiness also involves a company’s ability to protect its brand online. Not only should an organization create new media policies that govern employee use of social media, but crisis response plans should also be put in place to establish go-to spokespeople and determine if, when and how to react should negative comments arise. Though the need for crisis preparedness is nothing new, social media intensify the game and make risk management all the more important. Planning in advance makes adhering to strategies — rather than acting on emotions — more likely.

Who do you trust?

 

For many companies, getting involved in digital media requires a shift in thinking. After all, new media involve two-way communication. The Internet is no longer just a place to find information; corporations must learn to be authentic, relevant and personal online, de Silva said.

 

From an advertising perspective, this may mean engaging with key influencers people already trust. According to Leyl Master Black’s article, “5 Predictions for the Public Relations Industry in 2011,” there will be an increasingly aggressive outreach to high-profile Twitter and Facebook users, offering them incentives to post or tweet information to followers.

 

This is another strategy SHS has already employed. Before the holidays, the agency worked on a campaign to get “foodies” to put a premium beef product on their wish lists. SHS reached out to the bloggers behind www.Cookerati.com and offered to send them sampler products in exchange for (positive or negative) food reviews. The pitch was a hit; not only did the bloggers agree to write about the beef product, but links back to Cookerati on Facebook and Twitter spread the message even further. In this case, the use of peer-to-peer interaction was more effective than any traditional advertisement because it gave credibility to the product.

 

How SHS is measuring up

 

So is SHS finding memorable ways to stand out from the flock in digital and differentiate clients’ brands, as its “We Hate Sheep” slogan promises?

 

In short, absolutely. The agency is taking risks where it counts, but it’s never doing so haphazardly. For SHS, strategy and planning are the name of the game. Surveys, questionnaires and methodical processes undergird everything it does — from promoting March Madness in Wichita to boosting sales of natural beef products nationwide.

 

For SHS, the timing of its shift to digital strategies couldn’t be more right. As Sacks writes in her Fast Company article, advertising is on the cusp of its first creative revolution since the 1960s. No longer a linear process where one part of the agency (copywriters, for example) completes its portion of a project and hands it off to the next group (art directors), advertising has become much more chaotic, but also a place where creativity can flourish. SHS seems to realize this and looks to cost-effective, innovative digital strategies to complete its arsenal of creative offerings.

 

Still, new media is free and relatively easy to use. As such, it’s not just long-established agencies like SHS that can cash in on the revolution. Up-and-coming creative agencies, even with few staff members and small budgets, have just as much ability in the digital age to make an impact. As Leah Moon writes, “Everyone is fighting to become the best out there.” And with the new media revolution, anyone can. This isn’t so much a critique of SHS’s ability to keep up as it is a call to action for all advertisers: Keep learning, keep looking ahead. It’s arguably the most exciting time to be in communication. What will we make of it?

Netflix. DVRs. YouTube. Hulu. Clicker.

 

New media like these change consumer expectations and create a culture where viewers demand programming be available at the touch of a button, any time they want.

 

So where does this leave local television news broadcasts, which for years have run in dependable 5, 6 and 10 p.m. time slots? How can television news programs remain relevant when so many voices are competing for consumer attention?

 

According to Sunflower Broadcasting General Sales Manager Brian McDonough, the new digital world is nothing short of a modern “wild, wild west.”

 

“It’s crazy out there,” McDonough said Feb. 22, when he spoke with WSU’s Media Transformation class.

 

Because new media is, well, so new, everyone is trying to be a pioneer. As a result, everyone and no one is an expert.

McDonough admits Sunflower Broadcasting, which includes CBS’s affiliate station in Wichita, KWCH, was slow to pay attention to the changing media landscape and did not initially compete for a share in the digital market. In fact, he said, the company was far behind until higher management began asking what their new media plan was.

 

The questioning was apparently just the wake-up call the broadcasting company needed. In the last five years, the company has made significant leaps and bounds in the digital arena. Their main site, KWCH.com, garnered well over 20 million page views in the last year, compared with just 750,000 in 2005. They also own and operate 4 thriving digital properties in addition to KWCH.com: CatchItKansas, KSCW, FetchToto and Univision Kansas.

 

In addition, each employee contributes to the various Web sites every month. This is a dramatic shift from 2005, when only one person regularly created Web content.

 

“It’s a full team effort, which is remarkable considering where we came from,” McDonough said.

 

Build, report and socialize

 

So how did Sunflower Broadcasting make the jump from their wait-and-see mindset to their digital-oriented outlook?

 

For one thing, “the culture of the station has changed,” said Shawn Hilferty, director of marketing and digital media.

 

In addition to weekly meetings where staff members discussed what to do and how to improve (a strategy they still employ today), the broadcast organization also began moving forward in strategic ways: By building the sites and populating them with content, transforming reporting strategies and using social media tools to build relationships with consumers.

 

Building the site and populating it with content

 

The first step included constructing the sites themselves. Hilferty built CatchItKansas.com, a site dedicated to local high school sports schedules, scores, statistics and photos, in just three weeks, a feat made more remarkable because each school and each sport is its own site under the larger, umbrella page. FetchToto.com, a local search and business directory, as well as sites for sister stations KSCW and Univision Kansas were constructed more recently.

 

 

According to Damon Kiesow in his Poynter post, Five Mobile Media Issues that Will Define the Future, mobile devices such as the iPhone open the market to an expansion of hybrid journalism, where professional reporters and regular citizens collaborate to produce more comprehensive coverage.

 

CatchItKansas, in particular, capitalizes on this ability by encouraging the public to submit digital photo and video highlights of local games. The concept is similar to CNN’s iReport and is a good way to keep up with the abundance of incoming stats and photos, especially since CatchItKansas now covers 180 schools (instead of the original 14).

 

Transforming reporting strategies

 

A second area in which the station’s culture changed was in photographer and reporter strategies. For example, with CatchItKansas offering extended video and photo coverage of multiple games around the state, station photographers can no longer shoot a few minutes of a game to air on the nightly news program. Instead, they have to be willing to spend time filming hours of footage.

 

Reporters also have to take on roles as writers, photographers and videographers. A simple system on the backend of the sites allows each reporter to post his/her own Web stories, plus related photos and videos, Hilferty said. The goal is to put in enough video and links to other stories and sites that no report is a dead end online but always leads to more content. Digital producers manage the content so it flows appropriately.

 

The extended and interlinking coverage is a key strategy considering the increasing competition from citizen journalists.

 

Using social media to build relationships with consumers 

 

Third, the station began tying everything to social media sites like Facebook, Digg and Twitter. As recently as three weeks ago, the company added a “Follow us on Facebook” widget to its sites to make “liking” the station on the popular social media network more accessible. Again, it is about getting — and monetizing — page views.  

 

More than that, though, the company has realized getting consumer attention is not enough; they must also interact with them.

 

“You need to talk to people and get them involved in the conversation,” McDonough said.

 

They’ve done that by doing away with automatic postings that are the same on each network, and they’re even trying to create a little fun. When a viewer recently commented about KWCH weatherman Merril Teller’s crazy hairdo and mustache in the ‘70s, the station tracked down an old picture and posted it to its sites.

Social media is a great way to get people chatting not only with the station, but also with each other about TV programming. As Brian Stelter writes in TV Industry Taps Social Media to Keep Viewers’ Attention, social media allow viewers to gather around the online water cooler and talk about their favorite shows in real time. The result can be higher ratings, as was the case for this year’s Grammy Awards, which had its highest ratings in a decade.

KWCH does try to get consumers involved in a conversation with each other on occasion by posting links to specific CBS programs or to newscast information (for example, a Facebook post from Feb. 25 reads, “Remember, a new episode of Blue Bloods tonight at 9p starring Tom Selleck. By the way…do you know Tom Selleck writes [Jesse Stone] movies? Have you seen them all?”).

This strategy, though, is nothing more than “skating with the puck at your feet,” writes Fast Company blogger Mark Suster. That is, TV execs understand where things are today but not where they’re headed. He predicts big advances in the area of social TV, and encourages broadcasters to look ahead to developing innovations.

Television’s advantages

While it may seem the digital world has evolved so completely that TV’s place is being edged out entirely, McDonough said there are unique advantages for broadcasters in this day and age.

 

“Broadcast TV is in a position to be the major player in digital,” he said.

Specifically, he gave five areas where broadcast TV — in particular, KWCH — has a unique hold:

 

• Their core product is still growing and profitable. Americans watched more television in 2010 than ever, with an average viewing time of 34 hours per person per week.
• The time spent watching Web videos in 2010 was less than the increase in TV viewing, McDonough said.
• Local broadcast stations have real-life people with whom consumers can develop relationships.
• Television is a “big, intrusive microphone,” according to McDonough. Television shows and commercials come into consumers’ homes.
• In the case of KWCH, they have the spectrum to launch mobile TV and can send free programming to mobile phones.

 The future of TV

 

As Suster contends, no one can predict exactly where the future of television is headed.

 

But the battle for the digital living room will continue, without question.

 

Broadband-enabled devices and subscription services (namely, Apple TV box, Google TV, Netflix and Hulu) are forecasted to lead the biggest revolution in viewing habits since the advent of cable TV and will prompt more consumers to “cut the cord” by dropping their cable and satellite services. According to a recent projection by SNL Kagan, 46.3 million homes will have at least one TV with Internet connection by 2014, and 7 percent of all households will depend on the Web instead of pay TV to watch professionally produced content.

 

As these numbers increase, consumers will no longer have to rely on one broadband pipe to deliver what they see in a linear timeframe. As Suster writes, content bundling, where companies bundle stations into packages, is among the walking dead. Consumers are tired of being told what they can get for their money, and the ability to pick and chose the stations they want will be all the more crucial in the new media environment.

 

Furthermore, mobile devices will continue to become “second screens,” where devices will be televisions in their own right. Broadcast stations like KWCH will need to continue working on their iPhone, iPad and Android apps in order to remain viable in this arena.

 

Hilferty knows this, and his approach to developing mobie waps and apps is just as methodical and committed as his approach to building the station’s Web presence. The station plans to build apps in house and is sending one employee to mobile application training to learn the necessary skills.

 

Ultimately, there’s no doubt that changes in television will transform how TV journalists report, how viewers contribute to the news and how people connect with one another. Whether you’re a broadcaster or a consumer, the old TV adage certainly applies: Don’t touch that dial. Stay tuned.

As the Web continues to play a greater role in the evolving media landscape, news organizations must integrate new capabilities into their efforts or risk losing their competitive edge.

This is the conclusion of a Media Management Center report (Moser-Wellman, Vahlberg, Durkes & Edwards, 2008), which identifies six main competencies an organization must adopt to stay afloat in the changing landscape. Specifically, the report contends journalists must learn not only to be reporters, but also to be: 1) Platform strategists, 2) marketers, 3) community builders, 4) data miners, 5) complete storytellers and 6) entrepreneurs.

In other words, journalists should utilize multiple platforms when telling a story, differentiate and market their content and opinion, target small, like-minded communities, use data to gain insight into new revenue streams, provide rich content and context and take on the mindset of entrepreneurs to engage audiences.

Taking on these principles has been the key objective of newspapers such as The Wichita Eagle, which has transformed into a true multimedia company in recent years. The newspaper utilizes everything from the print edition to Twitter feeds to mobile apps to reach consumers.

“Our job is to look for opportunities,” Editor Sherry Chisenhall said in a panel discussion Tuesday.

In the mid-‘90s, it was a common and acceptable practice for news organizations to “dump” their print versions onto their Web sites, with little to no changes or additions to content. As a result, the Web versions of newspapers and magazines tended to look exactly like the printed copies. This was an either/or experience for readers, who only needed to look at one source to get their fill of the news.

The last three to five years, however, have brought the fastest pace of change in news organizations in history, as Internet technologies have grown at rapid-fire rates.

“The pace of change will be eternal, that’s about the only thing that’s for sure,” Chisenhall said.

Platform strategists

The willingness to move with the pace of change is what allows the Eagle to reach news consumers at a variety of levels. Whether someone wants to check the latest headlines on their phones, glance through a photo gallery on a desktop or go the traditional route and pick up a print copy, the Eagle’s goal is to make content widely accessible.

 

Though the Eagle’s Web revenue equals 25 percent of its total monetary picture and is far from surpassing print, consumer appetite for digital content is no doubt on the rise. To ensure consumers can get news on whatever platform they prefer, the newspaper is placing strong emphasis on training everyone to be multi-platform specialists. This is true of everyone from reporters to the advertising team.

“The folks that have been here a long time…they’re having to learn digital just as much as they learn print,” said Jason Schlitz, interactive sales manager for the paper.

 

While consumers are still likely to read news primarily in one medium or another, offering content strategically across multiple platforms is at the top of the Eagle’s priority list, Chisenhall said.

This vision is consistent with Moser-Wellman, et al.’s finding that organizations with separate teams for Internet, mobile, print and so on — with no cross-pollination — are missing opportunities to meet consumer needs. Innovation cannot happen in a rigid and isolated environment. Therefore, newspapers would do well to follow the Eagle’s example and strategically integrate platforms to give consumers what they want, when they want it.

Marketers

What unique value does this news organization offer?

According to Moser-Wellman, et al.’s report, a news organization must answer this question if it hopes to set itself apart as a trusted resource. Essentially, an organization must define its brand by differentiating itself based on content and opinion.

For journalists, this means establishing their credibility as reporters and marketing their own stories. As Chisenhall said, “Your byline is your brand.”

One way to market your stories is to connect with readers through social media, as many marketing pros know.

Reporters at the Eagle are encouraged to do this regularly, and many effectively do (see Ron Sylvester,  Suzanne Tobias or Carrie Rengers’ Twitter pages, for example).

Community builders

Targeting small markets of like-minded consumers is important in providing readers with information they find valuable. This involves connecting people around shared interests, as well as tailoring content for smaller and smaller audience segments. Showing an appreciation for the audience and the social networks they represent is crucial, Moser-Wellman, et al. argue.

This does not mean news organizations have to create communities out of thin air; they should simply focus on connecting with existing communities (for example, people who are interested in college basketball or are employed in the aviation industry).

Data miners

When it comes to knowing what still needs work, numbers matter. Unlike newsrooms of the past, which had to rely on months-old reports, news organizations today can gather moment-by-moment metrics of how their work is being received by audiences.

According to Chisenhall, every bit of the metrics is a clue to what is working and what is not. That is why all journalists at The Wichita Eagle receive daily e-mail reports detailing the metrics of online stories. In fact, the paper has a training plan in place for multi-platform editors so they can begin to monitor their own metrics in real-time.

Complete storytellers

The emergent role of storyteller is perhaps the most consistent with journalistic standards of old: Paint a detailed, accurate picture. Today’s tools allow reporters to do this in a much more complete way than in the past, however. Now, integrating text with photos, videos, comments, charts, graphics, interactive elements and more is possible, and doing so offers consumers a more in-depth and satisfying experience.

Again, it is about giving consumers what they want, when they want it.

As Moser-Wellman, et al. contend, news organizations have an advantage when it comes to telling a full, detailed story. Because such organizations are equipped with a long-running and rich archive of information, journalists can retrieve a wide array of information and provide a deeply contextualized, localized history of any story. The ability is something to which bloggers and other competing voices do not have access.

The Eagle’s page on “The Miracle of Father Kapaun” incorporates a series of stories, photo galleries, videos, audio recordings, chat transcripts, timelines and more to paint a rich picture of Kansas priest and Vietnam War hero Father Emil Kapaun. The page serves as a kind of one-stop-shop for everything you want to know about the life and legacy of Father Kapaun, and is a wonderful example of complete and deeply satisfying storytelling.

Entrepreneurs

For an entrepreneur, taking risk is a necessary evil.

Indeed, a willingness to fail is equally essential in the current media landscape, where news organizations must try new strategies in order to stay relevant. Technology is constantly shifting, and no one is quite sure what the business will look like, even in the near future.

“A lot has changed since this morning,” Schlitz quipped.

Schlitz was only half joking. Fact is, in this changing environment, journalists and editors alike have to be flexible. What is true of technology one minute might not be true the next.  As Williams, Lynch and LeBailly write in Life Beyond Print (2009), news organizations should encourage journalists to keep current in online trends by using their downtime to edit video, upload photos, Tweet and more.

One area the Eagle will need to be willing to adapt is in mobile. As Deputy Editor of Interactive John Boogert said, phones and mobile devices will soon be the most important place for news. Though the Eagle already has an iPhone app and is working on one for Android, the changing facets of the new medium will make keeping up a challenge.

On target

In hearing from The Wichita Eagle' s panel, it is clear the organization is hitting the mark in several areas. By training reporters and editors to be multi-platform strategists, establishing personal brands via social media, paying attention to the metrics, telling rich, in-depth stories and being willing to learn and adapt, the Eagle is embracing its role as a multimedia company and is effectively serving many consumers.

While the Eagle’s efforts have transformed the organization into a local multimedia leader, energy has not been extended into improving all six competencies that Moser-Wellman, et al.’s report recommends. They have not tapped into existing communities the way they could, for example.

But holding back in some areas is not all bad. As Chisenhall said, smart businesses know excelling at two to three things is better than moderately accomplishing five or six. No matter the resources, no business can successfully be all things to all people. Identifying an organization’s core competencies and concentrating efforts solely on certain things is important in establishing a business as the go-to resource for the community.

When it comes to the role journalists are expected to play in this evolving media landscape, one thing is clear: Their jobs have fundamentally changed.  Reporters must now learn how to create content for both print and digital, as well as market their own stories and measure the results.

Still, as a local news consumer, I want the news I receive to be as accurate and thorough as possible. I have no doubt the Eagle strives to achieve this, but I am concerned that as organizations focus on more platforms, marketing and measurement, journalists will be left with little time to appropriately research and carefully craft a story. At the heart of print journalism is the art of writing. In the rush to remain competitive in the new digital age, this should never be forgotten.

 

 

 

For anyone looking for his or her 15 minutes of fame, the creation of YouTube in 2005 opened a world of shining possibilities. With its “Broadcast Yourself” trademark, the video site soon began turning homemade videos into overnight sensations and gave many unknowns their moment in the spotlight (if only through their piano-playing pets).

           

The implications of YouTube are significantly more far-reaching than the possibility of instant fame, however, and its cultural importance is evident in the site’s slogan alone. Armed with a video recording device of any size, brand or quality, YouTube users become more than viewers. With YouTube, anyone can be a broadcaster.

 

The shift from consumer to large-scale broadcaster isn’t limited to the general public.  “Broadcast Yourself” can just as easily mean “Broadcast Your Company” or “Broadcast Your Brand,” a fact many public relations professionals welcome with open arms. After all, posting videos to YouTube is a relatively easy and extraordinarily cheap (i.e., free) process that allows for the dissemination of a message — any message — on a worldwide level.

In the traditional top-down structure, where major news outlets had unique access to the tools needed to disseminate information,  public relations professionals had to rely on press releases and media contacts to spread their side of the story. Editors and reporters were gatekeepers, distributing only information they found relevant or important. The effectiveness of press releases and pitches was unpredictable at best, if for no other reason than newspapers had a limited amount of space, and television news programs had a limited amount of time. If the mainstream media did not pick up a story, the public was unlikely to hear about it.

 

However, as with other social media channels, YouTube became a means whereby PR professionals could bypass traditional media altogether and speak directly to customers. YouTube allows the audience to actually see and hear straight from the company, and is thus a more personal medium than even its social media predecessors. With its distinctly human element, the video format — if used correctly — can be of enormous benefit in getting the public engaged and connected with your brand and ideals.

 

Unlike television, there are no financial barriers to posting a video on YouTube. It is free to broadcast, which means a company can post an hour-long spot every day if it wants to. It would be impossible for even the president to secure that much television network time.  But with YouTube, posts can be made as frequently as creators have time to produce them.

 

What PR pros can learn from Obama’s use of YouTube

 

Human faces and voices can convey reassurance and comfort in otherwise uncertain times. As Levinson discusses in New New Media (2009), President Obama’s frequent use of YouTube to make public addresses gives him the ability to be in touch with the nation as no president has done before. In fact, Obama’s addresses have been hailed by many as the modern day equivalent of FDR’s radio “fireside chats.”  

 

Though there have been a string of politicians who either succeeded or failed at utilizing certain media in the past (e.g., President Kennedy did well on television, while Nixon did not), Obama was able to pull together the worlds of traditional media and new media in an unprecedented way. According to Levinson (2009), Obama was the ideal Internet candidate because he could look and sound good on television, and he was able to transfer that charisma to the Web. Paul Saffo calls this meeting of YouTube and “telegenics” (that is, being photogenic on television), “cybergenics.”

                                                                                                                                                 Photo by: Charles Dharapak / AP

In my opinion, the lesson to be learned from Obama’s widespread appeal on YouTube is not that everyone has to be television-ready at all times to be successful on the site, but that videos used as part of PR campaigns must, in some way, be credible. That is, there needs to be an element of knowledge, professionalism and expertise. Providing value is what makes customers trust a company. It does not matter if videos are silly or serious, and not everything has to be filmed using the highest quality digital recorder on the planet. But establishing your company as an affable expert will keep the audience coming back for more.

 

Fight fire with…YouTube?

 

The upside of YouTube from a PR standpoint is obvious: One can effectively disseminate messages instantly and on a worldwide scale.

 

However, there is a definite downside to YouTube from a PR standpoint: One can effectively disseminate messages instantly and on a worldwide scale.

 

This means, of course, that the open nature of the video site can admit some “bad eggs,” as Levinson puts it (p. 71). As a result, real reputational damage can be done to a company.

 

In April 2009, for example, Domino’s Pizza faced a corporate crisis when two employees created and posted prank videos on YouTube in which they were shown preparing food with some special added ingredients: nose mucus and saliva. The videos went viral, receiving one million views in just four days. Even though the employees were immediately fired, the nasty videos left some customers wondering about the quality of their food. As The New York Times reported, even many loyal customers refused to order pizza from the chain.

 

In response, the company strategically posted a YouTube video of its own, which featured company president Patrick Doyle apologizing for the confusion and explaining the company’s plans to move forward and listen to customers. Though Domino’s was criticized for making the video too late (it came 48 hours into the crisis), many praised the company for responding in the same medium where the incident first began (Soat, 2009, para. 16).

 

As the Domino’s/YouTube episode shows, social media are at once hazards and opportunities for public relations.

 

YouTube success

 

The creation of YouTube added two new dimensions to the audio-visual world: Viewer choice and interaction. The video site provides an on-demand and social element TV cannot. Consumers — not the producers, the network or the advertisers — can choose when and where and for how long they watch a video (Levinson, 2009, p. 68).  They can also comment on the videos and share them with others online.

 

But YouTube, like most of the Internet, seems to be suffering from a sort of information congestion, an abundance of activity and links and choices for consumers. According to the site’s online press room:

35 hours of video are uploaded every minute   More video is uploaded to YouTube in 60 days than the 3 major U.S. networks created in 60 years   94 of AdAge’s Top 100 advertisers have run campaigns on YouTube and the Google Display Network

In other words, there are a lot of competing voices on YouTube. And if PR practitioners hope to gain recognition and loyal subscribers, they must find a way to rise above the noise. While there is no absolute formula for success, there are a few things that may help PR professionals use YouTube more effectively.

 

• Be aware of what keywords your audience will likely search for and use them appropriately. Because YouTube is one of the largest search engines in the world, knowing and utilizing key search terms is important.

 

• Make appeals to multiple, targeted audiences. Since posting videos on YouTube is free, there is no reason not to produce different videos for different target audiences. For example, if you are a communications director at a university, you may want to make a video tailored to prospective students, another tailored to current students and yet another tailored to alumni. In each case, knowing what audiences are looking for is key in being able to target them directly.

 

• Talk with, not at, your audience. Because YouTube allows viewers to see, hear and comment on content, it is inherently a more personal medium than television and even other social media channels. As such, viewers have greater expectations for interaction. Posting commercial-like videos will likely not do much to engage YouTube audiences, and will not leave you with many return viewers.  

The Catholic Diocese of Wichita is a good example of an organization that has posted conversational videos on its   YouTube channel. Rather than blasting out information, many of the videos feature a single church or community leader who simply looks at the camera and discusses commonly asked questions or issues. Most of the videos are not fancy, but they provide straightforward information in a way that makes you feel as if you’re having a one-on-one conversation with the person being filmed. The channel is also frequently updated, so viewers have a reason to tune back in regularly.

 

All in all, becoming a trusted channel on YouTube will take effort and predetermined strategies. It is never certain exactly which videos will be a hit, but having a frequent, quality presence on the site is important in establishing a solid following. With the ease and affordability of posting videos to the site, it’s likely a venture worth taking. 

In early 2009, as US Airways flight 1529 bobbed in the frigid waters of the Hudson River and its passengers huddled for safety on the aircraft’s wings, Janis Krums, a stunned passenger on a nearby ferry, snapped a photo of the scene and immediately uploaded it to his Twitter stream. The photo, which Krums took with his iPhone, instantly spread across the Internet and was broadcast on MSNBC before US Airways could even make an official statement.

 

Krum’s now-famous photo offers more than just a glimpse into the Miracle on the Hudson. It shows how quickly and easily a regular citizen can become a news reporter when armed with a smartphone and an eagerness to share information.

 

And it shows just how dramatically the communication world has been turned on its head.

 

With the rise of the Internet and social media, consumers now have the power to express their opinions peer-to-peer and may bypass traditional media altogether. New media give easy and free tools so anyone can post information on the Internet at any time with only modest effort. As Jay Rosen wrote in his article, “The People Formerly Known as the Audience,” the news has been democratized. That is, information flows in several directions at once, transforming the traditional one-way structure into a two-way or many-to-many communication model. This social exchange of information online creates a new, equalized media landscape, where almost anyone can become a citizen journalist.

 

What’s more, citizens with the power to distribute any message are no longer simply consumers with a journalistic sense; they are users, editors and producers. According to a 2010 Pew Internet study, 37 percent of Internet users contribute, comment or disseminate news via postings on social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter. The news becomes an evolving participatory experience. As Internet technologies writer Clay Shirky notes, technology enables the average citizen to participate in the news on a size and scope so large that it has led to a change in kind.

 

Indeed, the changes to the top-down communication model are so profound that even referring to new media users as “citizen journalists” is a bit obtuse. In New New Media (2009), Paul Levinson contends the adjective “citizen” is insufficient; one does not need to be a citizen of any one country, a member of any one group or even have special training or education to become an active participant in this new media age. New tools have essentially made time, geographical and social boundaries irrelevant.

 

Blogging

 

Levinson calls this era in which consumers become writers and viewers become producers an age of “new new media.” Intrinsically social, new new media include blogging, Wikipedia, YouTube, Second Life and more. For the most part, new new media may be used by anyone with Internet access and the basic abilities to read and write.

 

The ease and accessibility of new new media have no doubt contributed to its massive growth in popularity over the last decade or so, particularly in regard to blogging. According to Alfonso Gonzalez-Herrero and Suzanne Smith’s article in a recent issue of the Organization Development Journal, only 23 blogs existed in 1999. By 2006, millions of blogs flooded the Internet, and it was estimated that a new blog was created every second.

While I’d like to think that, as a communication student and emerging professional, I’m uniquely qualified to maintain this blog, the very nature of blogging renders this at least somewhat inaccurate. As Levinson writes, anyone can join in and play the game. And as the aforementioned Pew study indicates, blogs turn writing and sharing into anytime, anywhere affairs. It doesn’t take more than a quick Google blog search to see just how true this is. Blogs about everything from the latest gadgets to Minnesota’s independent political scene to a tabloid-type blog called “The Superficial – Because You’re Ugly” (classy, right?) popped up on the first page of my search alone.

 

Of course, a poorly written and unsubstantiated blog isn’t hard to detect, and leaving the audience with nothing of value will likely leave you high and dry when it comes to readers. Still, the lack of gatekeepers and editors means you can post whatever you want, whenever you want.

 

The good news for communicators is that we can pick a niche and run with it. Blogging is a golden opportunity for us to share our passions and carve out our professional and personal brands. This can be especially important if we want to connect with likeminded individuals, present a certain persona or simply hope to have more control over what appears when someone Googles our names.

 

Beyond professional purposes, the ability to participate — to literally create and share content with anyone — can be personally satisfying. Interested in the latest designer handbags? You can blog about it. Love to take weekend fishing trips? You can blog about it. Want to chronicle every step of your month-long trip around Europe? Of course, you can blog about that, too.

 

As Shirky writes, millions willingly use their free time to write blogs and engage in new media because of the human desire to “do things that make us happy, not just things that pay us money.” Blogging for personal fun is like journaling on a large, public scale. The self actualization aspect of being able to write about and distribute whatever you want is best, I think, summed up by Levison’s definition of social media: They are “unprecedented vehicles for pursuit of personal and professional satisfaction and success.” For an aspiring writer like me, the ability is immensely freeing and exciting.

 

Reality check

 

The freedom that blogging and new media affords can get a bit heady. After all, we can now send out messages to just about anyone, anywhere, at any time. And anyone can comment right back. In New New Media, Levinson recounts times when he wrote blog posts about his favorite TV programs and received praise online from the shows’ stars and family members.

 

So surely this means all we need is passion for a topic, a witty writing style and a little luck, and celebrities will be commenting left and right on our blogs…right?

 

Not so much.

 

Fact is, we likely won’t be catapulted to instant fame or get book deals from our insights, no matter how fantastic they may be. Many of us will be lucky to get a handful of solid comments from regular Joes on our blogs, let alone from celebrities. (Although, Ryan Gosling, please feel free to prove me wrong on this point.)

 

Why blogging and new media are double-edged swords

 

As we have seen, consumers hold the control in this new communications environment. While this is wonderful news for anyone who wants to disseminate a message, it has its downfalls for professional communicators. Like Levinson points out, new new media seem transient. Messages on Twitter, for example, seem to come and go in an instant.

 

In reality, however, everything posted using new new media is actually quite permanent. It is immediately and universally accessible, so even if you delete a picture or a post, it has likely already been copied and reposted by someone else.

 

As a student who is hoping to go back into public relations one day soon, this widespread loss of control is particularly daunting to me. While information spreading like wildfire may be exciting if you’re attempting to raise awareness, it is equally horrifying in the event of a corporate crisis. Consumer control only compounds the difficulties associated with managing a crisis situation. Companies like BP learned this the hard way, to say the least. I hope I never face anything of even a fraction of that intensity in my professional career, yet I cannot help but be concerned by the possibility.

 

Even in lesser circumstances, consumer control of news and information leads to disconcerting questions for professional communicators. According to the Pew Internet study, 40 percent of Internet users say it is important to them to be able to customize a news Web site to get only the news they want. What results from this is a “Daily Me,” a personalized digital newspaper of sorts. Furthermore, 70 percent of Americans feel overwhelmed by the amount and speed of the news, the study says.

As communicators fight to appeal to a broad range of consumers, some weighty questions arise: What is relevance? What must we do as communicators to gain and hold public attention? How can we effectively target an audience when everyone can pick and choose their own news?

 

The answers to these questions have significant implications for PR professionals, marketers and journalists alike. And as the digital world continues to grow at an alarming rate, the answers seem all the more elusive.

 

Still, the potential impact of these new global forces cannot be ignored. As a recent report from McKinsey & Company states, trends matter. Those who wait for the full impact of these trends will miss out on the opportunities they may bring.

 

Levinson contends we will learn how to adapt to the new new media age by practicing, by working in and by doing the activities that we study. In this sense, my blog is one step — however personal and however small — toward this goal. It is my way, at least, of learning, of practicing, of doing the very thing that new media uniquely allows me to do: Participating.

I’ve just come home from class, and I have a little down time before bed. So what do I find myself doing?

 

Checking Facebook on my laptop.

 

It’s a standard activity for me these days, and I have a feeling it is for you, too. Thanks to the social media class I’m taking, I’ve given a lot of thought to this phenomenon over the last couple months. I’ve looked at social media tools like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google Profiles and Posterous until I’m practically blue in the face.

 

But before tonight, I’d given little thought to the way I’m connecting, checking and updating using all these tools. For the most part, as I just mentioned, it’s been on my laptop.

 

Essentially, what I’ve been doing is using a mobile device to keep up with my social media accounts (and surf the Web and check my e-mail and read the news…you get the point). Mobile devices like smart phones, iPods, iPads, laptops and more are growing in popularity and changing the way we get information. We can now consume information much as we would get food via a drive-thru: Fast and on-the-go.

 

On the move 

 

Americans spend an average of 2.7 hours a day on the mobile Internet. According to Kris Schindler, managing partner at Wichita’s Start-Thinking marketing firm, mobile devices make it easier for us to connect with others and obliterate time, distance and place restrictions in human communication. Though the technologies behind mobile devices are constantly — and rapidly — changing, such devices provide communicators with a variety of new opportunities.

For example, cell phone use in Third World countries is dramatically transforming education. In these parts of the globe, phone lines are rare. But with cell phones, students in these countries can instantly do research online, view video instructions and connect with their teacher and classmates. In essence, students can now have a computer in the palm of their hands.

 

According to Schindler, mobile phones and apps transform reality while also creating new ones. We’re familiar with the tactile or screen reality created by cell phones and the like. This type of the reality is one in which we can touch. We can tap the screen of an iPhone, for example.

 

But technologies are changing such that we will soon be more accustomed with augmented reality as well. Such a reality isn’t meant to be a substitute for the real thing, but it will enhance it, Schindler said. For instance, you can hold up your phone to a street, activate the GPS, tell the phone where you want to go and it will show you how to get there by putting a screen on top of reality. (For a cool example of how augmented reality works, check out the advertising campaign created by the Mini Cooper team.)

 

The shift toward mobile devices means that the use of applications is increasing, while the use of Web searching is going down, Schindler said. Overall, this is because it’s easier and less time-consuming to use the apps than search the Internet. In response to this trend, businesses are creating more and more apps, and funneling greater funds and efforts toward marketing to other businesses rather than to consumers.

 

Location, location, location

 

As Brogan and Smith write in Trust Agents, social media has allowed us to connect with others based on interests rather than geographical locations.

 

Nonetheless, location gives a realistic dimension to social media that helps us identify with others. As a result, location-based applications are becoming more prominent.

 

Tools like Foursquare and Gowalla allow us to share the places we go, see where our friends are/have been and connect with people in our city. This week, I gave Foursquare a whirl for myself. I don’t have a Web-enabled phone, so I had to check-in after the fact. I felt more comfortable with that from a privacy standpoint, but I do feel like waiting to update defeated the purpose.

 

However, at one point during the weekend, I did borrow a friend’s iPhone to try my hand at updating my location “live.”  Despite Foursquare’s claim to help me in “discovering new places, doing new things and meeting new people,” I didn’t suddenly make a new friend or stumble upon anything novel as a result of using the tool. In fact, after fumbling around with the app for awhile, I looked up to realize my group of friends had all walked away — leaving me standing alone. I certainly wasn’t connecting with anyone then. If anything, the tool only isolated me from what was going on around me.

 

No doubt, the popularity of mobile devices and geo-location tools are on the rise. Social media leaders argue this will lead to a new type of reality and change the ones we currently know. Still, as my brief experience with Foursquare shows, sometimes the only way to really connect with the world is to put your mobile device aside, look up and engage with the person actually standing beside you. Otherwise, you might just find yourself standing alone.

In a world where fast sometimes isn’t fast enough, the news media are under increasing pressure to distribute content-rich news almost instantaneously. Whether it’s a blurb about the weather, the latest political poll results or updates from a courtroom trial, news reporters are utilizing social media tools to provide news that is, literally, up-to-the-minute.

 

Broadcast, print and radio outlets are all getting into the action by posting regular updates on a variety of platforms. Social media sites like Twitter, which allow for brief, real-time messages, are of particular value for news reporters.

 

To meet consumer demand, posting alerts on Twitter and Facebook has become standard procedure for news organizations like the Wichita Eagle, said Skip Hidlay, the newspaper’s president and publisher.

Indeed, the Wichita Eagle’s presence on Twitter is among the strongest in the city. The paper’s account (Kansasdotcom) is regularly updated by a team of journalists and boasts a total of over 14,000 tweets. For the most part, their 140-character messages act as virtual headlines. Descriptive and tightly worded, Kansasdotcom’s Tweets pique interest, provide timely information and reflect the real-life publication (for example, “Sleet happens: More ice, less snow on the horizon this winter”). Accompanying links point back to the Eagle’s main site, where consumers can read full-length stories, see videos and check out sports scores.

 

Kansasdotcom also connects with the community by regularly replying to others and retweeting relevant information. While good marketers and PR professionals frequently use this strategy, it seems (on the surface) less necessary for a news organization to engage in this way. After all, a newspaper pushes news out. But by listening and responding via social media, the journalists behind Kansasdotcom establish the paper’s voice and presence in the community in a way they couldn’t do through the print version.

 

Wichita television broadcast stations KWCH and KAKE also maintain strong pages on Twitter. Each is followed by about 3,000 users and posts regularly. Similar to Kansasdotcom’s use of links to drive attention to full-length stories, KWCH often provides links to its Web site, while KAKE writes there will be “details at 4, 5 & 6.” Both strategies serve to point back to the stations’ content, which makes sense considering that social media should enhance – not replace — a news organization’s efforts.

 

Additionally, both stations utilize their Twitter pages to reinforce their image and brand. Both pages highlight the station’s logo, call letters and channel number on the left-hand sidebar. Having this design allows Twitter users to immediately identify KWCH and KAKE as credible news stations.

 

KAKE’s bio is the most informative and specific, which further helps users identify them as a quality news station. The bio directs users to KAKE’s Twitter pages for sports and weather. While it may be more efficient for these pages to be combined into one, this strategy is clear and is the best I’ve seen for handling multiple Twitter accounts.

 

As for radio, KFDI follows the golden rule of updating its Twitter page frequently. However, though the tweets usually include links to KFDI’s main Web site, they’re general and non-descriptive (e.g., “Woman escapes serious injury in shooting” and “Salina bank robbed”). The main information is there, but it does nothing to entice further reading.

 

Social media provides news organizations with a unique opportunity to reach consumers, who are increasingly crunched for time and eager for instant gratification. For now, the Wichita Eagle, KWCH and KAKE are seizing the moment and finding their way in this 140-character world.

You meet a new business contact. He acts like your new best friend, making you feel welcomed and connected right off the bat. You discuss some ideas, and he makes big promises about connecting you with other people. You walk away from the interaction with a business card in your hand and a smile on your face, because, after all, maybe this new contact will finally help you make big things happen.

 

But soon, you start getting e-mail after e-mail from him, trying to sell you on a particular brand or product. Your e-mails and questions get no concrete response. And suddenly, all that candor and connection you first felt gives way to a sinking suspicion that you were nothing more than another number in his contact database. You may write it off, but truth be told, you feel kind of used.

 

If you’ve ever done much networking, you probably know the feeling. And you also know that once someone breaks your trust, it’s nearly impossible for him or her to win it back. This is true for any type of relationship, on any platform (online or offline).

 

That’s why trust is so hard to earn — and so necessary to maintain.

 

In the New York Times bestselling book Trust Agents [1], social media veterans Chris Brogan and Julien Smith write that in the fast-pasted, transparent age of social media, trust is needed more than ever. People who build a positive, open reputation both online and in the real world and consistently maintain that reputation through the mastering of one-to-many communications methods become “trust agents.” Trust agents understand bottom-line goals, but do not come across as sales-hungry, high-pressure marketers. Rather, they inspire public confidence and, consequently, see results.

The Web changes the way we understand communication. Gone are verbal cues and gestures. Brogan and Smith contend Internet users, paradoxically, value both anonymity and transparency. We feel more comfortable opening up when no one knows exactly who we are, yet we are willing to reveal more and more personal information online. For marketers, this creates a greater potential for understanding the way people truly feel. A human artist taps into that understanding and provides better feedback and empathy. Being a human artist is ultimately about customer service.

 

Still, deciding what to reveal about yourself is tricky business. Once you put something out there, Google has it forever. The good thing about that is, every time you share something helpful and valuable, it’s there for people to see at any time. The one-to-many nature of social media also means many people can view your post, and you don’t have to repeat your answer. All this leads to more reliability and credibility.

 

Human artistry involves risk. After all, at the core of every personality type is a little bud of a wallflower, Brogan and Smith contend. It’s not always easy to take initiative, and it can be downright uncomfortable. But trust agents take the chance in hopes that being open will result in real success.

 

Build an army 

 

“Many hands make light work.”

 

It’s an expression I remember hearing as far back as grade school. It’s also a cheesy way of summarizing Brogan and Smith’s final tenet of trust agents: They know how to build armies to reduce individual effort and get greater results.

 

A trust agent recognizes there is only so much one person can do. Therefore, he or she assembles an “army” of resources to help in reaching goals. These resources can be capable people or useful digital tools. Either way, they reduce the long-term work.

 

Because social media has democratized information (distributing your work is as easy as creating it now), a group of people acting toward a common goal on the Web has the potential to reach thousands of people with one post. Again, since being a trust agent is never about using people, each member of the army needs to benefit from the efforts. But the power of a team to reach the masses is no doubt exponentially greater than that of an individual.

 

A final note

 

While the need for trust is by no means new, technology has accelerated communication to the point that it now flows differently. Rather than fear technology, trust agents learn from it and master it. They use it to frame their own game, identify with people, gain leverage, connect and interact with others and build a powerful team.

 

Trust agents take the high road simply because it’s the right thing to do. No one walks away from a trust agent with that I’m-being-used feeling because, in every step, a trust agent exudes a genuineness people immediately recognize — and fervently appreciate.

 

Becoming a trust agent may seem daunting at first. No doubt, it demands steadfast determination and a willingness to take risks. But realizing it can all start with a commitment and a few comments gives me hope that I — that we — can do it, too. As Brogan and Smith note, we’ll need confidence. We’ll have to be transparent and be ourselves because this is what social media requires of us. Fortunately, though, we’re in luck. After all, when we loosen up and let it happen, isn’t being ourselves what we really do best?

 

 

[1] Brogan, C. & Smith, J. (2010). Trust agents: Using the Web to build influence, improve reputation, and earn trust. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.