Social media has helped to completely change the way people share and consume news. It has become the fastest and easiest way to access current topics around the world. In the context of journalism, it is important to note that social media for journalists goes beyond news consumption to news production. Hyperproduction has contributed to the fact that it is very difficult to devote yourself to one story or piece of news, as well as to build an audience around that news, which essentially should be the one who consumes that news.
A key part of the journalistic process today is to reach a wide audience, collect reviews, communicate with the audience, and share breaking news faster than ever.
Social media marketing (SMM) uses social media and social networks, such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, to advertise products and services, interact with existing customers, and acquire new ones. For journalism, this means that the media use social networks to strategically present content, interact with their audience, and reach new ones.
So, it is not enough for you as a medium to have accounts on social networks and publish texts after you have published them on your portal. Just posting on social media isn’t going to get you much, and that’s definitely not social media marketing.
The strength of social media marketing stems from social media’s unparalleled capacity in three key marketing areas: connectivity, interaction, and user data.
With the emergence of social networks and then the advent of marketing on these networks, the way in which companies, as well as the media, can influence the audience has changed, from promoting content that encourages engagement to extracting personal data that contributes to the messages. to resonate exactly with the user who should receive that information.
Since social media is present everywhere today, the marketing techniques that use these platforms are extremely important for the media.
In addition to providing a way for companies or media outlets to reach out to existing and new audiences, social media marketing (SMM) has purpose-built data analytics that allow marketing experts to track their efforts and identify even more ways to get involved. And it is analytics that often creates the biggest challenges for newsrooms. How to analyze that data and get the most out of it for future strategic announcements and the direction of media reporting.
Fundamental pillars of social media marketing
Before you even start using social media marketing, it’s important to approach crafting your social media strategy.
Consider how social media can help you achieve your goals. State what your goals are. Do you want more audience engagement? Or do you want your social media audience to go to your website? Or you want more likes.
What are those platforms that can benefit you? Today we have more and more social networks, and all of them are important because you can find a certain audience on all of them. Think about what content you will publish on which platform.
Consider which format will be most effective in sharing the content, whether it is video or photography as a medium.
Although sharing content on social media seems simple, it’s a good idea to plan ahead rather than creating content and posting it spontaneously. There are a number of tools you can use to schedule content posts in advance, such as Buffer, Hootsuite, PromoRepublic, and many others.
Through your growth and social media development, your audience will increasingly engage, share, and comment on your content. It’s important to follow the comments and see what your audience is talking about; maybe you’ll find a new topic right there. Today, there are also social media listening and engagement tools, such as Buffer, that can be useful for tracking content and engagement.
Analytics cannot be bypassed when talking about social media, because if you’ve spent time on a strategic approach, planned content, and tracked audience engagement, you’ll want to see what your audience reach is, how many positive mentions you have, how many people have used your hashtags, and much more.