How will big news media reach out to fragmented audiences in a networked world of infinite choice? How does network TV news reclaim audiences that have given up on the evening news all together? How will my employer connect deeply with people who have lost their faith in traditional media? How about this: empower your most passionate employees to engage and even drive online conversation using drop dead simple social media tools.
Mobasoft President Michael Bailey blogged on the vexing nature of corporations overcoming their fear of the transparent nature of social media.
Once they seem to be getting it, how difficult is it to let them know that it is okay to be human, without giving away the store, another way of saying that would be that you don’t need to divulge company secrets to let people know what is going on within the company.
-Michael Bailey, President, Mobasoft LLC
Considering the increasingly confrontational mood at the fringes of the new media/old media dialogue, it’s no surprise that many companies are shying away from the transparency and openness of social media. Some companies are setting those apprehensions aside in favor of comprehensive branding strategies that include social media. In an interview with Intel Internet Strategist Bryan Rhoads, Pod Tech’s Jeremiah Owyang gives us a compelling case study for big companies harnessing the conversational power of social media. While it would be patently absurd to suggest that a big media company replace the promotions department with legions of Twitter-ers, I believe a a healthy mix of traditional an non-traditional branding will be key to spreading the brand across millions of channels.
I don’t know if people in big media fully understand the power of the one on one, human connection that social media enable. I was in the newswroom talking to one of my favorite NBC News correspondents the other day about Twitter. I’d emailed him my feed, and ultimately he asked, what most people who’ve given Twitter only a cursory glance typically inquire: “Who cares?” When I was first introduced to this “attention director” I felt the same way. Evidentally, people DO care about what I’m doing, and I care about what they’re doing. It’s strangely addictive, to the point where I go back through a day’s worth of Twitters to see what my friends have been up to.
What’s perhaps unusual about the nature of my Twittering is that I do it from the “rarefied air”, as friend and social media guru Chris Abraham put it, of my perch as a network news cameraman. My posts range from my need for fresh coffee to the chopper landing of the President of the United States. I’ve come to discover that people in this early-adopter, social media influencer, ecostystem have really become intrigued, by the very simple, human observations of a worker-bee toiling in the salt mines of TV news. Many of my friends who follow me on Twitter have told me that they’ve rekindled their interest in TV news because of my enthusiasm for what I do. I guess I do have a pretty cool job. At least that’s what my Twitter friends tell me!
In a post entitled “Why I Switched to NBC News”, consultant and social media evangelist Connie Reece uses podcasting tools to describe how my “rarefied air” twittering has influenced her news viewing habits, with her lovely Texan radio voice.
Last week I was asked to be Brian Williams’ cameraman as he anchored NBC Nightly News from our Washington bureau. I took this opportunity to give my Twitter friends a behind-the-scenes look at live network news. Take a look at these responses.
I had a similar response when I was a guest cameraman on the set of Meet The Press, with Tim Russert. Take a close look at the comments section of that post. At a time when ratings battles are decided by margins of thousands, any effort to engage one more passionate user of your product is worthwhile. If the response of my Twitter friends is any indicator, putting a human face on your brand really does make a difference. Ironically, I use Twitter to direct attention to my blog and new media venture. But because my day job is so demanding of my time, I “tweet” a great deal about it. I’ve been genuinely surprised by the positive comments I get about NBC’s efforts. I truly believe that I help people understand that a lot of dedicated, talented people work very hard to put together the news product.
I’ve blogged about how, in a world of unlimited choice, it is now incumbent upon journalists to promote their own work. Twitter and other social media tools allow you to direct peoples attention, using links as marketing tools. For me, this is about connecting with people and building my brand. Turns out, it’s becoming precisely that for my current employer. As the fragmentation of media continues to sour the economics of being technical worker in my chosen field, I continue to seek out the attendant opportunity created by this disruption using social media tools. Fortunately, we both seem to benefit from it!
So I wonder, do any of my assembled readers engage in social media that inadvertanly champions the brand of their employer? Is that type of “unauthorized” discussion welcome? I’m kind of out on a limb here. While I simply talk about what I’m doing on any given day. Just so happens that I Twitter about a lot of high-profile stuff. The likely outcome of this little experiment (The people I work for watch what I do) would be one of the following:
I’ve listed those outcomes in order of desirability. I’ll Twitter the results. 
