Social Media Newsroom Management
Facebook and Twitter have revolutionized journalism. These sites have created an entire new platform to access news. As a multimedia producer, I use these sites everyday as tools to keep my audience updated with the latest stories. Not only do I inform my audience, but my audience informs me. Facebook and Twitter give viewers a chance to interact with the newsroom and the on-air talent. I think these social media tools make news a more interactive experience.
I believe Twitter is more than a social network, it's a media platform. Twitter gives news outlets a whole new medium to give an audience their news. Twitter allows news outlets to produce quick updates that an audience can access on laptops, phones and iPads. These updates are short, timely and keep viewers informed between newscasts. Each tweet may only be 140 characters or less. One advantage twitter has on other news mediums is keeping viewers informed during breaking news situations. Tweeting is the easiest way a media outlet can quickly inform its' viewers with the latest information.
CoTweet
CoTweet is a website that allows a team of people to manage one twitter account. Newsrooms all over the nation are starting to use this tool. Producers, reporters and anchors can all tweet to the account and the multimedia producer can confirm the tweets and approve them for the station's twitter. I think this helps newsroom management keep a station's twitter organized. CoTweet also helps a newsroom to keep tweets on a schedule and produced in a timely manner.
Facebook gives the community a chance to not only gather news from the station Facebook site, but to also interact with the news outlet. I believe Facebook is an outlet for not only reporting the news, but a platform to start discussion. I advise reporters to post their stories to the station Facebook account, and prompt viewers to discuss the story with a question. It's amazing to see how much feedback the question receives. Facebook makes gathering news interactive, and I think it's important for a station to interact with it's audience.