9 Pieces of Technology You Can Use to Do Better PR

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Today, even an Android smartphone has more computational power than did the world’s most powerful supercomputer just a couple of decades ago. Yet, few public relations pros have updated the way they work to take advantage of the capabilities now available to them.

It is true that public relations is at least in part a people business, and human relations are naturally resistant to digitization.

Even so, the tools I discuss here have boosted my productivity dramatically. In 2015, Juwai.com generated more than $80 million of media coverage, without an agency and with just one internal person dedicated to PR (me). Moreover, I have operated in another time zone and on another continent from most of the Juwai.com team.

So, here are some tips on using productivity-enhancing tools. They have helped Juwai.com place stories everywhere from CNBC and the New York Times to China Daily and Nikkei Asian Review.

Evernote

Evernote is like the notebook where your mother used to keep her recipes (or maybe it was your father – no stereotypes here).

Unlike that notebook, Evernote can never get full. You can insert any sort of document, picture or video. It is completely searchable, easy to organize and even shareable with people who don’t have an account.

I have one Evernote notebook for news related to Juwai.com, which I share with Sales and Marketing. Another shared notebook stores content that I have created, and a third holds confidential files, which I share with no one. I clip items directly from my Chrome browser, iPad and even iPhone.

Evernote makes it easy for me to store and retrieve much more information than was ever possible before.

Apple Devices

You may prefer Android or Windows. By all means stick with what works for you.

As for me, I find Apple’s smooth, intuitive software makes work more fun.

The ease with which I can manage and produce files, photos, audio and video saves me countless hours on creative tasks. My MacBook Pro laptop is so portable that I take notes on it in meetings.

As for the iPad, it is a vast improvement over wading through a stack of newspapers and magazines each morning. Believe it or not, the iPad is also an excellent tool for writing, because it allows you to more easily narrow your focus down to the project at hand. Turn off all but the most important notifications in Settings, and you can compose without distraction.

The iPhone is so powerful that I have more than once worked entire afternoons with no other device, and been nearly as effective as I would have been with the laptop.

For greatest productivity on all of your Apple devices, in ‘Settings’ enable the dictation feature so you can compose an email or an article as quickly as you can speak the words.

Also, be sure to create official email signatures on your portable devices, so you look professional.

Contactually

If you want to be good at public relations, you can’t let opportunities fall through the cracks. And, you need to make the most of the relationships you have.

After trying many, many contact and task managers, I have finally settled on this one. Officially billed as a CRM, Contactually works nearly as well for the public relations pro as the salesperson.

I use sales pipelines to track stories I am pitching. Contactually automatically creates tasks when I need it to. I rely on its built-in email templates and bulk emailing to easily send personalized messages to large numbers of individuals. Contactually could make it easier to sort contacts, and its mobile apps are atrocious. Still, it is the best relationship manager I have seen for PR pros.

Factiva and Meltwater

News databases and clipping services let you research the media environment before you pitch, and communicate the value you are generating after you collect your clips.

Factiva has much more powerful search functions, but several times a week Meltwater sends me clips that Factiva has overlooked. I recommend both if budget permits.

Vuelio

A subscription media contact database is helpful for those occasions when you need to reach someone new. It is expensive but useful, especially if you can share the cost among a team.

I have found Vuelio has slightly better lists for the international media I often pitch.

Skype and Viber

I place calls to every continent on almost a daily basis, which would be prohibitively expensive via my regular mobile phone service. Nor can I always wait until I am able to use a landline.

These two services allow me to call any phone, anywhere in the world, for pennies. Usually, call quality is better with Viber. On the other hand, colleagues and journalists are more likely to have a Skype account, which enables video chats and text messaging. You can even use Viber’s and Skype’s smartphone apps when you do not have Wi-Fi service, over your regular mobile signal.

Ulysses

One reason public relations is such a rewarding career is that you get to both work intensively with others and also spend time on your own — thinking and writing.

This is my favorite software for writing. Ulysses makes it extremely easy to organize files, but really shines in providing a clean, inviting workspace for putting down your thoughts. Just about every media release, op-ed, messaging brief and piece of web content that I create starts here.

My final advice is to keep experimenting and not let yourself be limited by what your employer will pay for. Invest a few of your own dollars to try promising apps or devices, and it will more than pay off in the long run.

Reinvent Australia: how can we shape a positive future for nations?

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A few days ago I attended the launch event of Reinvent Australia, organized by Annalie Killian of Amplify Festival at PwC’s Sydney offices. It was a very interesting event, digging into the issues of how we can bring together many people’s ideas to create better futures for nations.

Graham Kenny, President of Reinvent Australia, described the organisation as a collaborative initiative to create a conversation on a shared vision for the nation. The bottom line of its endeavors is to increase the quality of life for all Australians, by influencing government and business in how they work.

Kenny quoted Henry Mintzberg in a recent Harvard Business Review article, Rescuing Capitalism from Itself.
Read more →

Thought Leaders on What to Expect in PR in 2016: Story and Content

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What should we expect for PR in 2016? We asked top industry thought leaders for their thoughts.

Three powerful themes emerged from their responses:
– Scope and Breadth (Click link for insights)
– Science, Data and Analytics (Click link for insights)
– Story and Content (Insights below)

On story, content, and channels, Michael Brenner of Marketing Insider Group points to the power of storytelling, Mark Schaefer of Schaefer Marketing Solutions says we need to focus on content, Lars Voedisch from PRecious Communications explores how content marketing and story telling can bring results, while Trevor Young looks to the potential of video live-streaming.

Read the insights on story and content from these top thought leaders below.

I expect the PR industry in 2016 will shift to helping brands tell their stories in the classic tradition on storytelling. Great stories have heroes who overcome a challenge and find surprising things about themselves along the way. The hero of the stories brands tell needs to be their customers. And PR pros will continue to focus on classic storytelling techniques in 2016.

Michael Brenner, CEO, Marketing Insider Group
Follow on Twitter: @BrennerMichael

There is one mega-trend affecting every PR person on the planet: Rising above the tidal wave of information density to stand out. And this is a problem that is expected to get much, much worse. The amount of information on the web is expected to increase by 400% in the next four years. This trend will impact budgets, strategies, content/platform innovations and the skillsets needed to succeed now and in the future. How do we win in this environment? By focusing beyond content, beyond the message, to concentrate on who and how the message is getting shared.

Mark W. Schaefer,Executive Director, Schaefer Marketing Solutions and author of The Content Code
Follow on Twitter: @markwschaefer

The hot topics for 2016 are content marketing and story telling – in my opinion not new topics though, rather a new context of discussing them from a PR perspective and trying to label them.

PR’s job has always been to influence different audiences’ perception of brands, people or topics. And the arsenal of communications methods has always gone beyond the different iterations of the press release. Combinations of white paper, opinion pieces, blog posts or editorial contributions are at the centre of content and story telling – just that finally we look at it from a more strategic approach of the core story to bring across and then packaging them into different formats and pushing them through different channels across earned, shared and paid including third party services like e.g. Outbrain.

But for PR to keep its hands in the game and fend off marketing – it has to look at the ROI from those activities. For the longest time PR wanted nearly frantically to not be associated with sales results. Those artificial wars have to be over – we’ve to look into linking efforts not only to outputs, but outcomes: Do our activities drive traffic, conversion or perception changes.

Real strategic PR will use stories and content from a holistic perspective and link it to a wider sales funnel approachl – at which points of a customers or audience conversation can we influence behaviour and trigger perception changes, if not even actions!

Content is only as effective as the results it can provide.

Lars Voedisch, Managing Director, PRecious Communications
Follow on Twitter: @larsv

I’m bullish on video live-streaming. I think it has tremendous application for PR and comms folk, especially around humanising organisations and putting a sense of urgency back into our communications. THINK: Periscope, Meerkat – and we’ve just seen the launch of MeVee, which has some extra benefits – this, from @MeVeeApp on Twitter to me the other day: “we have ad revenue sharing opportunities, streams don’t disappear … anyone can view the streams, you can share streams to any social media channel”. And I think Blab.im has tremendous potential. Hopefully as an industry we can start embracing these new social formats.

Trevor Young, Founder and Chief, PR Warrior
Follow on Twitter: @trevoryoung

Thought Leaders on What to Expect in PR in 2016: Science, Data and Analytics

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What should we expect in PR and communications in 2016? We asked top thought leaders for their insights.

Three powerful themes emerged from their responses:
– Scope and Breadth (Click link for insights)
– Science, Data and Analytics (Insights below)
– Story and Content (Click link for insights)

The importance of data and science in taking PR forward stood out. Fred Bateman of Bateman Group points to the analytical capabilities required, Blogger and Author Jeff Bullas says PR is now a science, while Futurist Carmen Villadar looks at the role of data science in a social context.

Read the insights on science, data, and analytics from these top thought leaders below.

In 2015, PR as an industry definitely came into its own and solidified a seat at the C-level table. But to keep it, 2016 needs to be about putting to rest lingering notions that PR people are pure creatives who don’t understand the complex spectrum of dynamics impacting their businesses. To be successful in PR today requires a lot, with mastery of the spoken and written word but only one of the criteria. It requires a hyper analytical mind able to quickly dissect products, competitors and markets. Every strategy is also dependent on our ability to accurately calculate every possible risk while never being too risk averse in our recommended approach. In other words, PR is hard.

PR professionals need to know more or at least be better informed than anyone else in the room, including the CEO. In 2016, I predict PR people across all industries will lean in even more to bring the profession to new levels of respect and admiration.

Fred Bateman, Owner, Bateman Group
Follow on Twitter: @fredbateman

The digital world has turned communications on its head and made everyone publishers and communicators. Simple media has become complex and a multi-media minefield. This means that the “Public Relations” industry needs to adapt to this new mobile and social web that is global and in real time. Fast evolving technology has also provided the tools and platforms to talk to the world at scale.

So PR is no longer just an art…. but a science. So in 2016 what does PR need to embrace and implement for themselves and their clients?

It needs to continue innovate so it can manage the splintered media world we now live in that is made of many moving parts. This means adopting digital technology and big data strategies that provides monitoring and communication at scale and simplified with automation.

If you don’t then you are at risk of becoming irrelevant and a dinosaur.

Jeff Bullas, Blogger, Author, Strategist and Speaker, JeffBullas.com
Follow on Twitter: @jeffbullas

I expect to see hybrid roles and/or teams develop that converges data science with more customized social metrics. The role of cognitive computing will become more and more important as companies continue to seek a deeper understanding of the dynamics of building relevance and relationships in a rapidly augmented (reality) world. I’m thinking this would fit under something like the ABC’s of PR. Awareness. Branding. Cognition., but I’m sure that’s been said before.

Carmen Villadar, Futurist, #AIoT
Follow on Twitter: @digitalfemme

Thought Leaders on What to Expect in PR in 2016: Scope and Breadth

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We asked global thought leaders in PR and communications what they expect in 2016.

Three powerful themes emerged from their responses:
– Scope and Breadth (Insights below)
– Science, Data and Analytics (Click link for insights)
– Story and Content (Click link for insights)

The theme of increasing breadth and scope of what PR needs to become was particularly important. Lucy Allen of LEWIS points to PR agencies crossing over to encompass paid as well as earned media, Grey Healthcare Group’s Erin Byrne sees PR going beyond its traditional role to be at the center of corporate marketing and communications, Tracey Follows of AnyDayNow expects the growth of internal comms to drive customer experience, and Marian Salzman of Havas PR looks at the breadth of experience that PR professionals need to succeed.

Read the insights on the increasing scope and breadth of PR from these top thought leaders below.

Whether it’s paid social, mobile or display, PR agencies are getting more serious about their media spend. In 2016, I expect we’ll see more agencies growing their paid media departments, especially in digital media. Programmatic has levelled the playing field when it comes to media buying power. It’s no longer about who spends the most, since anyone can bid. That gives PR agencies the opportunity to get into the advertising market. Clients are seeing the value of paid media to amplify and complement PR content. Meanwhile, media owners are recognizing this and welcoming PR firms in their beta programs for new products and tools. We’ll see more PR agencies develop their skills in this area. We’ll likely see some resulting debate in 2016 about how PR agencies account for their revenues (fees vs turnover).

Lucy Allen, Executive Vice President and Chief Strategy Officer, LEWIS
Follow on Twitter: @lucya

PR is so fundamental to marketing and communications as a whole that I believe this will be the year that PR truly has a seat at the table beyond corporate communications. Reputation is more important than ever, stakeholders are usually part of multiple target groups, and digital becoming ubiquitous has created an environment where messages can no longer be directed to one group. Therefore, PR can and should be at the center of an organization’s marketing and communications strategy. Along with this will come: – Much more robust approaches to content development, management and syndication – Proactive social media engagement, including in highly regulated industries like health – Assisted analytics that truly measure the efforts of PR based on how they impact other disciplines Just like years ago there was a big move to ensure everyone had a baseline level of digital expertise, this will be the year that all marketing and communications professionals are required to have a working knowledge and ability around the principles of public relations and corporate communications.

Erin Byrne, Chief Client Officer, Grey Healthcare Group
Follow on Twitter: @ErinByrne

The one thing I expect in 2016 for the PR industry is an increased focus on internal comms rather than external comms. Of course the latter is still important but it’s getting harder and harder to influence consumers through the efficient deployment of one consistent messaging plan; it’s now all about the experience.

New brands with new business models work to a longer term 10-20 yr vision and execute 2 or 3 initiatives that accelerate them towards that vision every 6-12 months. Nurturing a coherent long and short term plan is key; and creating an attractive internal culture with everyone delivering it to a high standard in a joined up way, is now the name of the game. Only a coherent internal experience can deliver a coherent consumer experience. Look at culture-building at Google, Facebook, Apple and how it shows up in their end users’ service. That’s the blueprint for every company now.

Tracey Follows, Founder and Futurist, Any Day Now
Follow on Twitter: @tracey_lou

For PR pros, a faux intimacy among themselves, influencers and media personalities comes about through tech addiction and its ugly cousin, contact collection (the antithesis of experience collection, because you’re collecting folks whom you oftentimes know by name without ever getting to know them). We’re not only addicted to our techno toys, but we’re also addicted to the rush of adding yet another fan, friend or follower—especially one who sits in the seat of influence.

In another area, experience is the new classroom. Internships have been the new first jobs in PR; now add to that office swaps, which are early career-learning bonanzas. PR pros need to do many things other than taking classes, including immersing themselves in newsrooms, working alongside event planners, being based in client offices and doing everything they do on the job with a student lens. I can imagine a two-year immersion into our biz that replaces graduate study—and puts rolled-up sleeves on the keyboard, ready to collaborate and cooperate in a professional mode.

Marian Salzman, Chairman, Global Collective, Havas PR and CEO, Havas PR North America
Follow on Twitter: @mariansalzman

Big game changers: Immersive reality and customer robot service

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An article in yesterday’s Sydney Morning Herald, Five business trends set to shape 2016, asked three business “clairvoyants” what innovations small business will see in 2016: Craig Rispin, Jon Tanner, and myself.

Here are a couple of the quotes from me:

On Immersive Reality:

Futurist Ross Dawson, who heads Advanced Human Technologies Group, says the debut of Facebook’s Oculus Rift (and a host of other virtual reality head-sets arriving next year) is his “big game changer”. It will be arriving in the first quarter of 2016. Dawson believes it could transform the retail, travel, education and property industries. It is not augmented reality (as in Google Glass) but immersive​ reality: the images move in sync with a user’s head movements.

It could be used to offer virtual snapshots of off-plan apartments to prospective property buyers, give travellers the opportunity to peruse a virtual city or visit a mock art gallery in cyberspace, Dawson says. “You could immerse yourself in a battlefield or spend a virtual day in Rome, Paris or Berlin.”

On Automation:

Dawson expects to see greater automation in the retail and hospitality sectors, but believes fast food outlets will be the first to deploy robots. He mentions US-based Orchard Supply Hardware whose “OSHbot” answers questions and directs customers to products. There is also California’s Aloft Hotel, run by three-foot-high (91cm) “botlrs” which have 7-inch touchscreens to interact with patrons.

Here are videos of these robots:

Companies large and small need to be actively thinking about and exploring how these kinds of new technologies will change their business, and how they can seize the emerging opportunities.

What It Means to Be a PR Pro in 2016 and Beyond

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How crazy has this year been?

From a PR practitioner’s perspective, we’ve had to:

  • come up to speed with the challenges and opportunities of live video streaming (THINK: Periscope, Meerkat etc);
  • grapple with the ever-decreasing organic reach of our clients’ (agency or inhouse) Facebook Pages, while at the same time try to understand how advertising on the platform works;
  • keep abreast of all the new apps, tools and platforms that emerge with alarming regularity (one of my favourites is Meddle; I’m also a huge fan of Blab – I think it has huge potential);
  • stay ahead of the curve by learning and understanding the finer points of podcasting and audio-on-demand formats (this is a trend we’re going to see and hear a lot more of in 2016 and beyond);
  • become savvy video storytellers so as to tap into a visual medium that continues to grow like crazy;
  • continue to get our heads around the myriad platform changes occurring at LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest and Instagram seemingly on a daily basis; and
  • understand the need to post content where audiences live, for example, blogging on LinkedIn’s Pulse, Medium.com and Facebook Notes.

And I haven’t even yet mentioned SEO, native advertising, online newsrooms and mobile (the latter, of course, is having a profound impact on the communications business) – these are all things PR pros need to have at least a basic understanding of.

Heck, we’re still trying to get our clients to understand the finer points of being on Twitter (be truthful, how many companies and organisations really get Twitter? Indeed, how many have truly become open and connected brands as a result of social media? How many value openness and transparency as core attributes?).

Of course, all of this is against an ever-evolving backdrop of big picture societal themes – fueled by technology but inherently driven by good old human behavior – that continue to force us to think differently (and act more nimbly) as professional communicators:

  • The democratization of information, in which everyone is now a real-time, global publisher.
  • Further to the above, a growing number of content creators are becoming bona fide influencers in their own right, which in turn means they probably should be on the radar of some in the PR industry.
  • Consumers are becoming expert ‘hunters and gatherers’ of information; we’re more than happy to get our news and information from a range of different sources, including brands – as long as we trust the source.
  • Demand for radical corporate transparency is at an all-time high (and at a time when trust in government, business and institutions remains at undesirable levels).

The good news is, the demand for savvy PR professionals is going to go through the roof as the complexity of communicating with one’s constituents continues to increase.

The challenge for communications pros is being ‘big picture’ enough to be able to join the dots strategically, but also sufficiently savvy tactically so any recommendations we make are practical and grounded in common sense, not just ‘cool things to do’.

Of course, there will also be an increased need for tactical specialists. For some of us, this might be a great way of differentiating our professional offering in the PR marketplace.

Lots of challenges ahead, but also heaps of opportunities available for those in our industry who invest the time to understand the ever-evolving new media landscape; not just how it works, but where it makes sense for us to be involved professionally. Concurrently, however, we should not forget the more traditional skills and tactics in our kitbag that when applied correctly in the right situation can still work effectively for the companies and organizations we represent.

Bring on 2016!

Does the Agency Model and Leadership Impact the Future of Creativity in Communications?

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The Holmes Report recently released their fourth annual Creativity in PR Global Study and the results present a mixed bag on the status of right brain thinking in the PR profession. While there has evidently been an uptick in key areas – for instance viewing creativity as a key element in agency culture and more resources being devoted to creativity – there is still work to be done.

The study, conducted in association with H+K Strategies, provides both a snapshot and a somewhat longer view of the profession relative to its creative path.  But as with any study, the real insights are when the results of similar questions are considered together.

This year’s study included the question “Do you think the PR industry is set fair to deliver and lead creativity in the next five years, in terms of …?”. Respondents had four categories to respond to: Talent (hiring, training, diversity of workforce), Innovation, Agency Business Model, and Leadership.

Here’s how the responses netted out:

Unfortunately, this question wasn’t included in last year’s study, so there’s no way to know if there’s been a change. But there are both insights and dichotomies when the responses to this question are compared to the response to others.

Take talent for instance. Responses to a separate question about how agencies reward creativity indicated less than half (45.7%) do so as part of an annual performance review and a third don’t reward it at all. Taking that into account, how then could the industry as a whole be well positioned to hire, train and diversify for creativity into the foreseeable future? How many people – regardless of age group – will want to continue to work in an industry that says it values creativity, but your chances of being rewarded for it are less than 50 percent?

Let’s move to innovation. The greatest percentage of respondents to this question believes that the industry is poised to lead in this area. That’s all good, but when compared to the 50% of respondents who rated the current quality of creativity as ordinary in a separate question, there’s clearly a lot of work that needs to be done to get the industry to a leadership position in innovation over the next five years.

The Agency Model received the lowest percentage of yes votes relative to the long-term view and the highest number of no’s. Should we be surprised? The model has been in question for some time now, yet no one seems to know what to do about it. Unfortunately, when these numbers are combined with the fact that Leadership got the second lowest number of yes votes and the second highest number of no’s to this same question, it’s not difficult to see that the industry may be stymied in its efforts to be more creative.

Clients and agency personnel alike are providing some possible solutions. When asked if they could only do three things to improve their own or their company’s creative capabilities here are the top five responses:

–       Improve use of insight

–       Ability to take more risks

–       Educate clients

–       More budget

–       Clearer client briefs

Three of the above require more direct money and two require more time, which equates to more money. With money involved, change in the agency model and leadership mindset will be necessary to address all or most of these.

In other parts of the report, client input suggests they’re willing to spend the money on innovative ideas, but not if there’s no data to back up the approach. Advertising agencies have never had a problem with this. They create ideas, test them, iterate on the results then present concepts based on data. Brainstorming might have gotten them to the initial idea, but the results of the brainstorm typically don’t go immediately to the client without some kind of data to back it up. That’s a model that PR firms aren’t used to operating within but may need to get comfortable with.

It’s encouraging to see that the industry as a whole is continuing to move toward a greater focus on being more creative. This has been a conundrum that has affected PR for decades. But verbalizing what you want to be and proving it are two different things. Rather than pointing to ad agencies and wondering why they get to wear the creative mantle, PR needs to take a clue from them and mimic what’s allowed them to do so. It’s going to have to start with agency and in-house leadership – their future and the industry’s may depend on it.

Are Newspapers Truly Facing Extinction?

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Are newspapers truly facing extinction? Dominique Delport, Global Managing Director of Havas Media Group, shares an optimistic perspective.

While the newspaper industry is being confronted by profound changes, he predicts a better future for five reasons: the rise of the global middle class; the transition to mobile-first and online platforms; new content and adjusted editorial purpose; data exploitation; and more innovation and agility.

Black and white dailies are not as profitable as they used to be. However, Delport envisions a bright path ahead for the industry, with publications embracing new trends and technology to reshape the old paper model. It is not that newspapers are dead, it is that media organizations are being reborn and must alter how they deliver the news.

To learn more about his fascinating insights, view his slide called “The Future of Newspapers.” Since it was published in June 2014, it has garnered more than 90,000 views and nearly 400 likes. After a year, his points are still relevant and the slide continues to receive comments.

It begins with futurist Ross Dawson’s Newspaper Extinction Timeline and ends with his NewsScape diagram, which shows where value can be created in a post-channel media world.

Image source: Dominique Delport

Social Journalism Degree Aims to Frame Journalism As a Service

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The CUNY Graduate School of Journalism wants to create a new generation of journalists with its recently launched master’s program. Instead of treating audience members as one large mass, the Social Journalism degree aims to teach students how to connect better with communities and individuals.

In a video filmed at the 2014 Online News Association Conference, Jeff Jarvis, the director of the Tow-Knight Center for Entrepreneurial Journalism at CUNY, explains the goals behind the new curriculum.
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“This is really turning journalism on its head. Rather than starting with the idea that we make content, it starts with the idea that we serve communities. And how do we start? By listening to those communities, understanding them, understanding their needs, and then serving them with all the tools we have at hand.”

One of Jarvis’s main points is social journalism goes beyond basic social media practices such as merely using it as another way to spread content. It’s about listening and building relationships with the public—figuring out their particular needs and how to meet them.

Whereas Google knows where he lives and works, said Jarvis, his newspaper doesn’t know anything about him as an individual. Social journalists will be trained to use data to identify unique people and communities, but also to measure their success in reaching them.

Next Steps

Could social journalism become the new standard for newsrooms? According to CUNY Graduate School of Journalism, the demand from media companies for reporters trained in its practices is high throughout the industry.

Instead of simply waiting for new graduates to fill these open spaces, agencies can act now by reframing how they view news production—as a two-way interaction rather than a one-way conversation. In fact many media outlets already place a high value on engaging readers before publishing a story.

This is often done through crowdsourcing and taking a different approach to social media. Here are some interesting and successful examples to learn from.

Crowdsourcing

In the digital age, it’s easier than ever to access a large audience. In hearing input on events form a mass of people, it helps increase accuracy with multiple accounts and raises community connection with stories.

ProPublica used this method with its project on the patient safety in the United States. In 2012, It offered an online contribution form for people to share their stories and received more than 1,000 responses. Another recent example of collaborative journalism is from The Guardian, which launched a crowdsourced project on police shootings called The Counted.

Rethinking social media

Most media companies view article clicks and shares as the main measures of engagement, says ProPublica’s senior engagement editor Amanda Zamora.

However, growing an active community of people who will discuss issues important to them is crucial to the publication’s success in crowdsourcing. For example, ProPublica’s Facebook group on patient harm has more than 3,000 members, two of whom were speakers at last year’s U.S. Senate hearing on preventable deaths in hospitals.

Jersey Shore Hurricane News, a Facebook page with nearly 230,000 members, was applauded by the White House for doing what traditional news organizations cannot. It connects residents so they can receive and share developments in real time. Beyond simply offering a service to communities affected by storms, it provides news from a multitude of perspectives and from areas many reporters won’t have the resources to access.

Is social journalism the future of news in our constantly evolving digital age?

Image source: Online News Association