1. Including your audience
in your investigation
Sharon McNary, So. Calif. Public Radio &
American Public Media
Mary Hartney, The Baltimore Sun
2. W com unity/social m
hat m edia
specialists are doing
• Helping build local site traffic
• Connecting readers and journalists
• Finding new audiences/groups that aren't
typical users
• Using social media to do outreach and
spread journalism across platforms
3. Public Insight Journalism
Partners with the public to inform the news
We promise:
• No spam, fundraising or marketing
• Nothing published or aired w/o
permission
• Journalism use only
6. Ask questions: M open-ended
ost
These questions seek experience rather than opinions.
Ask about changes -- personal, community, financial.
Open topic -- what else to consider, who else to call?
8. Get public insight your journalism
into
Good for:
• Breaking news -- Bridge collapse; Wall St. collapse
• Blog posts or talk shows
• Character for a column or feature
• Find community commentary authors
• Testing a hunch, story ideas to follow up
• Move background sources into on-record
• Coverage stream proposal or series
• Crowdsourcing -- getting eyes in many places
• Populating focus groups and community forums
• Find surprising angles on the news
• Discover stories that are off your radar
13. Social networks: What's in it for
you?
• Make yourself available to readers and the
community
• Explain what you cover and be transparent
• Get tips
• Follow sources, politicians and
organizations
14. Build your following
• Thank new followers
• Start a conversation
• The language of following and friending
• Find others to follow using search tools and
specialized Web sites
• Follow others' followers
23. DIY
netw ork:
Results spreadsheet in Google
Docs
24. Doing outreach on the Web
• Read blogs regularly and leave comments
(leave breadcrumbs with a URL to your site
and use your work e-mail address)
• Join groups on Facebook or Ning
• The old-fashioned social networking: Attend
real-world meetups
25. Build your network
• Personal outreach: biz or post cards
• On-air callouts, Web and print features
• Serious games like Budget Hero,
Consumer Consequences
27. Leverage your network:
Crow dsource
• Ask for sources, anecdotes, people affected
• Let the community help you report
• Collect information and data
• Connect people with other people
• Find allies in transparency
33. Post-publication interaction
• Post your story to social bookmarking sites,
groups you've joined
• E-mail sources or interested parties
• Track and read comments after publication
• Join in the comments or talk forums
• Answer questions (formal Q&A or live chat)
