One of the Basic Tenets of the Convergence Curriculum Is Understanding and Adapting To

Engagement Capstone 1

Schmid, Helmy, Pinder

Professor McKean

Convergence Capstone Final Paper

10 May 2011

One of the basic tenets of the convergence curriculum is understanding and adapting to the changing format of news gathering, production and consumption. Through the Convergence Fundamentals, Reporting and Editing courses, we have learned the most effective and compelling ways to create multimedia news. However, the active role of journalists pitching, reporting and editing the story is only half of the equation. The other end is how to effectively deliver the news to an audience. This is a simple concept that has been part of the media narrative since the rise of the Internet. Consumers now have a variety of ways to acquire information from several different platforms, and it is up to the journalist to understand how to make their content worth not only a reader’s attention, but also a reader’s investment.

This is where our capstone semester project comes in. We, (Abbie Schmid, Lauren Pinder and Harumendhah Helmy) have been working with Reynolds Journalism Institute Fellow Joy Mayer on how to increase audience engagement at the Columbia Missourian. Through research of various media outlets, we’ve come to understand the importance of journalism facilitating a dialogue, not a monologue with readers. Under the umbrella of three basic ideas: conversation, collaboration and outreach, we believe there many dynamic ways publications big and small can expand and reach their audiences in ways that benefit readers and content producers alike.

The project presented challenges. The first was the level of enthusiasm for engagement in a newsroom. While the Missourian’s editors all encouraged and supported increased engagement, it is not a priority for every member of their staff. This prompted a discussion among our team about whether engagement is an attitude that must permeate the entire newsroom or whether it can simply be something to work on through certain outlets, i.e. Facebook, Twitter. Our work centered around Facebook, but we see no reason why the Missourian cannot develop a fully engaged environment for readers and a community in which newsroom and reader collaborate in every aspect of news.

Another challenge we have faced is how to suggest the Missourian proceed with our findings in the future. We worked with TA’s and editors at the Interactive Copy Desk when we were in the newsroom, however we are not sure that they should be the ones doing the work in the future. While, as we will discuss more, we suggest that individual reporters handle comments and responses for their own stories through social media outlets, it may not be smart for each one to have access to the Missourian’s Facebook as a whole. Another suggestion is to have future convergence students (or other sequences) handle the Missourian’s social media during a certain time every day (possibly 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.) in order to have more organization. While this decision will be left up to the editors, we are excited to see future growth and change in the Missourian’s engagement strategy.

What We Know

Our time spent trying certain techniques through the Missourian’s Facebook has taught us

what works and what doesn’t when it comes to engagement. While it takes at least some interest to read a story it takes even more to make a comment about it. We know that certain categories of news garner more engagement. These topics are typically: sports, breaking news, opinions, and community features. These tend to get more responses simply because they are the topics people are more interested in. People will more readily share their thoughts on something they already think about and have an interest in.

Multimedia draw people to a story. When a video or photo is uploaded to Facebook (not just linked to) people are more likely to participate in conversation and to read the story. An entire photo album is appropriate for something like a community event where people can tag themselves. However, at least one photo should be posted with each story if it is available and if there is any visual aspect to it. For something like a video it is imperative the video be uploaded on Facebook and not linked to, as cutting out that extra step makes watching and engaging much simpler. Posting shots of the front page of the newspaper has also been successful for out project. It is a way for Facebook users to gather the top stories without having to search the website.

Adding our own commentary to whatever link you are putting up is very important. Whether it is a question pertaining to the story or an interesting excerpt from the article, showing that we took the time to say something about the story makes a reader more likely to say something. This is important for every story, even “Today’s Question.” Not just linking to the question but retyping it again into Facebook is something more familiar to users.

In documenting our time at the Missourian we categorized what kinds of commentary we put with stories, which can be helpful in finding out which kinds of questions prompt more responses. See Question Page. Pulling from the archives is another way to promote engagement. This could either be something like “this day last year” or just promoting past stories that relate to a current issue. It brings something new to the table and can spark new conversation. This is a unique aspect of a website. In print, you have to constantly summarize past information on stories and also reprint materials such as schedules. With a website, you can simply link to previous stories to give a reader background on a subject. Timing of posts is something to factor into engagement. Facebook Insights have shown us that posts made between 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. get the most visibility or number of “Impressions.”

Feedback from the newsroom on comments is something integral to Facebook engagement. If a reader asks a question through Facebook it should be quickly answered by someone at the Missourian. Follow-up is essential because it shows the newsroom cares about what the readers think. It also shows that we ask these questions for a reason and want to communicate with our readers.

A Little Bit About Columbia Missourian’s Audience

Earlier in the semester, we conducted a survey of Columbia Missourian’s audience. The goal of the survey was to learn how Missourian readers already interact with the newspaper and its staff, specifically on itswebsite, as well its online social networking arms:Facebook andTwitter.

Thesurvey, hosted by SurveyMonkey, was posted and promoted on the Missourian’s Facebook and Twitter pages starting in late February 2011. The Missourian also publishedacolumn about it, which Joy Mayer wrote. As of March 13, 2011, we have heard from 157 respondents.

In the interest of transparency and getting back to our respondents, we compiled highlights from the results in a public Google Document and posted the link to it on the Missourian’s Facebook page. We also posted the link in a comment posted on Joy Mayer’s column on the Missourian website.

The results below are compiled from those highlights, with a few more details added.

General respondent demographics — highlights

The largest chunk of respondents (32.5 percent) are 23-32 years old, closely followed by 15-22 year olds (29.8 percent). In terms of relationship to the University of Missouri, most respondents (34.4 percent) are current students. The next largest group is comprised of former students, faculty members or employees (31.8 percent). A little more than half of the respondents (52 percent) say they know at least one member of the Missourian staff personally.

The gender divide among the survey respondents is almost right down the middle: 51 percent female and 49 percent male.

Audience interaction with ColumbiaMissourian.com

The survey finds only 30 percent of all the respondents have commented on a story on the Missourian website.

To the question “Why did you comment on a story on the Missourian website?,” where more than one answer is allowed, respondents most commonly stated “I had a strong opinion on the issue at hand” (59 percent of respondents who said they have commented). This answer was followed closely by “The issue was relevant to me” (57 percent) and “I was responding to a previous comment” (52 percent).

The most common answer to the question “How often do you read the Missourian?” is “Several times a week,” representing 36.4 percent of all respondents.

Audience interaction with the Missourian’s Facebook page

Out of 133 respondents who say they use Facebook, 42 percent of the 133 Facebook users say they have clicked ‘Like’ for the Missourian’s page. But, 82.4 percent say they have never actually interacted with the Missourian’s Facebook page. Interestingly, 45 percent of those Facebook users say they have shared the Missourian’s content on the social networking site.

Audience interaction with the Missourian’s Twitter account

Out of 100 respondents who use Twitter, 88 percent say they follow at least one of the Missourian’s Twitter accounts — @CoMissourian, @CoMissourianNow and @CoMoSports. About 48 percent of those Twitter users say they have interacted with the Missourian’s account. Interestingly, 66 percent of those Twittering respondents say they have shared content from the Missourian through tweets — more than the percentage of followers itself.

Interest in community meet-ups or receiving news alerts

From the 136 respondents who answered to the question “If the community were invited to informally meet and chat with Missourian staff — with snacks! — would you be interested in participating?”, about 45 percent say they would be interested in attending such meet-ups.

When asked “Would you be interested in receiving news alerts from the Missourian?” 66.9 percent of the respondents say they are not interested. As for those who say they would be interested, more prefer to receive e-mail alerts (26.8 percent of all respondents, as compared to 11.3 percent who say they prefer text alerts).

Facebook Insights

Every Page on Facebook comes equipped with the Insights feature, which allows Page owners to keep track on the user activities and interactions with their Page.

Here’s Facebook’sownexplanation of the Insights feature:

“Facebook Insights provides Facebook Page owners and Facebook Platform developers with metrics around their content. By understanding and analyzing trends within user growth and demographics, consumption of content, and creation of content, Page owners and Platform developers are better equipped to improve their business with Facebook.”

What can Insights tell us?

Among other things, Insight keeps track of how many ‘Likes’ the ColumbiaMissourian.com Page gets daily, how many times each of our post appear on our fan’s News Feed (also called Impression), and how many people have hidden our posts from their News Feed (also called Unsubscribers).

By checking those types of data from Insights, we can try to gauge what kind of content gets our audience’s attention, as well as what kinds of content doesn’t get their attention, and what could make fans hide us from their News Feed, or even “unLike” us.

How should we check Insights: Some tips and suggestions

On the Facebook page, Insights data are presented in line graphs.

Active Users on ColumbiaMissourian.com Facebook Page, Week of April 17-April 23

For easier analysis, Insights allows Page owners to export data into a Microsoft Excel format. The data can be exported in either monthly or weekly chunks. We suggest for Admins to use this export tool weekly — kind of like Nick Jungman’s weekly report of the Missourian’s website — because a month’s worth of data is simply too many numbers.

To easily share the data with a number of editors, the Excel document can also be imported to Google Spreadsheets. Here’s what a week’s worth of exported data looks like, on Google Spreadsheets:

From that Spreadsheet, we see that on April 21, we have a particularly high number of Daily Page Views. This means we don’t simply just show up on people’s News Feed, but some people actually click through to our Page. A simple scroll down on our Page shows that April 21 is the day we posted a breaking news photo of a bomb squad member outside of the Boone County Courthouse — showing that posting multimedia like photos help our Page. Of course, breaking news helps too.

Insights is not perfect

Don’t be deterred by the horrendous Feedback percentage! This is how Facebook calculates Feedback percentage: number of Likes+comments divided by number of Impressions. But how Facebook calculates Impressions is a little flawed: a user may load up their homepage and somewhere in their stream will be your story. While not all users may have seen that story (as they may decide not to scroll down), Facebook made a request for your story, making the appearance count as an Impression.

What We Recommend

Based on our experience we have a few simple recommendations for the newsroom to try in the near future. We have talked about using either Facebook or Disquis to upgrade the Missourian’s commenting system. With either of these platforms, people would have an more convenient way to respond to stories. They could use a login that they already posses through a social media site to comment, rather than having to create one through the Missourian’s website. One drawback of this however, is that some people might not want to comment on something so public with their private Facebook account. This should be taken into consideration when deciding what options to give users.

As mentioned earlier we have statistics on timing of posts, however, through some of our research we have learned that Thursdays and Fridays are when people are more likely to engage. From Mashable:

“Analyzing more than 200 of its clients’ Facebook pages over a 14-day period, Buddy Media found that engagement on Thursdays and Fridays was 18% higher than the rest of the week, and that engagement was actually even better on Thursday than on Friday. Meanwhile, Twitter Chief Revenue Officer Adam Bain — speaking at the Ad Age Digital conference earlier this week — said that Twitter users are more engaged with tweets on Fridays.”

The reason for this is that people are more likely to be relaxing, less distracted by work, etc. and therefore have more time to use social media. However, this is somewhat true of the Missourian as well. Friday through Sunday Facebook activity on the Missourian’s part is not particularly high. We recommend the Missourian put a new focus on weekend Facebook activity to better engage readers in their down time.

Suggestions for Further Exploration

Creating a welcome graphic for the Missourian Facebook page. Some great examples are the Mashable, Red Bull and the Austin-American Statesman. The welcome graphic allows new visitors to get a sense of what the page is about and immediately encourages them to click the Like button and interact with the content. The key to the welcome page is to get visitors to Like the page as soon as they arrive.

We want to explore syncing the Missourian website commenting system with Facebook and other social media outlets. In general, people may be more accountable for what they if it’s connected to their online identities.

Keeping track of who is granted administrative privileges on the Missourian Facebook page should be a priority for the Missourian. Since there is constant turnover in the newsroom, it is important to keep track of who has access to add and remove accordingly. It is also important to establish a Missourian social media voice and culture. This means that no Facebook post goes up without a written question and a photo if possible, and appropriate editorial judgement is used on questions asked on Twitter. If a reporter or photagrapher has a fan comment on their work, it’s appropriate for them to respond with their own personal profile.

We would like to see the Missourian involving fans in discussions and encouraging them to share their own memories/experiences during big events and holidays during the year. (Example: Homecoming, Christmas) This could be on a separate discussion page on the Facebook page. This is a good opportunity to crowdsource and involve fans in the conversation. This could also lead to contests and quizzes for readers. There are some good examples from the Omaha World-Herald’s page.

The Missourian should work to integrate local media and businesses on the page. For example, if there’s a story about a new restaurant opening, friend the local restaurant on the Facebook page and mention them in a post. If there’s a big news story, link KOMU or KBIA’s coverage to the Missourian’s coverage.

Social Plugins through Facebook is something the Missourian could utilize more in the future. Using SocialPlugin on Facebook to provide a view of how users are engaging with the website, its content, the sharing on Facebook and the referral traffic sent by Facebook to the website could give us more information about our users. This is a concrete way to keep track of kind of activity is happening on the page.