Guest post by Todd Blecher, Communications Director, The Boeing Company

Much wisdom did Yoda accumulate. But experience with social media I think not the Jedi had. Yoda’s insistence that we “do, or do not. There is no try,” to brand journalism does not apply.

When it comes to brand journalism the instruction should be “Try. There is no do or do not.” In fact, since April, 2010, when we transformed www.boeing.com into a brand journalism platform, we’ve been all about trying. We started with modest goals and walk-then-run approach that has been essential to sustainable success.

Starting with walking seems obvious but not everybody does it. It not only builds your experience in a manageable way it also helps gain essential internal cooperation. We designed our initial stages as a trial run that could be halted relatively easily. Going slow helped address the unease of doing something new (aka risky) that we found in some corners. It got our nose under the tent and allowed for gradually picking up the pace when the time was right.

From what we’ve learned success with brand journalism seems to flow with the force of some basic principles outlined below.

First and foremost, as with any communications effort, brand journalism must be part of an overall communications strategy. If it’s not, its content will communicate in a vacuum, with little benefit to the organization and of little interest to audiences.

When thinking about brand journalism content an organization must recognize that the stories must, as Shel Holtz recently put it, “be inspiring, clarifying, funny, useful or just plain interesting.” Developing such content requires thinking like an audience member and not just a representative of the organization. Content that serves a communications strategy must be shared. Content that meets what Holtz outlined has a much higher likelihood of being shared than content that doesn’t.

Many organizations, however, won’t allow for thinking like an audience member. They should not do brand journalism.

For those ready to try brand journalism I would recommend hiring some former journalists. And I say to former journalists, as David Meerman Scott put it in this column, consider the opportunities of working for brands. Being that kind of journalist isn’t akin to joining the Dark Side, as some would have you believe.

Having former media journalists doing your brand journalism should save time, money, and aggravation because they are trained to create the engaging content that brand journalism requires. What’s more, they know the necessary tricks of the trade. Organizations doing brand journalism are publishers. They need to think about broad and timely content distribution, editorial calendars, and a strategy for repurposing stories. Former media journalists know how to do all that.

As you may’ve guessed, we have many former reporters on our team. While it’s possible to hire such talent on a project-by-project basis, the best brand journalism requires commitment, access, and trust. Those all seem to come easier for an in-house journalist.

When brand journalists think of what’s interesting to their audiences and create engaging content they generate stories that can, pardon the pun, really take off. Here’s one of ours that did. This story is about testing the brakes on our new 747. The test involves speeding an airplane down a runway then hitting the brakes just before takeoff. It ends with the brakes on fire, which is eye catching, to say the least.

That story had it all for our audiences: iconic airplane, an interesting test activity, and great visuals. We’ve had more than 1.1 million views, and our key messages about safety and durability reached more people through our website, YouTube channel, and Facebook page, than we would’ve reached with a traditional news release.

Another, albeit more unexpected success, came with this story about our Phantom Eye unmanned system. It has more than 400,000 views, a lot for a military story as those usually appeal to a niche audience. This one broke out by presenting a new and unique vehicle in a way that sparked imaginations and discussions.

We’ve certainly had our share of stories that didn’t work. Here are two: this one is about a retiring security dog while this story is about designs for World War Two-era uniforms. Our audiences didn’t know what to make of either of them.

Overall, however, we think (metrics remain a work in progress) that we’re succeeding more often than not. We’ve concluded that brand journalism is a very useful communications tool that, if an organization is prepared to properly pursue it, is worth trying. And doing.

Image Credit: Shutterstock

Following the news of Osama Bin Laden’s death, Twitter once again celebrated its CNN-moment. This isn’t its first however, which actually seems to be news to emerging media pundits. The new reality of a real-time world is that news no longer breaks, it Tweets. We are the architects of a new media alert system, TNN – the Twitter News Network. And, because of us, we have set a foundation for which news media can more effectively track, check, and report on breaking stories as they unfold.

We are connected, we are the new wire…

As I shared with Jon Swartz of USA TODAY earlier…

When Sohaib Athar (@ReallyVirtual on Twitter) inadvertently live tweeted the Osama Bin Laden raid, the Twitter News Network (TNN) proved once again that it is the live wire for everyday people to break news. When Keith Urbahn @keithurbahn published the first credible report that the U.S. killed Bin Laden, TNN was also the people’s news source. Is it the biggest event in social media? It is among them, but that’s not the point. What it does signify however is that the gap between events and reporting is where Twitter shines as a human seismograph. This is yet another example of the importance of social media and the role it plays in monitoring the pulse of world events.

Twitter isn’t journalism, but it is a perfect beast for committing acts of journalism. Long before the news media and as President Obama was learning about the details of the events in Pakistan, individuals following @ReallyVirtual, @mpoppel, and @keithurbahn witnessed first hand as the operation developed and the real news emerged.

There are countless stories that already unravel the Tweets to show how Twitter was well, just being Twitter…a conduit for us to share our experiences as we experience them. Instead, I would like to focus on you, me, and how the magic of shared experiences in social “me”dia come alive in what I refer to as the information divide…the space between an event and when media fact check and officially report it.

We are literally making the world a much smaller place. Tied to connectedness, Twitter is equally magnificent at merging reach and velocity.  The ability to propel news as reported by everyday people around the world in minutes consistently is as wonderful as it is surprising.  And if words are a gateway to one’s soul, in the digital realm, they are the portage to insight and analytics. Shortly after the hail of Tweets, Twitter published an interesting data report that demonstrates the breathtaking volume of our ability to share what moves us.

The Bin Laden news peaked at 11 pm EDT with 5,106 Tweets per second (TPS) following the all time TPS high set by NYE 2010 at 6,939 TPS. Most notably,  According to Twitter, the news event held the highest sustained rate of Tweets to date, hitting 3,000 TPS between 10:45 and 2:20 am, climbing to 38,7 million tweets in just  3.5 hours.

Social media monitoring and analytics platform Sysomos published data that was equally revealing.

In less than 12 hours since the tweeting began we saw almost 40,000 blog post and news articles and an astounding 2.2 million tweets all talking about Osama Bin Laden. As well, while no surprise that people in the US were talking the most about this event a look at our geo-location map shows us that people all over the world were tweeting about the news.

p.s. Congratulations Will & Kate. While we celebrate in this news, we also celebrate your marriage, your love, and the hope it gives everyone around the world that a market for “happily ever after” does indeed exist.

More on the evolution of news and journalism…

Interview with Dan Farber, Editor-in-Chief of CBSNews.com

Interview with Katie Couric

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I was asked to enter the Bloomberg BusinessWeek Debate Room to make the case “for” Twitter as a platform for journalism – at least that’s how I interpreted it. On the other side, ScribbleLive CEO Michael De Monte debates why it is “for the birds.”

But before we get too far down the path, let’s frame the discussion. The original debate topic posed by BusinessWeek, “Twitter Isn’t Journalism, Or Is It?” is a bit misleading  and honestly, I think it’s the wrong question to ask.

In his reaction to the question as posed, Jeff Jarvis shed light on its fallibility through a literal interpretation, “More like an undebate. Typing: journalism or not?”

Dan Patterson of ABC News Radio introduced helpful frames of reference in his Tweet, “It’s the wrong question. Twitter is a tool, the web is a medium, and journalism is an action.”

Perhaps Jarvis’s response is an example of what’s really at the heart of the debate, context. BusinessWeek’s headline as proposed is constraining. It implies Twitter as a platform is or isn’t journalism, which isn’t the intention, at least not in how it was presented to me. The bigger discussion is rooted in the action of Tweeting and whether or not for example, protected by the same rights as other media.

As Alex Howard signals, “There is a debate, whether you acknowledge it or not: shield laws now protect journalists, not acts of journalism.”

Perhaps, for the sake of this discussion, the question would be better asked this way, “Can Tweets represent acts of journalism?”

When we look at the question in this light, the original intention for the course of conversation is righted.

In addressing the spirit of the debate, GigaOm’s Mathew Ingram steers the discussion back on course with his response, “the answer is being provided by @acarvin and @NickKristof.”

Seeing the question in a new light, we need not look any further than NPR’s Andy Carvin for an answer. From the front lines in Bahrain, Carvin  Tweeted, “Later; too busy tweeting reports from Bahrain now.”

Twitter is a platform. And if journalism is an action, can Tweets represent acts of journalism?”

There are valid points on both sides of the discussion, but we learn a great deal more when we open it up to more voices. Please join us…share your thoughts.

Debate Topic: Tweets can recite facts, but Twitter doesn’t qualify as a journalistic vehicle. Pro or con?

To comply with BusinessWeek’s request, please click through to read the post in its entirety…

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The last post in the “Best of 2010″ series is an experience that won’t soon be forgotten. In 2010 I launched (R)evolution, a new video series that spotlights the people who are exploring and defining the future of business, culture, and media. In Episodes 11-13, I had the opportunity to sit down with one of my idols, Katie Couric, anchor and managing editor of the CBS EVENING NEWS WITH KATIE COURIC and correspondent for 60 MINUTES.

Katie Couric is every bit enchanting and welcoming as she is wise and thoughtful. Watching this series reveals a rare side of the person we see on TV. This is someone who is learning about the importance of new media and who isn’t afraid or above exploring the future of relevance. She is the first to say that we are all facing new media together…and together, we have much to learn. A master of traditional journalism, a mother of two daughters, a human being, Katie is looking at Social Media as nothing less than transformative to who she is professionally and personally.

To be honest, I was intimidated at first. As you watch each of the three episodes, you’ll notice a gradual shift from a formal interview to a conversation between two peers.

Take a moment to watch all three. It’s a very candid, sincere, and refreshing conversation. And if you’re like me, you’ll find that she really is America’s Sweetheart.

Part One: Social Media and Real-Time Journalism

Part Two: Privacy and Personal Branding

Part Three: Fact-First Journalism and Digital Identity

Past Episodes:

Episode 1: Empowered with Josh Bernoff
Episode 2: Silicon Valley vs. The World with Sarah Lacy
Episode 3: Rick Bakas on Social Media, Wine and Community
Episode 4: Charlene Li on Open Leadership
Episode 5: Michael Fertik on Privacy and Social Networks
Episode 6: Philip Kaplan on Social Commerce and Influence
Episode 7: Scott Monty Steers Ford to Social Relevance
Episode 8: Frank Eliason on the Social Business and Customer Service
Episode 9: Mark Burnett on Storytelling
Episode 10: CBSNews.com Editor-in-Chief Dan Farber on the Future of News
Episode 11: Katie Couric on Social Media and Real-Time Journalism
Episode 12: Katie Couric on Privacy and Personal Branding
Episode 13: Katie Couric on Fact-First Journalism and Digital Identity
Episode 14: Stanford Law’s Ryan Calo on Privacy Harm and Education

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We live in interesting times and among today’s catalysts spurring excitement and concern are social media…for it, as a movement, is a great equalizer.

Now, here we are, challenged to rethink what we know and think we know in order to compete for relevance now and in the future. As we heard in Part 1 of (R)evolution, we are witnessing the impact of social media on journalism and understanding how news travels differently through social graphs.

In Part 2 of a three-part series with Kate Couric, anchor and managing editor of the CBS EVENING NEWS WITH KATIE COURIC, we  examine how social media impact not only real-time journalism, but also how to protect the consequence of fact-first journalism amongst a new generation that Tweets first and asks questions later. We also explore the impact of new media on culture and society and how it influence who we are online as well as what we share and who we know.

Welcome to the (R)evolution, a new series that connects you to the people, trends, and ideas defining the future of business, marketing, and media.

Credits:

Andrew Landini, Producer, Director, Lead Cameraman
Adam Eckenfelder, Audio Tech/Re-Recording Mixing
Jason Fairbrother, Cameraman
Special thanks to Erica Anderson (@ericaamerica) who helped bring us all together

Location:

CBS Evening News Studios, New York

Past Episodes:

Episode 1: Empowered with Josh Bernoff
Episode 2: Silicon Valley vs. The World with Sarah Lacy
Episode 3: Rick Bakas on Social Media, Wine and Community
Episode 4: Charlene Li on Open Leadership
Episode 5: Michael Fertik on Privacy and Social Networks
Episode 6: Philip Kaplan on Social Commerce and Influence
Episode 7: Scott Monty Steers Ford to Social Relevance
Episode 8: Frank Eliason on the Social Business and Customer Service
Episode 9: Mark Burnett on Storytelling
Episode 10: CBSNews.com Editor-in-Chief Dan Farber on the Future of News
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As as I say at the beginning of this interview, I don’t even know where to begin, so let’s just go ahead and jump right in. In a special three-part series, I’m joined by none other than Katie Couric, anchor and managing editor of the CBS EVENING NEWS WITH KATIE COURIC, correspondent for 60 MINUTES and anchor of CBS News primetime specials.

When the CBS EVENING NEWS WITH KATIE COURIC debuted on September 5, 2006, Couric became the first female solo anchor of a weekday network evening news broadcast.  2008 was a pivotal year for Katie Couric, expanding her presence from traditional media to social media. During the Presidential campaign, Couric launched a series of important webcasts and a YouTube channel that gave viewers live, exclusive Web coverage of the election and the historic beginnings of Obama’s presidency. In 2009, @KatieCouric debuted as a weekly webcast, which features candid one-on-one interviews with top newsmakers. @KatieCouric also expanded its presence to Twitter, where Katie has not only joined the conversation, she’s actively investing in its future.

Please watch the first of three candid and fascinating conversations, which I hope you’ll find enlightening, refreshing, and also inspirational.

Please be sure to watch the next two installments:

Part 2: Katie Couric on Fact-First Journalism and Digital Identity

Part 3: Katie Couric on Privacy and Personal Branding

Welcome to the (R)evolution, a new series that connects you to the people, trends, and ideas defining the future of business, marketing, and media.

Credits:

Andrew Landini, Producer, Director, Lead Cameraman
Adam Eckenfelder, Audio Tech/Re-Recording Mixing
Jason Fairbrother, Cameraman
Special thanks to Erica Anderson (@ericaamerica) who helped bring us all together

Location:

CBS Evening News Studios, New York

Past Episodes:

Episode 1: Empowered with Josh Bernoff
Episode 2: Silicon Valley vs. The World with Sarah Lacy
Episode 3: Rick Bakas on Social Media, Wine and Community
Episode 4: Charlene Li on Open Leadership
Episode 5: Michael Fertik on Privacy and Social Networks
Episode 6: Philip Kaplan on Social Commerce and Influence
Episode 7: Scott Monty Steers Ford to Social Relevance
Episode 8: Frank Eliason on the Social Business and Customer Service
Episode 9: Mark Burnett on Storytelling
Episode 10: CBSNews.com Editor-in-Chief Dan Farber on the Future of News
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Welcome to the (R)evolution, a new series that connects you to the people, trends, and ideas defining the future of business, marketing, and media.

In a world where news no longer breaks, it Tweets, information finds us, because we expect it to.

Dan Farber is someone whom I respect and admire and he’s also someone I have the privilege to call a friend. Farber is the Editor-in-Chief of CBSNews.com and is one of the brightest minds in journalism, possessing a firm grasp on the intersection of technology, human behavior, and the business of news.

He joins me on Episode 10 of (R)evolution to explore the real-time media landscape and the 3C’s of information commerce. He shares his vision on how the business of media must now reinvent the design and distribution of information to connect with people when, where, and how their attention is focused.

News media are desperately trying to close the gap between events, when they appear on Twitter (TNN) and when we start to see official reports. We are the architects of our own social experiences and the content that flows through our stream is defined by our connections. Even though our Social and Interest Graphs are unique, news still makes its way to our stream. I call this the information divide and the pursuit of fact-first news and social media reduce the gap and improve opportunities for leadership.

The emergence of social and interest graphs change everything and now have us competing not only for attention, but also for the moment. People are now an essential part of the dissemination of content and must be factored into every step of the news cycle.

Credits:

Andrew Landini, Producer, Director
Adam Eckenfelder, Audio Tech/Re-Recording Mixing

Location:

CBSNews.com Studios, New York

Past Episodes:

1: Empowered with Josh Bernoff
2: Silicon Valley vs. The World with Sarah Lacy
3: Rick Bakas on Social Media, Wine and Community
4: Charlene Li on Open Leadership
5: Michael Fertik on Privacy and Social Networks
6: Philip Kaplan on Social Commerce and Influence
7: Scott Monty Steers Ford to Social Relevance
8: Frank Eliason on the Social Business and Customer Service
9: Mark Burnett on Storytelling

Photo Credit:
Thomas Hawk

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I recently called for businesses to broaden their perspective of Social Media from an experimental stage of acting and reacting, to one of learning and leading through intelligence, participation, and also publishing. Creating social profiles and broadcasting tweets and status updates is elementary, whereas creating a meaningful presence through the development and dissemination of remarkable content is judicious.

What lies ahead is an inflection point in the maturation of social media, publishing, marketing and communications. And, it all begins with the realization and the corresponding actions that businesses must become media in order to earn greater relevance and ultimately thought leadership within their respective markets.

Every Company is a Media Company: EC=MC

Good friend Tom Foremski is leading a powerful movement to rally companies towards a new media (r)evolution. As he has so astutely observed, every company is a media company or EC=MC:

Every company is a media company because every company publishes to its customers, its staff, its neighbors, its communities. It doesn’t matter if a company makes diapers or steel girders, it must also be a media company and know how to use all the media technologies at its disposal.

While this has always been true to some extent, it is even more important today, because our media technologies have become so much more powerful.

It is no longer a one-way broadcast medium, everyone now has access to an online printing press that can potentially reach tens of millions of people.

Indeed, the future of marketing starts with publishing, and as such, brands must contribute to the evolution of social media in order to truly socialize media and galvanize communities to create more informed and active markets.

While traditional mass marketing doesn’t vanish, the customary intermediaries whom we relied upon to broadly circulate our messages and intentions are now only part of the media cycle. With the proliferation of social networks and the channels they’ve constructed between people, social graphs are forming dedicated audiences willfully connected through context and interest.

Businesses can now weave social graphs of their own through the creation of social presences within the communities where customers, prospects and those who influence them, are actively sharing, consuming, and seeking relevant content and information. While many companies are just now realizing the immediate benefits of social participation and engagement, the rewards are far richer than the accumulation of followers or fans.

Time and attention are precious commodities and therefore require thoughtful commentary, involvement, contribution, and programming to spark actions and reactions and concurrently earn two-way alliances that ultimately form the relationships businesses need to cultivate communities and also inspire advocacy.

Social Objects are Conversational Catalysts

In Web 1.0, it was said that content was king. In social media, one could argue that context is now king, supported by a royal court of content producers and connectors united by a common desire to share information with purpose and utility.

In social media, content and context are packaged as social objects and they serve as the catalysts for conversation, intelligence, and sharing, and hopefully, word of mouth.

Essentially, social objects are the thoughtful blog posts we publish, the relevant updates we Tweet, the helpful tips we leave for others when they check-in, the useful videos we broadcast, the telling pictures we post, the constructive comments we voice, as well as every other pertinent message we syndicate throughout the statusphere.

Newton’s third law of motion states that every action has a reaction equal in magnitude and opposite in direction.

With every social object we introduce, we merit an entitled response, which either validates or discredits the strategy and work that introduced and propelled our content online. The cause and effect of our objective and outcome are dictated by our mission and purpose. Social objects represent the voice, personality, and design of brands and also reflect the culture and virtues we hope to embody and convey. As a result, social objects can trigger the creation and proliferation of earned media, user-generated content that fortifies and spreads our story to each respective social network and enlivens interaction among desirable social graphs. The goal is to incite reactions that potentially further the social effect.

Social Objects can take the form of a myriad of other conversation catalysts including…

Earned media is the result of our owned, paid, and participatory media programs and is reflected in the blog posts, tweets, status updates, comments, and ultimately actions of our consumers, peers, and influencers. Earned media is ideally linked to owned media campaigns as well as proactive initiatives that attempt to incite viral and word of mouth activity.

Owned Media – media that is essentially, controlled by the brand. Owned objects are social objects produced by the company and introduced to each network in a variety of formats, text, video, audio, experiences, etc.

Paid Media represents the visibility we purchase, such as display ads, paid search, and sponsorships. When paired with owned and earned media programs, paid media serves as a hub for complementing, reinforcing, and polishing brand voice, directives, mission, and stature. While many argue over the future and fate of advertising, what’s clear is that online paid presences can benefit initiatives where action and experiences are defined and promoted through the click path.

Participatory Media – Representing an extension of earned and owned media, participatory media takes the shape of a hosted hub where brand representatives and our communities can interact and collaborate. Go-to examples usually include Dell’s IdeaStorm and Starbuck’s “My Idea” network which resemble branded wikis designed to elicit responses, dictate direction, establish community-focused governances, etc. Participatory media equalizes the balance of power, providing a dedicated platform the gives voice to the consumer and a channel for their ideas to trigger transformation or change.

Sponsored Media - This new category fuses owned, paid, and earned media. Sponsored media is one that is championed by companies such as Izea, MyLikes, Ad.ly, Twittad, among others and is creating a new medium for packaging messages through trusted voices within highly visible and social channels. Sponsored media can take the form of paid tweets, blog posts, appearances, and featured objects on targeted profiles. And, whether you agree or disagree with the idea, the reality is that they work and they seem to benefit all parties involved, from brand to paid affiliates to their communities

Businesses are presented with a unique moment in time through interactive technologies to directly capture the attention of their audiences and ultimately stakeholders, through the creation, propagation, and connection of these social objects. However, access to new, expansive, and dynamic platforms does not guarantee our ability to earn and captivate audiences. Our ability to connect and reconnect is driven by our understanding of the unique needs and requirements of those consumers defining our markets and our mastery of the tools and services that form parallel contextual networks.

Read Part Two

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Article originally posted at HubSpot

Six years ago I had the opportunity to work on an ambitious social project that set out to socialize the living room. Keep in mind, this was before the popularization of social networking as it exists today. In almost every way, this system predicted what would ultimately transform your experience on PCs as well as everything else. It was rooted in the realization that the Web was an isolated and lonely experience and that in order for online and terrestrial content to connect with audiences in the future, a new hybrid was required – one that fused social, consumption, and participation in the overall experience.

For many of those who’ve flown Virgin America and experienced Red, their inflight entertainment system, you can get a feel for what lies ahead. The relevance of Red is less about the on-demand aspects of content consumption and more about the ability to view content with others in flight and socialize on screen during the program.

We become part of the experience and as such, we define the experience for ourselves and everyone else who is viewing and contributing to the conversation.

Many technologists, media industrialists, and marketers refer to the current landscape of content consumption as “The Three Screens,” representing mobile, PC, and also televisions. The three screens are the windows of the world, your world, as you are increasingly empowered to take control of the experiences in which you wish to immerse.

The three screens are powered by an underlying technology platform that fuses the social, mobile, and real-time Web into a Golden Triangle and connected by the devices that deliver an immersive and participatory experience, on-demand, regardless of location.

The Golden Triangle will one day soon engender a shared experience across the three screens, but for the meantime, a resurgence of crowd-powered demand for relevance and personalization is leading a groundswell of change and evolution within each medium.

Today, when you view the trending topics on Twitter, we can see the clustering of conversations around particular programs and events as participants gather around a virtual water cooler to share their reactions and essentially socialize around a focal point. The coalescence of this activity is visible and as it increases in volume, the reach and effects resonate across social graphs attracting outsiders and converting them into real-time participants – motivated by a common sentiment of not wanting to miss out in something that potentially carries cultural significance, albeit finite.

The New York Times refers to this online social phenomena as the Water Cooler Effect. In fact, this social effect is credited with breathing new life into the dwindling audiences for television overall.

According to the New York Times article…

This year’s Super Bowl was the most-watched program in United States history, beating out the final episode of “M*A*S*H” in 1983. Awards shows like the Grammys are attracting their biggest audiences in years. Blogs and social Web sites like Facebook and Twitter enable an online water-cooler conversation, encouraging people to split their time between the computer screen and the big-screen TV.

The Web is becoming part of us and we’re bringing it to everything we experience in the real world and now, also on TV.

Nielsen observed that one in seven people who were watching the Super Bowl and the Olympics opening ceremony was online at the same time. And, that number will only continue to escalate. As such, networks are seeking to capitalize on the social effect. Jon Gibs, a vice president at Nielsen, told the NY Times that he is encouraged by recent Olympic data that shows simultaneous TV-and-Web viewing signaled the growing importance of interactivity to the television experience, “Increased usage of social media is definitely driving the ratings

NBC aired The Golden Globes live on both coasts for the first time this year, and because of the tremendous social boosts it experienced, the network is now planning to recreate the experience for the Emmy Awards this fall. Accordingly networks will also further experiment with methods to trigger viewing and online engagement simultaneously.

A connected and shared experience is defining a new and attractive digital lifestyle.

But as this water-cooler effect gains in influence, its true opportunity lies in its holistic integration in each of the three screens – especially as tablets earn a new role in the consumption and engagement behavior of the digerati.

Today, TVs offer networking capabilities, quite literally. For example, my Samsung TV is connected to my Apple network hub in the living room, which allows it to connect to several social networks including Twitter. While viewing a program, I can view my Twitter stream on screen and also tweet directly from the TV (wish it had a keyboard however.)

Imagine the possibilities if each program was socialized within the screen of my choice. Suddenly my viewing and associated online engagement is liberated from the living room and now enabled from the place and device of my choosing. In the meantime however, the mediums are forcing creativity and as a result traditional perspectives are now complemented with multiple sides in a peer-to-peer format.

For example, online networks are proving to be effective channels for content experimentation, often extending the audience of a traditional program. The 51st Grammy Awards created additional live programming and partnered with uStream, the leading live online video network, and Facebook to broadcast complementary coverage of the event as an exclusive for the social Web. As a result, the video hosted as many as 200,000 simultaneous online viewers and the ensuing conversations that spilled over into concentric social graphs and networks helped increase the overall TV audience by 35%.

The result of the social effect and the integrated social hooks inherent in today’s online networks will only inspire a genre of connectivity and interaction as programming will eventually feature creative triggers that engender desired responses and action. The same is true for any event, whether it’s on air, live, or on the big screen.

Chloe Sladden is Twitter’s director of media partnerships and her words perfectly capture the sociological impact of social media, “Twitter [and other networks] lets people feel plugged in to a real-time conversation. In the future, I can’t imagine a major event where the audience doesn’t become part of the story itself.”

The water cooler or social effect is only one part of defining a more meaningful experience over time. It is culturally significant as it connects people around common interests in real-time all over the web using events as our participation hub and as our magnet for convergence. The social effect, as a united audience, will also force broadcasters and media to produce more meaningful and engaging programming, content and ultimately experiences, as we are leading the democratization of all media and attention.

Our actions speak louder than our words and as such the change we wish to instill lies beyond taking part in online conversations. We seek a more participatory experience where viewers can also dictate outcomes. Our role will mature from viewer to contributor and this shift will ensure the relevance and livelihood of media while connecting us, as individuals and online denizens, to a more personal and fulfilling engagement and the community that it fundamentally cultivates.

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In the era of the real-time Web, information travels at a greater velocity than the infrastructure of mainstream media can support as it exists today. As events materialize, the access to social publishing and syndication platforms propels information across attentive and connected nodes that link social graphs all over the world. Current events are now at the epicenter of global attention as social media makes the world a much smaller place.

It’s a timely subject as Clay Shirky will discuss how Social Media can make history at this year’s TED conference. Indeed social media is changing, documenting, and also making history, revolutionizing once invincible industries that are now paralyzed by confusion, fear, and ignorance. Although they’re reacting now, it will take more than the iPad, Kindle, Nook and other digital readers to revitalize the business of media.

Information moves with or without them…

News no longer breaks, it tweets - demonstrating the efficiency, momentum, and influence of the human network. With every new iterative update, social graphs transform into a highly organized information distribution system that resembles an “Amber Alert” network for the social Web – with far greater speed, reach, impact, and resonance.

I once referred to Twitter as TNN, the Twitter News Network as it consistently beat traditional media in the race to report relevant news and trends. And as a result, Twitter and other social networks continue to earn an entrenched role as the primary source of information and breaking events for the hundreds of millions of people connected to one another at varying degrees within and across each network.

We no longer find information; it finds us. And, trending topics become touchpoints to the state of events as they unfold.

Accuracy vs. Immediacy

Social Media is only accelerating and in the process, it dramatically reduces the time between an event and collective awareness, growing increasingly pervasive and prominent along the way. As such, a divide now exists between the materialization and journalistic reporting of an event and as such, this gap immediately fills with tweets, updates, and posts as the crowd-powered socialization of information steps in to fill the void.

The information divide describes the chasm that exists between information as it rapidly spreads through attention dashboards of connected individuals and the primary reporting of news by mainstream media reinforced through the emergence of trending topics within each network. It is distanced by the time required to discern, document, fact check, and publish material information, competing with citizen media whether or not it is completely or only partially based on facts.

This prolonged cycle of journalism and reporting, while slower than the human algorithm that powers the now Web, is still unrivaled however, by its dedication to discovering, verifying, and reporting truth and fact.  In the race towards veracity, the checks and balances of new media systematically reduce error and filter hearsay and speculation and as a result, long standing sources are now slowly losing favor as a destination for revelation and instead, transforming into resources for intelligence as it emerges. In many cases, it’s the tweet, the Twitpic, the Twitvid, the livestream that serve the role of breaking (used as a verb) news.

While the divide is decreasing as media becomes more versed in the art and science of new media tools, the information divide also represents an opportunity for journalists to earn greater relevance. It is a necessary stopgap that validates information and feeds back into a system that can syndicate ratified content from news media through conversational media – gaining a broader audience with every linkback, blog post, tweet, Facebook update, et al.

It’s about proactively defining the shift from reporter to a new genre of influencers who essentially become media catalysts.

The Wire

Media is now forced to compete in an attention economy where the business of news is now a real-time competition for mind share, connectedness, and earned relevance. Today, competitive advantages, and all that benefits the business of news as a result, are defined by the ability to narrow the time span between pinpointing, validating and reporting unconfirmed events as well as the prowess to connect facts to important social beacons online.

The future of all media is rooted in engagement and its worth is measured by contribution, collaboration, and the extent of consequential relationships within any and all online networks of relevance. Influence is not only the ability to inspire action, but also a state of prominence.

The news desk of tomorrow is actually needed today.

Whereas the wire served as a source of breaking information to those who could channel it to audiences everywhere, social media is now a fusion of not only a crowd-sourced wire, but it is also representative of a living and breathing human seismograph that surfaces important events, online and offline.  As a result, active connections to the very pulse of social activity are now an unswerving qualification to sit at the news desk of tomorrow.

The acceleration of real-time content production is not only a form of immediate differentiation, it is also critical to survival. Part of what we’re learning in all of this is that the battlefield for attention and significance is not where we actually engage today. Instead, it evolves and transpires in the places where information is discovered and shared today. We are shifting from a destination-based news ecosystem to a participatory model of sourcing, engagement, and relationships that increase value by identifying and connecting stories to people where and how they consume and share it.

If information reach, velocity, and impact are measured by a human seismograph, news media must now employ social seismologists in order to measure and source the information that will enable them to effectively compete for the future as well as mind share, right now.

Collective Intelligence

We are all in this together.

Information is no longer an isolated or individual experience. We are connected to one another based on common interests and our ability to learn is now the result of collaboration and social syndication. The ability to plug-in to social networks and the invaluable relationships that define them is where the transformation begins and the journey unfolds.

A recent study conducted by Cision and Don Bates of the George Washington University’s Master’s Degree Program in Strategic Public Relations found reporters depend on social media sources when researching their stories – but not at the extent to transform an industry over night. Indeed conversations form a groundswell that escalates information to those who can extend relevant content to the next level of audiences.

55% of the journalists said that social media was “important” or “somewhat important” for reporting and producing stories…

Not surprising however, is the perception or the observance by journalists that social media is not necessarily the most accurate source of facts. 84% of journalists indicated that information was much less and slightly less reliable than traditional media based on the lack of fact-checking, verification and reporting standards. Here in lies the opportunity to source, verify, and report on breaking stories. This is how we reduce the delta that defines the information divide.

Of the various forms of social media used by journalists to find information, blogs ranked at the very top. And in the world of news media, it should prove both alarming and also as an opportunity (again) for reporters to focus on micronetworks such as Twitter (currently ranked as third) in order to tap into news as it breaks or Tweets.

As reporters become social seismologists, it is also the responsibility of the reporter as well as the brand’s social media director, to connect information to audiences who can thus serve as information emissaries to further extend stories to social graphs across the Web.

In the end, we earn the attention, relationships, and audiences we deserve. As a new hybrid of collaborative journalism takes shape, reporters who remain plugged-in to communities outside of their domain will open new doors to relevance – connecting to stories and people that propel information beyond the reach of any one network at the speed of the now Web.

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The Federal Trade Commission is seeking your input regarding future of news media in advance of its upcoming workshops. The FTC seeks to explore the digital impact on consumption behavior and its correlating effects on the the business of publishing and journalism.

The workshop will be held on December 1-2, 2009 and will consider a wide range of issues, such as Internet-related changes in advertising and the way people receive news, ideas for reducing costs and restructuring news organizations, potential for-profit and non-profit models for journalism, and the evolving competition among news organizations.

The FTC is asking for input on a series of questions to be addressed in the workshops, including:

• How is the Internet changing the way consumers access news and how advertising dollars are spent?

• What economic challenges do news organizations face today?

• What cost-cutting measures have news organizations considered? Which have they adopted, and how have they affected the provision of news to consumers?

• What collaborations are news organizations undertaking or considering to deal with financial challenges brought about by the Internet?

• How is the Internet changing the way news organizations and others research, write, edit, produce, and distribute news?

• What innovative forms of journalism have emerged due to the Internet?

• What are the business models, including the revenue sources, for journalism on the Internet?

• How are news organizations likely to compete for audience and advertising in the future?

• Are new or changed government policies needed to support optimal amounts and types of journalism, including public affairs coverage?

• Should the tax code be modified to provide special status or tax breaks to all or certain types of news organizations?

• Do current U.S. copyright protections provide enough incentive to create news content?

• Should the federal government provide additional funding for news organizations?

The Commission will consider comments received by November 6, 2009.

Speak now or forever hold your peace.

The workshops will be held from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. each day at the FTC’s satellite building conference center, located at 601 New Jersey Avenue, N.W., Washington, DC. All attendees will be required to display a current driver’s license or other form of photo identification for entry.

For more information about the workshops, please visit http://www.ftc.gov/opp/workshops/news/index.shtml. To file comments, visit: http://public.commentworks.com/ftc/newsmediaworkshop.

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According to Rafat Ali, The Wall Street Journal today amended its editorial policy to no longer participate in embargoed news herds and will only consider exclusives from this point on. In March, The WSJ introduced a new plan to grade journalists based on the stories they break for the newswires.

For those who need a bit of clarification, embargoes are a form of PR where journalists and bloggers work on a story prior to official release with the understanding that the story can not publish until a fixed day and time. An exclusive is a story that is placed with only one publication or blog, with an implied or explicit promise that the story won’t go to anyone else until after it’s published.

While this is an ambitious move intended to establish dominance and competitive edge, other blogs and publications have instituted such policies due to the actions of over zealous PR pros who would employ a “quantity over quality” methodology. Essentially, these PR shepherds would herd a-listers into a corral of pre-briefings an hold them under embargo until a fixed point in time. In these cases, someone would always break the embargo as a way of scooping the others, thus leaving everyone else angered and embittered.

I fully expect this to be a public-facing trend for a short while, and not necessarily enforced in the back channel where reporters, bloggers and sources maintain proven, trusted relationships. Eventually, these publications will realize that their competition is willing to honor embargoes. This will draw a majority of major PR attention as it’s easier to appease the “more is more” publicity mentality of pitching and placing stories in bulk over a more strategic and effective “less is more” methodology.

Do you think this will lead to a reduction in the volume of embargoed stories it receives from PR or increase its leadership as the primary, exclusive source for breaking news?

Deirdre Breakenridge and I talk about embargoes and exclusives in the age of new media extensively in our new book. In the meantime, please feel free to download, “The Art and Science of Blogger Relations.”

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For those veterans who continue to define Twitter’s role in how we communicate, share and learn, those who have recently made its acquaintance, and those just finding their stride, we all linked through common threads and context that pique our curiosity, stimulate our quest for adventure,  expand our networks beyond our real world network, and feed our desire for attention.

We contribute to the expansion of the Twitterverse.

MG Siegler over at TechCrunch shared two images created by Manolith that richly visualize the three-year old, albeit brief, history of Twitter and its rapid rise to pop culture and its remarkable ability to detour its direction.

Had Manolith waited just one more week to create these images, we would have perhaps the most significant stage of Twitter’s maturation to date; its ability to break news, influence global perception, establish new channels for diplomacy, and galvanize world support.

The Twitter News Network

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The social media news release is rallying support. And more importantly, examples and discussions of usage are percolating throughout the blogsphere among PR practitioners and bloggers alike.

It’s no longer a matter of if, nor when, but now a matter of practice and evolution in order to determine success and failure.

As a recap, the Social Media Release has been pushed by many influencers, including Tom Foremski’s public outcry for the death of crappy press releases; Todd Defren who offered the first template and remains an authoritative champion; Chris Heuer who helped lead an effort to propose a standard for their construction and distribution; Stowe Boyd who reminds disingenuous, lazy or opportunistic PR people that they’re not invited to participate in Social Media (and rightfully so); Shel Holtz who hosted the original NMRcast, and continues to demonstrate the value of new releases; Shannon Whitley’s work to help PR “get it;” and the many others who continue to carry the flag forward.

I joined Heuer from the onset of the Working Group and have since spent most of my free time defending the reasons for their existence in blog posts and at conferences while also practicing what I preach.

Instead of being a spectator however (like many of the critics out there), I’ve been a player on the field helping to define the opportunities, landscape, best practices, and also, when to use restraint.

The social media release, aka SMR, aka social media press release, aka new media release, aka hrelease, is not a miracle pill to cure the ills of poorly written press releases. It is merely a tool that is most effective when combined with a strategic arsenal of relevant company blog posts, traditional releases, relationships, and an emerging category of press releases that tell a story (written by people for people using SEO to reach them).

What? There’s more than one way to tell a story?

YES! Why be so foolish to believe that one message matters to all who read it? Nowadays, different markets require information specifically tailored for them, and not one tool works across the spectrum.

Defining SMRs

Social media releases are designed to get the conversation going, providing readers with the ability to disseminate information and multimedia, bookmark and share the content, and in turn, spark threads. They also serve a purpose of providing new media influencers with the information they need, in one package, in order to write a full story, their way – without having to carve out the BS of a traditional release or pitch.

But just because it sounds cool, doesn’t mean PR should start folding new media releases into their day-to-day PR toolkit. And just because Social Media is a popular “buzz word” these days doesn’t mean that PR should even participate.

Why? Because we’re still battling the “used car sales” reputation that the industry has rightfully earned for itself by selling rather than talking, spinning rather than explaining, blasting instead of focusing, and most importantly, not understanding the venues, publications, blogs, sites, etc. or who they reach, before spamming them.

Social media is about respect, engagement, and transparency – critical traits that most PR is guilty of not practicing or embracing.

The only way to evaluate the potential for new media releases is to first participate in the communities you find interesting, and not as a PR person, but as a genuine enthusiast. This is the first step that will separate the PR people of today versus the communications professionals of tomorrow.

New media releases aren’t only written for journalists or bloggers. They can have the same impact with people they’re written to engage, appealing to an entirely new generation of influencers.

Clarifying Social Media Releases

While the SMR represents an exciting mechanism to socialize news, let’s recap what the Social Media Release is not…

It does not fix what’s wrong with most press releases nor is it designed to replace them

It’s not exclusively for journalists or bloggers

It was not created for PR to create new value for itself (that goes for social media in general)

Social Media Releases advertised by wire services are not true SMRs and neither are the multimedia releases they offer (although they do have value)

Even though a great template exists, SMRs can take many forms and include a variety of content plus social tools.

SMRs are not about BULLSHIT or SPIN or controlling the message.

New media releases represent the opportunity to share news in way that reaches people with the information that matters to them, in the ways that they use to digest and in turn share with others through text, links, images, video, bookmarks, tags, etc., while also giving them the ability interact with you directly or indirectly.

SMR Style Alternatives

While we’re familiar with the benefits of the existing template, there are other options for those looking to engage progressively without having to fully embrace an entirely new format – yet.

One option is to write a concise, compelling release as if it was the story you’d want to read in the press. You should also include new media elements, such as integrated resource links, video, images, etc. (and lite social elements such as del. icio .us and Digg ). This will enjoy greater success with journalists and readers in general and will most likely cost no more than what you already do today in terms of official wire distribution. Plus, it will carry valuable SEO benefits.

Another option (or in addition to) releases is to create a dedicated blog-like platform for distributing information in a way that’s designed to reach journalists, bloggers, and customers. Blog platforms, by nature, are already socially-enabled, and feature integrated comments, RSS feeds, social bookmarking, trackbacks, tags, etc. It shouldn’t resemble a press release, nor a traditional blog, but it should provide what’s new in a conversational, informative and resourceful format – with disclosures of course.

This does require an entirely new approach, but unlike traditional releases, these new approaches can engage readers in a way never before possible. But first, you have to know what you’re talking about and why it matters to those you’re trying to reach.

I guarantee you this, by just thinking about what you want to say, what you should say, distilling it in a way that matters to the people who read it, and provide links, resources, and other forms of relevant media to help tell the story, you will have greater traction with reporters, bloggers, and customers, regardless of the tools you use.

Recent Discussions and Examples of SMRs in the Field

Shel Holtz’s new media agency, Crayon, recently led a social media campaign for Coca Cola’s Virtual Coke program. Todd Defren covered it here. You can see the press release below (click on the pictures to enlarge them).

Deep Jive Interests hosted a very relevant discussion on how SMRs and Social Media Newsrooms could have helped Adobe with its recent Flex announcement. Read it here.

Social Media, What’s Next?

Social Media doesn’t just impact press releases or conversations (blog comments, forums, Twitters, etc.) It is also enabling smart, social media aware people to embrace the world of video.

Active social networks such as YouTube, Veoh, GoFish, etc., provide a new broadcast channel that drives popularity and encourages sharing of clever and meaningful videos. Social media/video-savvy marketers can now also reach people in ways never before possible. It represents the VNR (video news release) Redux.

Stay tuned for my next post, “Social Media Killed the VNR Star.”

Relevant Social Media Release Discussions on PR2.0

How To an Write SMR Template (and what it looks like on the wire)

Social Media Killed the Press Release Star

How to Write a Social Media Press Release, Why, and What It All Means

How to Write a Social Media Press Release – Part II

Enough Already: Getting the Social Media Release All Wrong

Don’t Kill the Press Release, Shoot the Messenger

PR in the Long Tail

The Evolution of Social Media Press Release Distribution and Technorati Tags
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