Jaci Smith: Native advertising for small media markets / Social media ninja school
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Native Advertising on a shoestring Jaci Smith, native advertising coordinator APG Media of Southern Minnesota
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Using an institutional fellowship with the Donald W. Reynolds Journalism Institute, I have been able to create and implement a native advertising program that utilizes existing resources and enriches both the editorial and advertising content of our websites. I created a curriculum of four "belts" of increasing depth on social media — what to use and how to use it wisely. Most of the classes are self-taught. As each student gets through all four "belts," they earn a paid day off.
Transcript of Jaci Smith: Native advertising for small media markets / Social media ninja school
Native Advertising on a shoestring
Jaci Smith, native advertising coordinatorAPG Media of Southern Minnesota
“Big Media” was doing native and making money.
But small market publishers cannot emulate their business model.
Native: Step-by-step
This took APG Media 7 months
1. Gauge demand and form a task force. Create timeline.
2. Develop a mission statement and guidelines for display, transparency, ownership of content, definition of terms.
3. Identify platforms to use and prepare technology infrastructure.
4. Determine resource allocation and training.
5. Set limits: How much is too much?
6. Determine pricing, analytics.
Here’s what it
looks like
Our successes:
Our first foray
into Native in
the daily print
product
Success!• 60 pitches, with a close rate of 83.7%
• Attendance at regional “Lunch and Learns” topped 50% of invitees
• Average time spent viewing: 1 minute, 15 seconds
• Click-through rate around 5-7 percent
• Significant increase (10-15 percent) in participation in specialsections
Opportunities?• Clients less interested in packages than “one-offs”
• Not all sales staff work “consultatively” with their clients; some don’t “get it”
• Clients struggle with subtlety of native
• Time investment much greater than other ad forms
• The slippery slope into advertorial
Social Media Ninja School
APG Media of Southern Minnesota’s
Jaci Smith, managing editor, Faribault (Minn.) Daily News
The problem: Lots of churn: Newsroom staff stay on average 1.5 years
They don’t come out of college knowing appropriate guidelines
Editors don’t have time to continuously monitor posts
Growing segment of audience rely on social media for news
The solution: A social media school Inspiration from Steve Buttry, formerly of Digital First Media Four “belts”: Yellow, Orange, Red, Black Almost entirely self-taught Editors collaborate on skill sets to teach Review forms assess progress Paid day off upon graduation
Yellow Belt: Going Digital How to work social media into your daily workflow
Introduction to our CMS
Importance of SEO, linking and reader engagement
3 classes; two weeks to complete
Orange Belt: Social Media
Twitter, Facebook and Hootsuite 101
LinkedIn and Google+
How to use social media for reporting and crowdsourcing
3 classes; two weeks to complete
Red Belt: Going MoJo Intro to mobile reporting: Doing it all from your phone
YouTube, Galleries and Slideshows: Shooting on the go
Flickr, Instagram, Pinterest – sharing your photos
Using CoverItLive to live blog
4 classes; three weeks to complete
Black Belt: Got Data? Intro to Excel and other database management systems
Intro to mapping with Google, and data visualization
How do I do a data journalism project? – Primer on time management
3 classes; one month to complete
The results/Facebook
Reach on Facebook tripled in 18 monthsLikes doubled, almost equals print circulation
The results/Twitter
30 percent growth in followers since January 2014Average 2-3 tweets daily on main news account
And … Investigative/data reporting awards 4 out of the last 5 years
Stories from social media-generated tips has increased two-fold
Measurable community impact on stories
