Looking to the future

In my week as a business reporter, I've, naturally, been speaking with a lot of successful entrepreneurs about how they've started and grown their businesses.

Two words keep coming back to me when they discuss their growth: "social media."

Those two words provide two emotions for any journalist -- or anyone who is preparing future journalists. Of course, that's what we do as publications advisers.

One of them is fear. Let's be honest -- as journalists, we are in the information business. But news is not made for free, and advertising is -- and always has been -- the backbone of journalism. What each one of these businesspeople has said is that Facebook, Twitter, their blogs and email lists have allowed them to bypass traditional media advertising and connect directly with their customers. When one looks at things from a pure dollars and cents standpoint, that provides a bit of a problem. Who is going to fund media if our advertisers are bypassing us to go directly to their potential audience?

That means one thing -- the business model of producing journalism is rapidly changing.

Very rapidly.

I'm not 100 percent sure how that is going to be changed, although my publication -- the Indianapolis Business Journal -- is on a pretty good path that high school publications can follow, mixing a daily online publication (which has a mix of free and premium content) with a paid-for weekly print publication (whose stories are also online, behind a paywall). While I'm not advcating pay-for-print in a high school publication -- we are a training ground, after all -- the idea of mixing online and print is a strong one. Tablet PCs and their associated apps will also provide more ways to produce fees directly from the users.


However, here is the opportunity to be gleaned from the increased emphasis on social media -- the ability to interact directly with our readers. As journalists, we are experts at providing content, and we also are experts on our particular areas of coverage. That's why it's important, as high school publications, to cover our buildings and our communities as completely as possible -- and not focus so much on stories in which we can't really do any original reporting. In other words, we need to get away from the tendency to recycle/rehash national and international stories, as some high school journalists often want to do.

We need to be the authorities on our subjects, and Facebook/Twitter/email lists allow us to connect with our readers on a par with others. So many of our potential readers have Facebook and Twitter accounts, and if a story shows up in their news feed, they'll be likely to read it -- no matter whether it comes from a professional or a student publication, so we have the ability to get our work in front of many, many more eyeballs than just the students and faculty members who read the paper on publication day. They allow us to stay on top of news -- and also to break news as it happens within our communities. They allow us to be *the* sources in our communities, and develop a rapport with readers. Having social media experience also allows your students to gain valuable experience that will send them to college on a good footing -- whether or not they plan to pursue a journalism career.

The lesson? Use social media. Create an online edition. Your primary audience has smartphones, tablet PCs and social media feeds on their person nearly constantly. It's a way to provide visibility, allow your reporters to develop online personalities and develop an instant feedback rapport with readers that will enhance their credibility as experts on their subjects.

That's going to be a major emphasis of mine as I head back to New Palestine next month to begin another year with the Crimson Messenger and Avalon, our two student publications. I hope you can help cultivate it, too.