As a journalist and digital media professional with expertise in social media management that wants to apply my skills in news organizations, these are difficult times to find a job.
Canada, where I lived and worked for more than four years now, is a cautionary tale for news organizations around the world on what can happen when most of your traffic relies on third-party social media platforms, like Facebook and Twitter, and is suddenly gone.
There was a time when Twitter was a reliable source for journalists to find and share information.
Facebook (and Instagram) were also a good place to find breaking news between pictures of your exes and invitations to that school reunion you didn’t want to attend. Facebook (now Meta) was investing in journalism, particularly local news, with their Journalism Project.
That ‘golden era’ for news content on social media was long gone before Elon Musk bought Twitter and Zuckerberg turned to vertical short video to compete with TikTok, but recent events have accelerated this shift.
What is Canada’s Bill C-18?
Also known as the Online News Act, Bill C-18 requires internet giants to compensate Canadian media companies for making news content available on their platforms.
Similar initiatives have been tabled in Spain and Australia before.
‘Big Tech’ is not willing to compensate Canadian media companies and, after the bill became law on June 22, 2023, they responded by blocking Canadian news content in their platform.
UPDATE:On August 1, Meta announced that in the course of coming weeks content from Canadian news outlets will cease to be viewable on Facebook and Instagram for anyone in Canada, posts from international news outlets will not be viewable in Canada, and people in Canada won’t be able to view or share news content, including news articles and audio-visual content.
I was living in Spain when Google News stopped operating in the country, due to the introduction of new legislation to meet European Union copyright rules, and I don’t remember it impacting newsrooms as severely as it has impacted the Canadian news ecosystem.
The difference? Canadian news media has become extremely reliable on referral traffic from these third-party sources (search and social). Proportionally, a very few Canadians actively seek out information and, instead, rely on search results and social media algorithms.
That’s where the shift must happen from both ends, media and audience, for news content to continue thriving in the ever-changing digital space, in Canada and worldwide.
I’m aware that Bill C-18 had consequences on both, search and social, but I’m focusing just on social here. The future of SEO under this new bill, and as Google relies more heavily on generative artificial intelligence, could be a topic for a future article, if you are interested?
For Law nerds, you can read the full Bill C-18, here.
Social media as a brand builder, not a traffic generator
Journalists have a hard time talking about marketing, myself included, but a conversation must be had. When social media is no longer bringing eyeballs to your stories, when analytics show click-through rates in extreme decline, what do you need to be on social media for?
Social media is still a great (free) place to build your brand and find new audiences that discover you and then proactively seek out your content.
You might need to look at different metrics, conversions instead of click-throughs, and please (PLEASE!) ignore vanity metrics like followers or likes. Most likely, you need to re-evaluate your overall content strategy for social media channels, as well.
Short vertical video is here to stay, the use of TikTok for news is on the rise and, even if you have legit concerns on privacy, Chinese ownership and free speech, vertical video can now be repurposed to at least three other social platforms: Reels on Facebook and Instagram, and Shorts on YouTube. Not for click-throughs, but for reach and brand awareness.
TIP: Use SnapTik to download your TikTok videos without a watermark, so you can re-upload them on other platforms: Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.
In Canada (specifically, in Québec), there’s an interesting initiative to bring vertical videos to a news homepage, but continue reading the next section to learn more about that.
Bring your audience ‘home’
The key to sustain a digital news venture in this platform-agnostic, ever-changing and challenging environment is to build your own audiences, not relying on third parties.
Focus on a responsive and engaging website and additional products, like newsletters or apps, where you own the data of your audience, so you can reach out to them more effectively.
That probably means shifting your focus towards product development to truly ideate and optimize news products that meet and satisfy the needs of your audience, and marketing to differentiate yourself from competitors and remain top-of-mind for your audience.
A couple of organizations that have been doing interesting work recently:
MTLBlog, the Montreal-based blog owned by Narcity Media Group, introduced a series of new features to ‘gamify’ the reading experience, with 3D avatars and a point-based system to encourage engagement with their content. I find this is a great way to bring social elements back to your owned and operated platform. Why would you want hundreds of comments on a Facebook post, that often don’t even click in the link, when you can have a more engaging commenting experience in your platform? It’s like going back to the origins of Web 2.0 with the best parts of Web 3.0. This is one of the first steps in a larger groundbreaking strategy shift Narcity announced in June 2023.
Noovo Info, Bell Media’s news service in French, is the example of bringing vertical videos to a news homepage that I was teasing before. They found a new outlet for the vertical videos that they have been producing for TikTok and Instagram: their own homepage. And it comes with a click-through and call to action, so it is a great way to present new content in a mobile-friendly and video-first way, increasing internal traffic. Full disclaimer: I worked for Bell Media’s news services from April 2022 to June 2023, I was not directly involved in Noovo Info’s initiatives but I followed them closely.
Befriend an influencer
Another way for news organizations to take advantage of the current social media landscape is by embracing influencers and the creator economy, rather than antagonizing them.
The Digital News Report 2023 by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism found a large proportion of surveyed people pay more attention to personalities (celebrities and influencers) than mainstream or alternative news outlets when they are looking for news, particularly on YouTube, Instagram, Snapchat at TikTok.
Tiktok journalist Sophia Smith Galer made a summary of key takeaways after attending the VidCon conference this year. One idea that stood out for me was the need for news organizations to fund partnerships with content creators rather than ‘acquiring’ their content.
What that looks like can be different for each news organization, but to me it all speaks to an idea that I’ve been quietly advocating for all my career: a need for individual journalists to build a social media presence, independently or with the support of news organizations they belong to.
News on social media are possibly better received when they come from an individual, through a more personable transmission of information. That’s why influencers succeed.
Engage with your community
Another finding in the Digital News Report this year is that participation (shares and comments) are in decline and becoming less representative, with a small group of engaged users having a disproportionate influence over political and cultural debates.
I’ve seen this personally with the feedback becoming increasingly toxic during the COVID-19 pandemic, when the comments section on Facebook and the replies on Twitter were filled with misinformation, politically divisive remarks and hate messages.
Under that, it is hard to find the positive or negative but constructive criticism that will help you understand what your audience needs, but it remains critical to do so, to inform and shape your editorial strategy, engage with your audience and become truly ‘social’.
There’s a light…
Some good news to close this article: is not all doom and gloom. There are successful news ventures that are (and remain) social first. These are often funded through philanthropy, donations, public funding, crowdfunding or branded content, or (ideally) a diversified mix.
They increasingly thrive in building relationships with their audience through closed messaging apps, like Telegram or Discord, and often serve niche audiences and interests.
I recommend reading Francesco Zaffarano’s newsletter Mapping Journalism on Social Platforms and his directories for news organizations and individual journalists on TikTok, Telegram, Instagram and Reddit, if you are looking for some hope and inspiration.
This article is the first in a series where I’m collecting my thoughts after attending the 3-day Transformation Boost course at Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY, in New York City, in July 2023. These are my thoughts and this is an open conversation, so feel free to share your point of view in the comments or contact me.
Oriol Salvador 
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