Brand journalism is a key aspect of our ongoing campaign to expand awareness about one of our client’s particular services. For months, we’ve met with employees, interviewed them and transformed their stories into articles for social media posts and the company’s website. We’re reviewing social media and Google Analytics to understand how the articles are impacting engagement and website traffic. However, even early on, we’re already hearing a difference. People are telling leadership they hadn’t previously realized to what extent the client offered this particular service.
The news media might not always share – or care – about words of wisdom from your subject matter experts. It doesn’t matter. Just do it yourself!
Brand journalism is the ability to create your own news. It’s a helpful way to get your brand out there without the reliance on the media. It’s a tool to control your own narrative whether you’re a communications person in a company or you wear many hats as a business owner and want to do it for yourself. Maybe you’re an individual brand and want to reflect the stories of your own company or who you are. Whoever you are, brand journalism can put your story out there. So how do you actually use brand journalism?
Do it in the form of an article. Articles are a way to share your expertise and tips with your target audiences. It could be simply sharing statistics or behind the scenes information. Articles are a great tool to share your knowledge in a variety of ways while putting yourself out there.
Share via LinkedIn. A LinkedIn article or post is another tool to get yourself out there. A blog on your website that you share the link to via social media works as well. You are pushing it out there and sharing your own news. It is an opportunity for the news media to find you when they’re looking for specific topics through general online and hashtag searches.
Brand journalism enhances the visibility of your company or brand. These days, media outlets across the country are not as highly staffed as they once were because of budget cuts. They are asking their reporters to do more. They even hire freelancers and are more than ever strapped for time. So brand journalism – by putting your own news out there, by being your own news outlet – helps them when they are looking for news sources, experts and content.
Brand journalism can also be used for educating and informing employees. Traditionally, over the years before social media and intranets, there were company newsletters. That’s how companies would inform their employees about what was happening within the company during the beginnings of brand journalism. Now, companies are relying on their intranet to service their one stop shop. Or, perhaps, they send out an e-newsletter or a morning email on a daily basis that has links pushing people to the intranet.
There are other forms of internal social media platforms like a discussion thread where you can share information across a company. This is especially helpful when people are in several locations or are part of a large company. You can share important information that way. While that is not necessarily pure brand journalism, those are some of the tools that can be used to achieve it.
External and internal content for the intranet can be similar. There is a blurred line of what can be shared depending on the audience. Some people will refer to external communications as a combination of communications (“mixternal”) that can apply to both an internal and external audience.
For example, let’s say a company is sharing internally an article or a story that goes on their intranet about a great job an employee did to help find a solution to a problem. That would probably be a mixternal example where they can share that on their LinkedIn or other social media channels or their blog that is available for external audiences to look at. It shows what’s happening behind-the-scenes and how a company can tap into their experts. That also bolsters their reputation of being a go-to source for information.
Brand journalism is humanization. It shows your organization is not just some faceless company. It’s a way to demonstrate the human stories of people doing interesting things, to show photos and to share behind the scenes of people doing their jobs. Brand journalism has opened up this sort of behind-the-curtain feel. It shows the public a side of the company that was previously closed off to the public unless you worked there.
Companies not doing brand journalism are missing out. Unless they want to remain closed off, these companies are missing a great opportunity to get their name out there, to be found, to showcase themselves as an expert or a source and, again, to humanize themselves. It could even be some clever, funny posts they share. And sometimes, these are ways to connect with people. Brand journalism provides a tool to connect with a target audience in a way that wasn’t available before the rise of social media.
Have a digital newsroom on your website. It’s a hub where companies can share news releases. It’s a library of happenings in the company. Sometimes, newsrooms provide a great way to do the legwork for a reporter who might be covering the company. Reporters can go to the news section and get news releases, photos and the company logo(s).
Don’t miss out. Use brand journalism to elevate your company and put its name out there. It will make it easier to gain media attention and will keep employees updated. Try it out and realize how powerful brand journalism really is.
