Journalists use social media sites well

By Angela Moneck

After analyzing three different journalist and their social media sites, it’s become obvious that all three do a good job in promoting themselves and their work on their social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook. 

I analyzed the websites of the very famous romance novelist Nicholas Sparks, Lifestyles editor for The St. Petersburg Times Janet Keeler, and freelance journalist Kerry Hiatt. Nicholas Sparks has written several best-seller novels. Janet Keeler works mostly on the food section of the St. Petersburg Times. Kerry Hiatt has a publishing company in London that she writes for, but does mostly freelance articles for her website getupandout.com.

The more the author is known across the world, the more followers and/or friends they had on their social media sites. Sparks has 30,102 followers on Twitter.

Sparks tweets almost every day, sometimes several times a day. The other two journalists update their social media sites almost every day.

All three journalists provide a small amount of personal information on their sites, such as where they live. Sparks tweets where he is, but mostly only if he’s doing some type of public event like a book signing.

Each journalist does a good job with involving their fans in their social media lives. Sparks retweets posts like this: Too sweet! RT @iLoVeJONAS616: @SparksNicholas still in shock that I met nicholas sparks, best night of my life. Keeler asks her followers what she should cook and answers questions from her fans. She also encourages them to send in recipes so she can try them and possibly publish them in The Times. Hiatt asks her fans questions, posts polls for her fans to engage in, and updates about contests her website is hosting.

Nicholas Sparks, Janet Keeler, and Kerry Hiatt all use very good tactics to promote themselves and their organizations. Sparks tweets about his book signings and appearances. He also promotes other authors by posting articles he personally likes. Keeler tweets several food ideas for her fans and tells them what she’s eating: Boneless, skinless chicken thighs on sale. Wild rice soup today. Ginger-sesame marinated bird on the grill tomorrow. More in freezer. This works well because if the fan likes the food, they will probably go pick up a copy of The Times to find more recipes. She also tweets when the newspaper, especially her section, wins awards and dates and times of events for the fans to attend. Hiatt promotes her website in similar ways as the other authors by posting stories on the Facebook page almost every day with a link to the website and updating when the website is featured somewhere such as a newspaper.

After analyzing the three journalists, I think they all do a very good job in engaging their fans and promoting themselves and their companies. The journalists all follow the guidelines for social media and use the sites well.