Atlanta Social Media Week

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I sat in on two workshops as part of Atlanta Social Media Week.

One was about promoting events using social media.  Too often at my church, we have the same people supporting the events. My goal is to throw the net wider and attract new people. The folks don’t have to join the church, but come out and enjoy the social events. That’s my idea anyway.

So what did I learn?

  • Establish a micro-site to promote the event.
  • Develop geo-location program, from FourSquare to Facebook Places. It’d be best to offer a reward for those folks.
  • And following the event, put photos and other features on Youtube, which is the second most popular search engine. Use that material for the next promotion.

The second event was at the Atlanta Bloggers Meetup. It was all interesting. Sadly, I lost my notes. But one message was to be consistent in branding an event. Don’t change things up on people.

New venture

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I’ve recently attended Toastmaster meetings near my office.

I had heard good things about the organization and I thought know I could benefit from improved public speaking, especially thinking on my feet.

Funny enough, at my first meeting, the folks thought my brief speech – which is supposed to resemble an elevator pitch on the job – was the best. But I think they were just being kind to the new guy. Me.

Now, you may ask, “Andrew, you are a reporter, you talk with strangers all the time. Why do you need to practice public speaking?”

Aaah. That is the power of the notebook. When I am working, or even on my own time, it is very easy for me to ask questions. I notice I do it often to keep a conversation going.  That’s a good trait, but when I am the one answering questions, my responses aren’t as fluid, or as good as they could be.  My goal with Toastmasters is to be more comfortable answering the questions, instead of asking them.

NPR memories

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I’ve been a big fan of NPR for many years, probably going back to college. There wasn’t a TV in my room, but a radio tuned to the NPR station in Binghamton, NY.

Today, I volunteered at WABE, Atlanta’s NPR station, to answer phones for the first morning of fall fund drive. On my way there in the darkened Atlanta highway, I heard a local public figure talk about what she got out of listening to NP.

In the same vein, here are three memories I have of listening to NPR news:

3.  Listening to the vice presidential debate in 1994.  I remember thinking this as an interesting point to make.

2. Listening to the Iraqi War unfold on the radio in the early 1990s.  There is something about radio, good radio, that can transport me to another time and place by listening to it. It has a different effect than TV.

1. 9-11-2001. I woke up late from a night shift at The Telegraph, NH. As was my usual m.o., the first thing I did as I stumbled between my bedroom and my coffee pot, was flip on the radio. That morning, I was stunned into thinking this event was not real. Could not be real.  Even as the announcers were saying the towers were falling, I couldn’t fathom the event.

Go here for an archives of the event.

I am energized

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I spent Friday at an all-day conference hosted by Investigative Reporters and Editors organization. Unlike many conferences, where the final speaker cannot come soon enough, this conference ended too soon. The 50 or so people got all sorts of tips help dig deeper in stories and learn from the best.

I found these speakers very encouraging:

  • T. Christian Miller, ProPublica: He had an interesting take on FOIA requests, along with how to organize complicated stories.
  • Tisha Thompson, Fox5 News, Washington, D.C.: She talked about her love of documents to make stories stand out from competitors.
  • Alison Young, USA Today: The former Atlanta reporter, she talked about working hard to get interviews by working from outside the circle of decision makers for a story to gather more information before approaching folks on the inside.

I’ll be posting more links from the conference in the days ahead. I want to figure out how I can use the ideas for The Jefferson Park Hub.

Seeking: Better Marketing

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Marketing my 10-month-old online news magazine is my weakest link.  I’d rather focus energies on story ideas, not tooting my horn. But I know that isn’t enough.  People won’t come to The Jefferson Park Hub if they don’t know about it.

My online news magazine/newspaper was recently promoted in the neighborhood newsletter, The Grapevine. You can read it at the organization’s website here. I noted the date of the publication on my Google Analytics account.  I am curious to see if the site sees an uptick in the number of viewers.

Another opportunity to get the word out is I plan on being a a regular contributor the quarterly newsletter. It’ll be a reprint of a past feature with a notice of where it came from. That’ll be a lazy way to get my site in front of the 1,000 people on the circ list.

I’ve posted a question on LinkedIn looking for other marketing techniques. I’ll follow up with any ideas that are floated.

New video: short, but sweet

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I just put up a brief video I shot.

I used my Flip camera, used the option to make a still photo to break up the player and her ball tricks and then cropped it to have the voice over. It provides a little more depth to just the written story. (I’ll link to that when it’s online.)

Award winning. Booyah

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It’s true that reporters don’t write for judges, but it’s nice to be recognized.

A project I worked on was recognized with the second place award for multimedia presentation at the national Catholic Press Association. I traveled to New Orleans for the annual convention. While there, I was asked to make a presentation to Catholic Relief Services and during the convention to about 15 other journalists

You can see the winning piece here:

Georgia Bulletin Photo Slideshows.

Sound editing, silencing the noise

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I am working on another post for my ongoing series “In Person” a one on one interview with interesting people. I add multimedia to the posting by including the recording of the interview.

The interview was done on an outside patio at a pizza shop. I set my digital voice recorder on the lowest level but it still picked up nearby diners talking and laughing. That’ll make the sound editing a little trickier.

I use the free program Audacity for my editing. But I have some time to play around so I think I’ll be trying to work with Apple’s Garage Band.

What’s it all about

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Like the world needs another blog, I’m thinking

These online musing will be my ‘reporters notebook’ of my hyperlocal news blog, The Jefferson Park Hub.

I expect to write at least twice a week about successes, challenges and work arounds to those obstacles.

Also, I’ll throw in a few words about my hobbies – reading and running.

Comments are most welcome. Follow me with my Twitter handle @NelsonAndrewC.

Need more oomph.

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It’s one thing to approach people to interview and drop the name of a well-known publication. It’s no great insight that working for an established news organization opens doors. A start-up neighborhood news blog doesn’t have much swagger.

Poynter Online columnist Damon Kiesow wrote about this at the website when he interviewed Jim MacMillan. He had a great lede: “Hi, my name is Jim. I’m from the Internet.”

Recently, I attended a local government expo where staff at the city of East Point, Ga., where I write my hyperlocal blog, showcased their services. And although I’ve been writing and reporting since the early 1990s, it gave me pause as I walked up to strangers and tell them I write for the a blog called The Jefferson Park Hub and would like to take up their time.

Maybe it’s the term blog that makes my stomach queasy. It lacks oomph. It seems so juvenile, like I am a school-aged kid scribbling my crushes in an online diary.

Next time, I’ll try online news publication.