This is one topic I cover often with my students at Columbia University School of Journalism: look for jobs beyond the traditional newsroom.
In my own consulting work, I now can tell that 40% of my clients are in corporate communications. All the teams in these communication teams have one thing in common: the need for training in storytelling via mobile devices. As I enter the world of corporate communications, I witness a great need for content managers, writers, editors and designers. This, I believe, will continue to evolve, giving way to more jobs in those sectors.
Now Axios comes up with an article that puts it all in perspective:
When your smartphone can access any song, movie or book ever created, and you can use it to do anything from ordering food to finding dates to getting rides, companies are realizing they need a new weapon in the war for attention: an editor in chief.
The big picture: Because it’s never been harder for companies to reach distracted consumers, more and more firms are hiring editors and content creators to build everything from podcasts to news websites to print magazines to grab your interest.
The piece cites some specific examples, and you can see more by reading the article:
- Airbnb this year started a print magazine — it’s free for hosts or $18/year for everyone else.
- Netflix is publishing a free magazine “to promote its programs and stars ahead of this year’s Emmys,” Bloomberg reports.
- Verizon is hiring an “Editor in Chief-Social” to oversee an editorial team tasked with “high frequency coverage” of Verizon activities.
My own work with corporate communications teams
In the past few months, I have conducted in-house mobile storytelling for the corporate communications teams of Walmart, JetBlue Airlines, the United Nations, Hapag-Lloyd Shipping, Paul Allen and XXL Furniture (Austria).
I am finding out that the majority of the people working in these communications teams are mostly trained as journalists (some come form the advertising side) . Like their counterparts in traditional newsrooms, they struggle with the fast changes in how we consume information, and, therefore, how it should be presented. I follow the same steps in a corporate communications workshop as I do in a newsroom. Within two hours of the workshop, these communicators are putting together linear stories. Such important elements of the discussion as the importance of content managers, how stories flow and designing mobile strategies are the same for corporate communicators.
We have not seen the tip of the iceberg yet in terms of mobile storytelling, and thus the need for trained journalists who can tell stories across platforms—and beyond just the environment of a traditional newsroom.
Mario’s speaking engagements
Mario (above) doing a keynote presentation at Newscamp 2018 in Augsburg, Germany
Here are places where I will be taking the message of mobile storytelling in the weeks ahead:
May 15 INMA, New York City International News Media Association’s Mobile Storytelling Workshop
May 25, Milan, Italy, EidosMedia Annual Customer Meeting, Keynote: Mobile First Strategies for Publishers
June 12, NEC Media City, Bergen, Norway, Storytelling workshop for Editors
June 13, Fortellingens kraft 2019, Bergen, Norway, Long form Mobile Storytelling for Writers
July 11, Florida Media Conference, St. Petersburg, FL, Keynote for editors: The mobile first newspaper strategy.
Mario’s weekend rituals…..
Monocle interviews me about what I do on a typical weekend (is there such a thing? Not for someone like me who is seldom in the same location twice. But I gave it my best shot, for what may come as a normal weekend, when I am home in New York! Enjoy.
https://monocle.com/minute/2019/04/27/
Pre-order The Story
The newspaper remains the most powerful source of storytelling on the planet. But technology threatens its very existence. To survive, the Editor must transform, adapt, and manage the newsroom in a new way. Find out how, pre-orderThe Story by Mario Garcia, chief strategist for the redesign of over 700 newspapers around the world.
Order here:
https://thaneandprose.com/shop-the-bookstore?olsPage=products%2Fthe-story
An interview of interest
http://www.itertranslations.com/blog/2019/3/11/fd60ybflpvlqrgrpdp5ida5rq0c3sp
TheMarioBlog post #3046