As other newspapers have adjusted to the requirements of the modern media age, The Globe has finally followed suit. Point Park news having a presence on social media is not a new concept, as The Globe has been on Instagram for over 10 years and both Facebook and X, formerly known as Twitter, for 14 years.
While we’ve been on major platforms for a long time, we decided it was time to focus on one platform and utilize it the most. We’ve realized that our audience is not on X, formerly known as Twitter, and most of our readers are likely not on Facebook either
Instead, we decided to focus our attention on The Globe’s Instagram page. As some of you may have noticed, regular posts per issue have returned. Additionally, we have been posting articles we feel are the most impactful per issue in an easy-to-read manner. This will continue, with each editor picking articles for our Instagram page.
Why are we able to do this now? Much of this is because we have a social media manager again. The more people who participate in The Globe, the better it can be, and the better it can serve our audience.
In today’s media landscape, simply just putting articles in a newspaper isn’t good enough anymore and it hasn’t been ever since social media took hold.
People are not going to go out of their way to go to a different website beyond their usual social media pages. Making potential new readers aware of our existence is one monumental task and so is keeping them interested with content besides nothing but text.
This is true for any news organization – multimedia is the requirement. We’re just fulfilling that requirement again, and it’s working.
What’s the role of you, the reader, in this? Pay attention to what we’re doing on Instagram from now on. The content we put on the Instagram page is just as good as what we work tirelessly to put in print and on our website, ppuglobe.com. Alums, current students, parents and more continue to interact on this platform that we previously underutilized because of a lack of time and people willing to put in the work.
We are grateful for Camani Campbell, our social media manager, who works with our graphic designer to make our posts beautiful and engaging. want to maintain our momentum on social media. They are the reason engagement on the page is as high as it is.
And why does this engagement matter? Because the ultimate purpose of The Globe beyond just reporting the facts is to create discussion about what’s going on at Point Park and around Downtown, tying big stories to our audience.
This purpose extends to those who are reaching for the first time in years — especially alums — because knowing information about one’s alma mater is still worthwhile, especially when this can include what’s happening beyond Point Park’s campus.
Our hope is the saying “did you pick up The Globe today” will never go away because of this goal. We want to be as present as we can be for our readers and this can only be fully realized when our social media presence is built up like it is now.
Why does it matter? We cannot just rely on our newspaper alone to create discussion and get necessary stories out to our audience. Social media has the convenience of easy shareability, immediate commenting and concision. Granted, we will still print as long as possible.
Pay attention. This is only the beginning.