How LinkedIn Can Help Journalists Find Sources and Break Stories

LinkedIn appears to have come a long way since its beginning as a platform for making professional connections. In fact, it is quickly infiltrating newsrooms as a resource for research, sourcing, and listening, allowing journalists to find sources and discover stories from conversations.

Unsurprisingly, LinkedIn ranked higher than all other Social Media platforms to be integrated into professional use. Since its initiation, LinkedIn has grown to over 720 million users, with up to 40% of them accessing the platform daily. In such a case, you could be targeting over 100 million professionals every single day. In fact, over 500,000 professionals from all over the world gather on LinkedIn. The platform can be significantly beneficial for journalists and news organizations who understand how to use its advanced features. Here are a few ideas to get you started:

Find Sources, Initiate Conversations, and Discover Trends

1. LinkedIn for Journalists Group

The “LinkedIn for Journalists” group has over 85,000 members who must be “full-time editorial staff for mainstream news media outlets.” The group allows you to expand your network and stay connected with a wide range of professional journalists, find suitable sources, stay updated on trends, and even build readership.

2. Advanced People Search Tool

If you know someone's name, you can quickly look them up on LinkedIn. On the other hand, as a journalist, you may want to approach people you do not know, where the advanced people search comes in. A journalist looking for experts working at a specific company may find dozens or even hundreds of profiles. Besides basic options like looking for someone in a specific position at a specific company, you can add interesting filters to ensure you find precisely what you are looking for by searching by company name, titles, and keywords.

“I find it useful when I just want to double check someone’s job title [without having to remake a phone call], or I’ll look before interviewing them so I can get some background information. I also use it before job interviews.” -- Alya Zayed, Reporter at Cambridgeshire Live

3. Content Search

Users can search by topic and hashtags to find related content and professional knowledge posted on LinkedIn by other members in their feed or third-parties. The value of using LinkedIn as a tool for finding stories, interviewees, or case studies should not be underestimated. Content Search is also interesting if you want to keep track of the latest discussion and conversations over a particular topic. Also, you have the opportunity to search and find content written by particular people or pages. You can run a Boolean search on LinkedIn by combining keywords with operators like AND, NOT, and OR during your search. 

4. Follow #Hashtags

Hashtags are not just for Instagram anymore; they are also being used by people who want to discuss a specific topic. Hashtags, therefore, are an excellent starting point for discovering trends and finding case studies and inspiration. You need to check out what is trending and make sure to follow companies and people that might be of interest – even if they are not working on a piece about them right now.

5. Follow Company Pages

LinkedIn is a great place to keep up with what is going on with key companies in your field if you cover a specific industry. It is also interesting to follow other news organizations' pages and get different perspectives on stories and trends covered. Another interesting fact is that you can also get updates on new hires and job changes at companies.

6. Join Groups

Again, if you are looking for case studies or ideas, LinkedIn has groups for everything you can think of. It is a great place to see what people are interested in, and case studies abound. It is also a great approach to initiating conversation, understanding different opinions on a particular topic, and finding sources. 

"Journalists can keep their ears open for nuggets through groups on LinkedIn. If one wants to follow new technology or mobile, one can find what people say about different companies. Journalists can follow groups, participate in discussions, and solicit feedback." -- Yumi Wilson, Corporate Communications Manager at LinkedIn and Associate Professor of Journalism at San Francisco State University

7. Participate in LinkedIn Events

Members can easily create and participate in professional Events of interest to them, such as meetups, online workshops, seminars, and more, using the LinkedIn Events feature. You can use this feature to find and join communities, grow their businesses, network with others, and learn new skills.

8. LinkedIn Today

 LinkedIn Today delivers the top news, tailored to you based on your connections and industry peers reading and sharing. As a journalist, you can follow industries of your interest or industries within your scope of work and then come to one place to get all of your news.

Build Your Personal Brand

Aside from searching stories and connecting with sources, a journalist must build a good personal brand. Personal branding is the process of marketing yourself, your career, or your business to attract relevant opportunities. Effective and powerful personal branding will differentiate you from the competition and allow your sources and other users to build trust with prospective. Here are few tips to help boost your personal branding on LinkedIn:

1. Optimize Your Profile for Search

LinkedIn is both a search engine and a social media platform, so the words and visuals you use are highly significant.

• Professional Headline: To make an excellent first impression, start with a tagline. Next, fill in the blanks with keywords that describe yourself and your areas of expertise. You want to be discovered through relevant searches. Try to highlight your strengths without being a narcissist. Avoid a generic headline and try narrowing down what you do because all professional journalists will be curious about your area of focus.
• Profile Picture and Cover Photo: Your profile is 10X more likely to be viewed if it includes a photo. Keep in mind that a professional photo indicates professionalism. Look into the lens to make eye contact and smile. It is recommended to upload a Cover Photo that reflects your brand, services, or expertise.
• Use Your Description to Sell Yourself: Tell your story in the summary section, just as you would on an "about" page. Include keywords for search purposes, and highlight your most significant accomplishments relevant to the clients or jobs you want to attract.
• Add your Experience: Through your past experiences, try highlighting some of the most remarkable cases that you took a role in their emergence process. Your job history and examples of cases (like news, interviews or TV programs) enable you to build your experience e on a solid basis and increase your credibility. 
• Use Media: Documents, photos, links, presentations, and videos can be displayed in both the experience and education sections. Including visual content in your profile will help it stand out.
• Choose your Skills Strategically: You should fill all 50 slots with relevant skills, and you should think strategically about which skills to include.

2. Provide Value

The thing that will set you apart from everyone else on LinkedIn is to provide super-valuable content that people can't get enough of. Share your thoughts and build a solid personal brand by creating posts and articles and sharing original content and curating additional content that you believe will be of interest to your connections. Your articles in LinkedIn is a reference point not merely for knowledge, but also for credibility. Remember that there are some necessities to digital publishing, such as using exciting and straightforward language, using hyperlinks, including visuals, and writing a relevant headline. Also, make sure to consistently use Hashtags that might be relevant to your field of expertise or trending topic, and remember that if you want to stand out from the crowd, your content needs to be visual.

3. Grow your Network

Expand your niche with relevant connections from all over the world. Taking the time to write a personal note with an invitation to connect will increase your chances of acceptance and open the door for future communication. Building relationships with influencers and mentioning them in your posts can help boost your LinkedIn visibility.

4. Engage in Meaningful Conversations

Comment, start threads, ask questions, and offer advice – try to be a valuable, active member rather than a silent lurker. Engage with both your connections and within groups, and always contribute to the conversation.

5. Be a Quick Replier

Always be a quick and frequent replier to messages, comments, and even on your shared content by others. Always maintain a conversation even from users outside of your networks.

6. Share to Your Stories

LinkedIn Stories is a quick and engaging way to share professional updates on LinkedIn. Make use of this interesting feature and provide tips, share emotional and inspirational stories, or share announcements that might be relevant and helpful to your connections.

Conclusion

Journalism is becoming more digitalized by the day, particularly among journalists who are primarily interested in breaking news. As a result, it is critical to make the most of LinkedIn while also developing a professional presence on the platform. Always keep track of your SSI Score. The LinkedIn SSI score essentially tells you how effective you are at developing your brand, connecting with the right people, engaging with insights, and building relationships. These four points add up to give you an overall picture of how well you are using the platform.