Are there bluer skies to leave for?

Editor’s note: we are republishing an article that previously appeared in The Fix Media’s weekly newsletter. Subscribe to get everything you need to know about the European media market every Monday, along with monthly special reports.

It’s now a cliché to say that publishers live in a “post-social” world. The old days of plentiful Facebook traffic are long gone, Twitter has declined under Musk’s leadership, Instagram and its sibling Threads aren’t interested in news content.

Sure, the biggest piece of advice for news media today is investing in venues where they have direct connection with their audience, like their website and newsletters. But are there any exciting places left in the world of social media? Let’s look at three platforms that look interesting as we’re heading closer to the end of 2024.

1. LinkedIn

LinkedIn has been around for a long time, and it has a certain aesthetic. It wouldn’t be a good place for a publisher focused on sports or celebrity culture, but it seems more and more useful for business and B2B publishers (like, indeed, The Fix – follow us on LinkedIn while we’re at it).

LinkedIn is one of the few platforms that is actually interested in news content at the moment. It helps that “many people are a little bit tired of how other social media has been recently related to news, especially X, where it’s difficult to know who’s behind an account and if it’s fake or not”, as Ismael Nafría told The Fix a few weeks ago.

2. Bluesky

Bluesky seems to be the winner of the current exodus from Elon Musk’s X. As Romain Chauvet observed for The Fix, “the platform creates a lot of nostalgia among users who feel like they are reliving the beginnings of Twitter”. Notably, the migration to Bluesky includes not only journalists but also educators, scientists and other audiences that formed the bedrock of Twitter’s relevance back in the day.

Bluesky’s wave might not last, but it seems safe to try. As A Media Operator’s Jacob Cohen Donnelly wrote this week, “Bluesky’s algorithm is so basic (if it even has one) that there are no obvious penalties when distributing your content compared to X, which deprioritizes tweets with links. If that’s the case, your ability to drive traffic depends on your followers. Since the only way to grow your following is to post, starting earlier could be smart”.

(One point of advice from Donnelly, also relevant for LinkedIn, is to have individual journalists do more of the posting and not rely only on posts from the publisher’s organisational account).

3. YouTube

Video podcasting is one of this year’s big trends, and YouTube is the biggest place for podcast consumption. Major publishers are moving their chat interviews to YouTube, and a smart strategy for the platform might help increase visibility and drive revenue.

As David Tvrdon wrote for The Fix, copying Vox’s strategy of investing a lot of resources into highly polished ever-green videos will not be feasible for most publishers. But figuring out your version of carpet-cleaning videos might be.

Source of the cover photo: Uladzislau Petrushkevich via Unsplash

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