A Clearer Picture

Abstract

As journalists continue integrating social media into their professional work, they wrestle with ways to best represent themselves, their organizations, and their profession. Several recent studies have examined this trend in terms of branding, raising important questions about the changing ways in which journalists present themselves and how these changes may indicate shifts in their personal and professional identities. This study combines a visual content analysis of the images journalists use in their Twitter profiles with analyses of their profile text and tweets to examine how journalists present themselves online with an eye toward individual and organizational branding. Findings indicate journalists choose a branding approach and apply it consistently across their profiles, with most profiles consisting of a professional headshot while notably lacking organizational identifiers such as logos. Journalists also tend to lean toward professional rather than personal images in their profile and header photos, indicating a possible predilection for professional identity over personal on social media.

The social silos of journalism? Twitter, news media and partisan segregation

“…As mentioned, journalists are increasingly using social media platforms to brand their own online identities, even as they may still emphasize building a profession brand, and not a purely personal one (Hanusch, 2017;Lough et al, 2018). The networks that journalists help construct around them are undoubtedly bound up in the process of online identity creation, and the networks themselves may further shift partisan leanings and identities.…”

“…However, we take a different approach to identifying journalists on Twitter, because we would like to link them to the articles they write. Finally, scholars have analyzed the social media posts of individual journalists, as well as other aspects of their self-presentation, in order assess whether norms of transparency and traditional gatekeeping roles may be changing, as well as to examine changing dimensions of professional identity (Lawrence et al, 2014;Lough et al, 2018). Rather than focus on the social media posts or presence of journalists, we instead focus on the social networks they build on these sites and the content they consume from this network.…”

Media work, identity, and the motivations that shape branding practices among journalists: An explanatory framework

“…These motivations and the typology by which they are classified are drawn largely from an emerging body of research that has relied, for the most part, on content analyses of Twitter (Hanusch and Bruns, 2017;Lough et al, 2018;Molyneux et al, 2017;Ottovordemgentschenfelde, 2017) or feedback from journalists limited to a single social media platform (Hedman, 2017;Holton and Molyneux, 2017;Molyneux and Holton, 2015). To look beyond Twitter alone, this study considers multiple social media platforms used by journalists, 1 the use of social media in their branding activities, the possible relationship between their professional identity and their use of branding, and whether or not the motives behind that branding activity align with the kind of branding they practice.…”

“…This pattern could be shaped by external influences (the celebrity-oriented nature of social media, organizational pressure, and the cultural weakening of journalistic institutions), but we suspect it is also a product of internal influences, specifically identity and motivations. While many journalists have reported practicing branding at multiple levels, sensing the conflict between individual and organizational branding most strongly, previous analyses also noted that journalists tend to favor one of these approaches, applying it consistently across their profiles (Lough et al, 2018). Therefore, we propose that journalists’ branding activity may be driven primarily by internal factors that are individually and uniquely felt, rather than by commonly felt external pressures from social media norms, journalistic practices, or organizational mandates (which have begun to converge).…”

Making the most of Twitter: How technological affordances influence Swedish journalists’ self-branding

“…Molyneux, 2014), but also that their tweeting practices as a whole are part of this strategy (e.g. Brems et al, 2016;Lough et al, 2017), not least as one's status can be evaluated via interactions (e.g. Barnard, 2014) or the character of one's personal network (e.g.…”