It’s key to have a knack for writing in social media and other digital spaces. A writer must know how to write in such mediums. Social media mediums include Facebook and Twitter. Then, there are digital spaces such as blogs and podcasts/video blogs. These digital spaces are all accessible though the internet. However, there is a difference in how to write for social media, such as Facebook and Twitter, and difference in writing for the other digital spaces such as blogs and podcasts/video blogs. In this blog, I will explain how to write for both social media and the other digital mediums such as blogs and podcasts/video blogs.
All of these digital mediums are multi-model. Multi-model is a multi-element process that includes the elements of linguistics, which is human interaction, ocular, which is the visual, acoustics, which is auditory and has video elements such as a podcast or a video on YouTube, structure, which is important for organization and content, and finally, expression, which is subtexts, gestures, and non-verbal cues.
First, I will explain what social media is. Then, I will explain how to write for social media such as Facebook and Twitter. I will then explain what the other digital spaces are, such as blogs and podcasts/video blogs, and how to write for them.
Social media is a method in which people communicate in short messages. The popular outlets of social media are Facebook and Twitter, as previously mentioned. These two social media outlets are internet based and are very popular among personal users (common people), celebrities, businesses, and many government agencies.
Because Facebook and Twitter are very popular social media outlets, people, organizations, and government agencies must know how to communicate in the parameters of short messages. Here are some tips on how to write on Facebook and Twitter.
Writing for Facebook:
– Audience concerns include friends, fickle audiences, and educated/cynical audiences.
– Diction concerns include visuals and memes. Also, the writer must keep status updates 80 words and under. The writer should also be emotional, which has both positives and negatives.
– The writer should also have a determining purpose included by asking a question to engage people to comment and have thoughtful posts.
Writing (tweeting) on Twitter:
– A writer should speak in rhetorical situations.
– A writer should consider a tone.
– Listen and observe to what people are posting.
– 80% interaction to build ethos to 20% action based is a good principle to have while writing on Twitter.
– Also consider the three point triangle of communication which focuses on people in a P.R. manner.
Meanwhile, writing for other digital spaces such as blogs and podcast/video blogs are different. Here, writing can be longer. These digital spaces also are more formal then writing for social media and some are still informal. Yet, these mediums can still incorporate the same multi-model elements as Facebook and Twitter.
The differences in writing for blogs and podcasts/video blogs are as follows:
Writing for blogs:
– Original content is produced.
– Imitation is always transparent in writing.
– A theme must be picked when someone writes.
– A person’s voice is their style guide.
– A writer must do cultural research for the diction in their writing. This includes I.D. background, analyzing, synthesizing, and creating a message which is the roll of the editor.
– The writer must also consider their voice and cultural research in which their diction is the visuals used.
– The writer must be relevant and timeless.
– The word count must be 300 to 1,000 words.
– The writer must have a thesis though usability and working links.
– The writer must also produce and consider that people will scan through the blog to get the jest of it.
Writing and creating podcasts/video blogs:
– These include video clips to be downloaded and viewed immediately or transferred to a portable player.
– The video blog can be exclusively a video with text used only for captions, or text entries that may be included.
– They are a venue for common people who like to remix audio, video and graphics in some artistic expression, as well as celebrities, or people from other industries to speak in audio form only.
– The material is distributed in popular video formats such as Windows Media, QuickTime, and Flash.
– The length of podcasts and video blogs should typically range from only a few minutes to 15-20 minutes tops. However, some podcasts and video blogs can last longer.
– Podcasts and video blogs can ether be formal or informal.
To conclude, writing for digital spaces, such as blogs and podcasts/video blogs, and social media like Facebook and Twitter, are something that people must know how to do. In this blog, I have explained what these digital spaces are and how to write for them.
Nicholas W. Norris 