Include social media in your efforts, traditional media urged

Mr. Maximus Ametorgoh, CEO of PopOut Ghana, has called on Ghana's traditional media to take advantage of social media as a way to promote their news and programmes and stay in business.

He said it is time for the traditional media to tap into the social media space, particularly Facebook to enhance their work as they reach out to a wider audience and readership within a short time.

Mr. Ametorgoh, who is also an Advertising Marketing and Technology Consultant, said this at a day's media training for selected journalists in the Western Region.

The training, held under the theme: "Using social media to power traditional media", was organized by MTN Ghana as part of its media development on Digital communication.

Mr. Ametorgoh said social media is a great tool to create awareness for media houses and should be utilized by the traditional media.

He urged traditional media to create websites and make sure their websites are mobile compatible since large number of readers came from mobile devices.

Mr. Ametorgoh said the world currently has more than 3 billion internet users and that more than two billion of such users are on social media, adding that Facebook alone has more than 8 million daily active users and this makes it a great channel to reach millions of people with news and programmes.

He said the "social media content finds the people and with the website, people find the content".

Social media, he said, over the years has seen massive usage globally and has become a great medium to reach people within a short period of time.

"With the introduction of social media tools like Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram and YouTube people can just visit any place or platform with just a tap on a mobile phone which allows content broadcasting, multiple channels, news delivery, wider coverage of news distribution, real time delivery and interaction among others".

Mr. Ametorgoh said there is the need for social media channels to be exploited by the traditional media to increase readership and following in the digital world.

He urged them to appreciate the dynamics of social media, define their market segment, know their audience, select the right platform, develop quality content, run promotions and campaigns as well as have a budget and measure their results to be effective on social media.

Mr. Simon Amoh, Western Regional Manager of MTN-Ghana, urged the participants to take advantage of the digital space to reach more audience and to expand their scope of work.

He said MTN would continue to partner the media in line with its vision of leading the delivery of a bold digital world.