When Social Media and Journalism Collide And Collaborate With Amanda Jaeger

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On today’s episode, we have Amanda Jaeger. Amanda is a news anchor in Little Rock, Arkansas, and co-host of a TV show called Eat it Up. Today we are going to be talking with Amanda about journalism and social media. Amanda is a well-established news anchor and a TikTok influencer. The attention, clout, and momentum from her social media channels are benefitting the news channel and her professional career.

Using social media and sharing your own voice in the world of journalism can be a little bit controversial. There are expectations that you should minimize your own voice and your own personality in order to allow the stories you are telling to come through more. One of my favorite things we discuss in this episode is actually how to choose the right controversy to really plant a flag in. Understanding a good controversy can really draw a lot of attention to you, get people really resonating with you and your message if it is in just the right spot. So we are going to talk about that and how she balances her career as a professional anchor, TV host, what she does on social media, and some of her strategies for how she has grown her audience on TikTok that you can start using in your business right away.

We discuss:

[02:51] Amanda shares her defining moment.
[03:40] If you keep trying and go all in, amazing things can happen.
[04:13] One of the key ingredients in entrepreneurship is being able to show up again, and again, and again.
[05:22] Amanda shares what she is up to today. She is a wife, cat mom, news anchor, TV co-host, and she was Mrs. Kansas in 2014.
[06:28] A lot of people have the misconception that you have to act very differently when you are on camera. People can tell insincerity immediately.
[07:15] She recommends being more conversational and authentic.
[09:11] Each platform is different and has a different vibe and people come to it for different things. She shows her brand in different ways on each platform.
[10:45] It is really understanding what people are coming to those platforms for. Craft the content based on that.
[12:50] Sell who you are first and make your personality or how you can connect with people the main thing first. Then all the other stuff will naturally gravitate.
[16:20] She shares some of her less controversial opinions in a way to open the door to conversations.
[18:34] Since she co-hosts a food show, she is able to share her food opinions to open the door for many conversations.
[20:04] Amanda is going to forge her own path through what she thinks is the future of journalism.
[21:04] People aren’t going to listen to you if they don’t trust you, believe you, and if they don’t understand you.
[21:16] Social media is the future. Either you fall behind and end up not innovating and you end up getting left behind or you move forward. You see all these platforms and figure out how to leverage them and give people what they are actually wanting to consume without sacrificing who you are.
[23:30] TikTok alone has allowed her to connect with over a million people. The ability to have conversations all over the world has opened up her mind to possibilities in the future and she is more aware of opportunities to connect.
[25:24] When she started out on TikTok, she tried several different things to see what would really catch on, and then she would craft her content around those things.
[27:18] Don’t be afraid to make fun of yourself at times either.
[27:52] Keep your TikTok videos short initially. Try different ideas and see what people are interested in. Find a way to make TikTok trends work for the message you are sharing. Recreate videos with your own spin.
[29:45] You can’t be afraid to try different things. TikTok is fun!
[30:46] It is totally okay to be authentic. Nobody makes it in this world by doing everything by the book. You have to be able to put your own spin on things and show who you are.