“HARNESSING THE POWER OF SOCIAL MEDIA TO BOOST YOUR GLOBAL AUDIENCE” WITH KAMALA DAUGHTRY
Introduction
A very enriching short virtual course on harnessing the power of social media to boost one’s global audience hosted by American digital reporter/producer, Ms. Kamara K. Daughtry, for the Mass Communication students of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN) ended Friday, Feb. 19, 2021.
The aim of the course was to equip the students with invaluable digital and presentation skills suitable for harnessing the power of social media for their journalism career and guide them on how to get connections for the future.
The course which was free was taught through a 4-part Zoom series held every Friday between 2 and 3 p.m. beginning from Jan. 29, 2021. Some students joined from different locations while others watched a projection of the meeting in the final-year classroom, Jackson Buliding, UNN, for the first three sessions and Mass Communication first-year classroom, Faculty of Arts, Block A, for the last session.
Ms. Daughtry, is also a social media specialist who assists TV stations by recommending viable strategies for their social media platforms. (You can learn more about her via the image of her bio at the end of this post.)
This post presents a summary of each session, the resources shared by Ms. Daughtry and links to my original Facebook posts from which this article has been compiled.
The First Class
In this class, students were taught the following, inter alia:
• The importance of using their social media accounts in reporting, a very important part of which is interviewing important personalities
• How to prepare for and conduct such interviews
• The superior effectiveness of videos in garnering attention over textual messages and how to use Facebook live in this regard.
Cross sections of students during the sessions
As homework assignment, Ms. Daughtry asked the students to do a Facebook live interview of an important personality or do a regular interview, transcribe it and share to their Facebook profiles. The links to these interview posts were to be sent to her via email for review during the next class.
She subsequently provided a link where students who missed the live session could watch it.
The Second Class
In the second class held on Feb. 5, 2021, the facilitator, Ms. Daughtry, brought on a special guest, a TV reporter from Alabama, Ms. Ashley Brown, to share with the students her job experiences.
Clips from some of Ms. Brown’s live reports were shown and she, along with Ms. Daughtry, explained the basics of live reporting. They fielded questions from students on how to improve one’s chances of landing a media job and overcome challenges faced in the process of researching stories/interviewing sources.
Ashley Brown reporting
The students’ live interview assignments from the previous week were reviewed, pointing out their strengths and weaknesses. More questions were entertained on the process of reporting and the students were given a news writing assignment to round off what had been a very lively and interactive session.
The only difficulty encountered was that some students couldn’t follow Ms. Brown’s Southern drawl easily but Ms. Daughtry’s reiterating of key points saved the day. Besides, by watching the recorded session via the link below, the students can catch what Ms. Brown said more clearly.
The Third Class
During the third class which held on Feb. 12, 2021, the students were taught, among other things, how to build professional profiles on social media, especially LinkedIn, and how to make job-yielding connections therefrom.
Ms. Daughtry during the third class
One of the videos Ms. Daughtry shared (linked below) gave detailed tips on how to create a LinkedIn profile that will draw attention and impress employers.
Video: 6 Tips for Making a Great LinkedIn Profile
The students were also given some tips for creating content on digital media, their news story assignments were reviewed and as their third week homework, they were asked to create profiles for themselves on LinkedIn.
They were to add clear portrait pictures in business attire to their profiles, a short bio describing themselves- their qualifications and skills- and add some media samples like articles they’ve written and videos they’ve made that can attract potential employers.
The Fourth Class
In the fourth and final class held on Feb. 19, 2021, Ms. Daughtry elaborated on how a young journalist can make the most of social media in news gathering and dissemination.
Screenshot from the fourth class
She explained the importance of Twitter lists, how to build them and shared a link on this (See below). She also asked the students to explore the features of other platforms like Tiktok and Instagram (reels & TV).
She then reviewed some LinkedIn profiles the students shared based on the third week’s assignment. She reemphasised the importance of using bright profile pictures; adding rich bios, samples of content they’ve created and the jobs they are seeking to those profiles.
Above all, she reiterated the importance of constantly creating and sharing content (textual, audio & video) if one wants to get better as a journalist.
Conclusion
Our students and I are grateful to Ms. Daughtry for taking the time to teach and challenge them to start their journalism careers even while in school by being active in making the most of news opportunities and building rich portfolios via their social media accounts.
The questions asked by students throughout this course resonated with this challenge: they were mostly about how to make professional connections and get good media jobs.
In her valedictory email, Ms. Daughtry made this glowing remark about our students:
I want to say thank you. It was a pleasure connecting with my new media family in Nigeria. You all are a BLESSED GROUP with AMAZING AND SMART students! The best word to describe the class – is the word- STARS! Bright stars that will change lives and be a light in their community. I’M SO EXCITED AND GLAD TO SEE THEIR PATHS!
We really appreciate this and send Ms. Daughtry a big bouquet of thanks. We also wish her the best in all her endeavours and express our heartfelt gratitude to the Royal Centre for Public Speaking for connecting us with her.
All those involved in various aspects of digital communication, particularly aspiring and practising journalists, can join Ms. Daughtry’s mentoring and networking group, Digital Career Opportunities Worldwide, on Facebook and follow her YouTube channel for updates.
About the Course Facilitator
Screenshot of Ms. Daughtry’s Bio
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Links to earlier posts from which this article was compiled:
Advance Story for the Second Class
Advance Story for the Third Class
Such great insights. This would go a long way in boosting our confidence to report happenings around us. Thank you for this golden opportunity.
You’re welcome. Glory to God!
Ma, I appreciate your effort. May God bless you immensely
Amen. May God bless you greatly too in Jesus’ name.
This is more of practical class.
Thanks, ma!
Lol! That’s the way to acquire the skills you need, my dear!
Highly educative and creating awareness in various areas of learning. Thank you Dr.
What is left is for you to practise what she taught. Cheers!
I really learnt a lot in this programme. May God bless Ms. Daughtry for taking out her time to teach us on how to effectively use the social media as mass communication tools.
And to you the organiser, may God bless you abundantly for bringing this avenue to us.
Glory to God! As Kamara rightly said, you’re a star and you’ll do great things.
By the way, did you see yourselfin one of the pix? Cool!
Yeah. I Did?. A very nice shot✌️
Wow, there is a whole lot of knowledge to imbibe here and I’m grateful I didn’t lose out. Thank you Ms Daughtry for this and thank you Ma for this golden opportunity. Have a blessed day .
God bless Ms. Daughtry for this great idea and eye-opener. The social media actually has a very wide range of positive impact on people. We just have to discover them.
Thank you Ms. Edith. God bless you.
Thank you so much Ms. Daughtry! You are an amazing teacher and I learnt a lot. I hope for another opportunity. Can’t wait.
Thank you very much Dr. Edith. Your zeal and vision for your students made this happen.
Many thanks to you our dear Approachable,Accessable and Available HOD. Cherish the uniqueness of your virtues. More power to your Bones.
Thank you ma, for finding it important to bring this piece to us, it’s so educative
Essentially after the outbreak of a pandemic, the world has moved to its digital stage and understanding social media, how to handle and influence its power is the first step to take. Thanks ma on this great opportunity
We are forever grateful for this golden opportunity of practically learning our course. May God richly bless the organisers and Ms Kamara.
I was one of the participants of the program, and I must say it was powerful. Though it was hard getting some of the things she said, but through the act of re-uploading the videos of the classes I got everything. The program went far in helping me to correct my LinkedIn account bio. Thank you ma for creating such opportunity and I pray more of this will come. Amen
Thank you so much Ms. Kamara Daughtry for all you shared with us in this class. . I learnt new things. I’m really grateful for this. Thank you Dr. Edith Ohaja for putting this together for us. God bless you Ma!
The information gathered from the summary is insightful and full of knowledge. May God bless Ms. Kamara and the organisers
Thank you for bringing such a practical course to our doorstep.
A very insightful course.
I was able to create a LinkedIn account after the course.
I look forward to practising more of everything she taught.
This was a very good initiative, and to crown it all there were practical aspect of the classes which makes it more useful and more engaging, thank you ma for initiating this program, remain blessed ma
Only one word describes this;AMAZING.
It’s just a breath of fresh air that one can still go back to all the videos from the class. It’s such a large amount of information buried in each class and to be able to go back to it when the need arises is truly amazing. Well done ma.
Social media is a very powerful tool, and being able to use it effectively is a skill almost every journalism Student should know, and it is good that the program provided room for practicals, thank you ma for this insight
Thank you ma for always trying your best effortlessly to expose us to the practical aspects of journalism, we really appreciate you for organizing such an enriching program for the mass communication students, God bless you abundantly ma.
Well done, that’s a wonderful one.
Ms Daughtry really came through for us, it not everyday you have a professional from the US taking her time to educate students on how the mass media really works
Thank you so much
The virtual class was very interesting, though I couldn’t follow up properly due to some phone issues.
But the first 2weeks was interesting
I even conducted my first interview which was fun
Quite an experience. God bless you, ma.
Wow… this is really educative, thank you so much Dr. Ohaja . Thank you Ms. Daughtry for these splendid pieces of information. Now we can practice our profession before we leave the den.
Thank you so much ms daughtry and dr Ohaja for the opportunity to learn this necessary topic.
I really learnt a lot in this programme. May God bless Ms. Daughtry for taking out her time to teach us on how to effectively use the social media as mass communication tools.
Thank u Dr. Edith Ohaja for putting this together for us. God bless u Ma!
very useful she taught us well…
I really feel enquiped after going through this insightful journey of how to become an effective journalist. I feel honored to have such access to quality teaching. I want to say thank you to the H.O.D and Ms Kamara for this opportunity.
A very big thank you to you Miss Kamala for taking time to put this together. The classes were indeed very practical and can easily be understood. Thanks a lot Dr. Edith for all you do. The passion to see that students don’t just learn mass commuication on the theoretical level is indeed laudable. God bless you, ma, for going the extra-mile .
Social media is one thing modern technology has afforded us. Its benefits are enormous and its impact is vast.
I hope you read the post.
My network connection didn’t afford me the opportunity to join these virtual sessions.
Frankly speaking, I just watched the first and second videos from the links provided here.
They were so detailed and practical.
I’m sure a lot of resources were spent on getting it all together.
Thank you ma for this.
And Ms Daughtry, much gratitude.
The focus on the most widely used social media platforms is on point. The online community gets larger and larger everyday. It is becoming more powerful and hard to ignore. Using this to our advantage is very important. Can’t wait to build my LinkedIn profile since I have the others she mentioned.
it’s actually a detailed and informative piece. the social media has proven to be effective in our dispensation. the class was fulfilling and i was empowered. connection issues kept hampering the flow or success of these power-packed live sessions, but we thank GOD the opportunity to re-watch them was provided. Thanks, ma, for your continuous benevolence with these posts.
This is impressive. It increased the students’ knowledge on how to report and gather information on social media. It is very educating.
Thankyou Dr. Ohaja and miss Kamla. Indeed social media has positive impact
Thank you Ms. Kamara Daughtry for creating out time to teach us. You are an amazing teacher and may God bless you immensely. I really learnt so many things in this course, the practical aspect of our course and how we can use the social media to boost our communication skills.
Thank you so much Dr Edith Ohaja for making this come to a success. May God continue to bless you. Amen!
I really learnt a lot from this piece.
It is informative and very educational.
And it will serve as a stepping stone to our Carrier.
May God bless you both for making this a success.
With the world veering towards digitalization, class such as this is timely. It spurs the students into relevance in the 21st century working class.
Thank you Miss Kamala Daughtry for exposing us to the importance of social media reporting and its relevance to our field of study. I was in the class and I must say, it was quite insighful for me. Thank you Dr. Ohaja for pioneering this class.
I participated in most of the classes and I must say, they’re an eye opener. I really learnt a lot especially on how to utilise my social media accounts into something meaningful. Thank you Ms Kamara Daughtry for these educative classes.
Sorry for people like us who missed the classes oo. But I guess this piece is made for us? and I have learnt somethings from it. A very big thanks to Ms Kamara for the teaching also to our mother Dr Ohaja for giving us the best you can.
First, I must commend on ms daughtry’s effort and willingness to pass on knowledge. she really took her time to sensitize, educate and inform us (the prospective journalists) on how beneficial and productive the social media can be, in the field of mass communication.
Ma I thank you so much for making it happen. I do appreciate..
I think it’s wonderful that we are being taught how to harness our social media accounts in order to get the most out of them. Thank you ma, for the insightful platform. Remain blessed.
Thank you very much Ma for this opportunity….I think we need more practical class like this in our educational system especially in mass communication department, it shouldn’t always be about, theory, theory, theory!!!
Yes, amazing tuition on how to harness the power of the ever evolving digital media. The use of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn to booster the aid of our course is very essential. Thank you Ms Kamara Daughtry and thank you ma for setting up something this technical for students to benefit from.
Thank you so much Ms Daughtry for this insightful knowledge, I learnt a lot and also a big thank you to Dr. Edith Ohaja for making it possible. God bless you ma
Learning in the digital life today is a necessity and Ms. Is doing a great job for the mass communication students. This would help to broaden our minds in doing things that can be of benefit reach out to people around the world. As mass communication students, “reporting consistently is the key to expand one’s global attention.” .
In the ever skyrocketing global media digitalization it’s unequivocalbly resounding to be having such a teaching now, this is such a huge investment in our future not just about us but the society who will benefit immensely from it in the nearest time as we appropriate judiciously the resounding thoughts gushed out from your vast knowledge and experiences. It’s quite timed and am grateful of your resourcefulness with such a valued teaching
Calm down, my dear! Your sentiments are wonderful but you need to simply state your ideas in informal fora like this.
Thanks a lot Ma..
Have a knowledge of how to report things happening around me now
May God crown your efforts
Crown them with what, my dear? Your prayer is incomplete.
Thumbs up to you Ms Daughtry for accepting to teach us,it was so amazing listening ? to you, you remain a great teacher, Thanks to you in a hundred fold and to the facilitator Ms Edith ohaja Thanks for creating such an opportunity for us.
Thank you so much Ms. Daughty kamala for this wonderful lesson, it’s so informative, educative and entertaining. I love the fact that it deals with more of practicals which will help me know it better
I really hope I can practise this. God bless you, ma, for impacting our lives with this. Thank you!
Of course you can if you choose to.
It is very great
I am so proud to be under your tutorship as a student and you my lecturer, thank you so much Ma, for this opportunity to meet with miss Kamala. This series of classes has really challenged me in putting more effort to my discipline.
God bless her too for the time she gave in sharing her knowledge with us.
With the rapid and almost scary increase in digitalization, the world has become not only a global village but a global planet. It wasn’t the same in the 18th century. So, in summary, the aspiring journalist must have core knowledge on the digital aspect of journalism and speculatively harness it to build himself and also improve his vocal ability and capabilities. This is nice to the core. Bravo!!!!!
A nice piece..the social media dominance in our today world is increasingly great…one could utilize the social media in plethora of ways for different purposes..
We now can harness everything the social media gives us as far as we are guided by the ethics in journalism..
Nice work ma. Simplified
I know i missed a great opportunity that was offered on a platter of gold. My only consolation is that Dr. Edith took out the time to reiterate what was taught in that virtual class. All one needs to succeed in the media world was laid bare.
Thank you ma for teaching us, engaging us and helping us to build ourselves. I’m so glad that this opportunity was given to us.
It was a great experience we had with ms Kamara.
Thank you so much Ma for creating this opportunity for us to learn practical lessons in relation to harnessing the media to boost our global audience. I attended some of the classes and I learnt a great deal.
Thank you for the opportunity to participate in this class and also for the re cap of everything learnt in the online sessions.
In reaching out to the global community,how do I monitor my progress?
Can I gauge this progress probably by how many likes,re shares or re tweets I get on a post?
Certainly, those are forms of feedback. Other forms of feedback include growth in your social media following, emails and specific offers you receive.
This program was very helpful. Thanks to Ms. Daughtry for taking out her time to impart to us the effective use of the social media as tools for mass communication.
Thank you so much for the opportunity to be a part of the class and also for this very detailed recap of the classes. God bless you ma
To be very honest, I didn’t attend all the classes but with the summary and the videos shared I definitely learnt something. Thank you ma
It is difficult to harness people to always have interest on ones media platforms…the various highlight here is just the morale. God bless you ma for the selfless effort
Ma, you indeed opened my eyes and I’ve seen why this course is very important and am so happy to be a mass comm. student.
Thank you ma for this great insight, remain gracious
Thanks a great deal.
Social media is a powerful tool to start with; even though it’s a bit difficult getting people to engage in your activities.
The programme was very helpful
Thanks so much, ma, for your time and effort towards making the programme a success.
The social media is definitely very effective as a tool for communication especially in our world these days which is a global village… Thanks for this ma’m
I really learnt a lot from those classes, thank you so much ma, God bless you ma✨. I also extend my gratitude to Ms. Kamara Daughtry for making out time to teach us these vital things we need in order to progress in this field of Mass Communication??
I wasn’t opportuned to attend any of the classes then but from this I just realise; I need to work on my LinkedIn profile.
Social media is an irreplaceable factor in the aspects of life because it’s is required in every works of life this piece is just like a detailed summary,as I was able to participate in the class and was made to Know that I can start practicing my proffession while still in school by posting on my Facebook home page, Instagram, watup status etc in order to let people know about the happenings in my immediate surrounding.indeed ma I really grabbed something. Nagode ma.
I was not opportuned to attend the classes then. there was no space in the final year class but with this article , I have got a little knowledge of what was thought. Thank u ma
I have always known the efficiency of social in many aspects of life, but never thought of it this far this is truly wonderful and amazing…… ride on ma
This post is really enlightening as it shows how to use social media to do meaningful things rather than whiling away time doing irrelevant things
I’m so happy i came across this post so much to learn from, Thank you Ma
The class was really an awesome lecture. I got to understand that as a student, there are many ways to practice my profession. This post is very educative . Thank you ma
Such great impact this would go q long way in boosting my self confidence.