We list six digital newsroom tools that are worth experimenting with.Â
At the start of the New Year, we listed the top 10 journalism tools that we thought every newsroom should be experimenting with in 2014.
Because it’s always a good idea to refresh the range of tools you should be experimenting with and implementing in the newsroom, we thought it was time to revisit the topic.
Here are some more digital tools to get experimenting with. We’d love to hear your own suggestions – let us know in the comments below, or on Twitter and Facebook.
1)Â Liveblogging:Â ScribbleLive
Once seen as a novelty, the liveblog has quickly become a standard feature of online reporting. No matter what you cover, once a developing story emerges, readers now expect to get a reliable live-stream of carefully curated information to help stay on top of the latest developments. Live blogs are a great way of encouraging readers to stick around, and can fit in nicely with your social strategy, too.
ScribbleLive is one of the most widely-used liveblogging tools, having acquired CoveritLive in July. It’s used to cover everything from breaking news events to marketing events. You can embed a ScribbleLive blog on your site with ease.
 – 24LiveBlog is another option for liveblogging.
2) Q&A Sessions:Â Dilmot
Reddit popularised the AMA format – getting a person of note to answer user-submitted questions in a live format. Their ‘Ask Me Anything’ threads have become so popular that Reddit have now decided to give them a mobile app of their own.
Dilmot is a tool that aims to bring some of this Q&A feel to your coverage, whether it be with a high-profile interview subject, or a member of staff. It’s a great way of getting your readers engaged.
Sign up for a Dilmot account and embed your live Q&As into your own site.
3) Visualising Data:Â CartoDB
Bringing geographic context to stories helps readers to get a grasp on how the news relates to them. Maybe you have a lot of geographic data that you want to display in an informative, eye-catching way. If so, CartoDB is a fantastic way of mapping your story.
It doesn’t just have to be for international news stories – CartoDB can drill right down into cities, states, towns and other areas.
It’s also pretty simple to use. CartoDB state you can import the data you want to map with a single click. Your data can come from a wide range of sources, including Google Drive, Dropbox, local drive, and even Twitter. Each new user can create five maps for free. And don’t worry – they look good on mobile and tablet, too. Here’s how Twitter used CartoDB to visualise the Twitter discussion of this year’s Indian elections:
Google Fusion Tables are another way of plotting data stories on a map.
4) Interactive images:Â ThingLink
Just as CartoDB brings your story to life with mapping elements, ThingLink promises to add to your stories by making your images interactive. Using ThingLink, it’s possible to craft a whole story around one image, without confusing with reams of text. Here’s one Esquire made earlier:
5) Cards for Social Media: Vox Meme Generator
For a while now, Vox Media’s fancy content management system has been the envy of many digital journalists.
They’re an innovative bunch at Vox Media, as shown by their meme generator, which they’ve been using to help bring a fresh visual element to their stories.
It’s a simple idea, one which has led to uplifts in engagement on Twitter and Facebook for Vox and other publishers, like the BBC. (For more, see our Guide to Getting Shared). The generator allows you to quickly create image cards in a consistent style.
The twisted financial incentives behind the war on drugs:
https://t.co/qFb9bHh1E7 pic.twitter.com/U8iYKcILTc — Vox (@voxdotcom) August 30, 2014
6) Trending Stories:Â Spike 2.0
Users of Spike might already have noticed a new button offering a sneak peek at Spike 2.0, which is available to all users as of today. It’s brand new interface, with much more powerful features to help newsrooms stay on top of the stories that matter right now. You can now create your own custom panels with the search terms, topics and sources you like. Filter your results by different social metrics, video, time of publication and more. It’s also a great way to boost your social knowledge around stories.
Jamie Seidel, a Digital Content Producer with News Corp Australia, says Spike “helps demonstrate what kind of headline, introduction and angle catch the reader’s eye.”
There are loads of new features to help connect with readers, stay informed, and boost your social awareness. To try the brand new, more powerful version of Spike for yourself, sign up today.
