It’s good that so many newsrooms are diving into online communities like Facebook and Twitter. There’s only one problem: Most are still acting like broadcasters—they’re all talk.

A couple of weeks ago, at a Radio and Television News Directors Foundation leadership conference in South Carolina, I had the pleasure of guiding about 50 newsroom leaders in a discussion of how traditional media outlets can take advantage of social media. 

We did a demonstration to show that many media outlets view social media communities as just another place to broadcast their news. We pulled two of our students to the front of the room and asked them to have a conversation.

“Hey, how are you?”
“Nice shirt.”
“Where should we go for lunch?”

Then we asked a third person to step into the middle of the conversation and do what a news organization too often does: scream our headlines while the first two students were still talking.

“TWO PEOPLE STABBED! DETAILS AT 11!” 

And we think that’s social.

Seventy-five years ago, Dale Carnegie published a book that has since sold 15 million copies. Perhaps you’ve heard the title, which long ago became a catch phrase, How to Win Friends and Influence People.

Here’s Carnegie’s recipe:
1.    Become genuinely interested in other people.
2.    Smile.
3.    Remember a person’s name is, to that person, the sweetest and most important sound in the language.
4.    Be a good listener. Encourage others to talk about themselves.
5.    Talk in terms of the other person’s interests.
6.    Make the other person feel important—and do it sincerely.

Now it’s your turn. Rewrite Carnegie’s rules for participating in social media. I think you’ll find the exercise worth your time. But I’ll offer my own advice:

1.    Realize the social-networking world does not revolve around you or your channel or your website. Every user sees the network revolving around himself or herself.
2.    Listen before you speak. What are the customs? How do people talk to each other?
3.    Call your viewers/customers/fans out by name. Make them feel like they’re a big deal in your presence.
4.    Ask your friends and fans lots of questions. What’s on their minds today?
5.    Bring something to the table that the community values. It’s generally not a tease for your 11 p.m. news.

There’s tremendous opportunity for traditional media outlets in the online social space. Get out there, mix it up, make some friends. But first, figure out how to be a friend.

Chip Mahaney is director of digital content for The E.W. Scripps Company in Cincinnati. He can be reached at chip.mahaney@scripps.com and twitter.com/chipmahaney.