Audio can engage, too

On our recent Digital Tools of Engagement webinar, Mike Caputo with APM’s Public Insight Network spoke to the crowd about the value of using audio for engagement. He talked about how audio is most often used as a one-way tool: Someone broadcasts, others listen. But, audio platform SoundCloud is helping bring interaction into the mix.In his blog post, How can we get people to “tell” us their story?, Mike recommends stations ask community members to submit audio and explains why SoundCloud makes it easier for the average person to share audio files on the Web:

Asking people to upload audio files requires users to know how to create a .wav or .mp3/.mp4 on their own and transfer them. Not exactly a one-click experience on machines and software built to exploit webcams over microphones.

That’s what attracts me to SoundCloud. The website’s designers make it simple: Push the ‘record’ button and speak. You can talk into your laptop microphone or, better yet, into your mobile phone (we’ll get to why that might be better in a second). Then SoundCloud makes it easy to upload the files to a newsroom’s account. And for the journalist in that newsroom, it’s rather easy to set up a way to collect those sounds.

Read the rest of Mike’s post on using SoundCloud to interact with the community. Or, watch the webinar for the full presentation.