How to keep journalism alive in the digital age: an interview with TikTok expert Erika Marzano

Social media journalism is evolving, and journalists need to evolve with it. TikTok, like all social platforms, thrives on interaction. Unlike traditional media, where you simply broadcast content, platforms like TikTok require active participation and listening. If journalists and media organisations don’t adapt, they risk becoming irrelevant. The way we tell stories is changing, and so too must the way we engage with audiences.

Erika Marzano is an audience development journalist at Deutsche Welle. Her focus has been on social media journalism, a field she has come to specialise in through practical experience rather than formal education. Erika has conducted extensive training for various institutions – ranging from private organisations to universities, as well as training individual journalists and media development organisations. Erika’s latest mentoring sessions were for Georgian and Belarusian journalists as part of the EU4IM (EU4IndependentMedia) project.

Traditional mindset persists

When working with Georgian journalists, I noticed that many of them still had a traditional TV mindset when it came to journalism. They focus on legacy media – TV, print, and radio – because these platforms still reach a certain segment of the audience. However, younger audiences are largely absent from these traditional channels, and that’s where the real challenge lies.

They also viewed TV and digital journalism as separate entities, with websites functioning more as an extension of television rather than as standalone digital platforms. So, when they had to adapt to short-form vertical videos, the format itself was a major challenge.

Initially, they approached TikTok and similar platforms by repurposing their existing TV content – taking traditional reports and simply publishing them without making any adjustments. This method may work on other social media platforms to some extent, but not for short-form vertical formats. However, once they started creating content specifically designed for TikTok, they saw a shift – not just in audience engagement but in their own approach to storytelling.

What became evident was that short-form vertical videos aren’t just for TikTok; they are adaptable across most traditional and newer social media platforms. As soon as they embraced this, they saw a clear shift in audience response and, more importantly, in their own mentality toward digital journalism.

Lack of tools for different languages

A big obstacle for Georgian journalists is editing. On most social media platforms, editing happens on mobile devices, often with automatic transcription and closed captions. However, Georgian language support for these tools is almost non-existent. Most major editing platforms struggle to recognise Georgian sentence structures, making automatic cuts and captions unreliable.

Through my own research, I found that in many languages, editing tools can easily detect sentence breaks and adjust accordingly, but this is not the case for Georgian. This lack of tool support explains why many Georgian journalists initially relied on existing TV content rather than creating native content for platforms like TikTok. They simply didn’t have the digital infrastructure to make it easier.

Social media isn’t just an add-on

Social media content requires dedicated attention. A single journalist can’t just be told, “Okay, on top of your regular work, you’ll also handle social media.” It doesn’t work that way. Social media journalism needs a dedicated team, even if it’s just two or three people, who can focus entirely on researching, creating, adapting, and publishing digital content tailored for online audiences.

Unfortunately, there is no magic formula for success in social media journalism. Unlike traditional media, where audience behaviour is more predictable, social media metrics are determined by algorithms controlled by corporations. As journalists, we don’t get to set the key performance indicators (KPIs), and we can’t directly influence how platforms distribute content. The ability to get it right comes with experience.

Reaching audiences is a great challenge for the media in exile

For Belarusian independent media, the biggest obstacle is working in exile. Most, if not all, Belarusian journalists are operating from outside their home country. This presents a huge challenge because social media platforms are increasingly using localised algorithms, prioritising content distribution within the country a user is physically located in. If you’re in exile, your content is more likely to reach people in your host country rather than the audience you’re trying to reach back home. This makes it incredibly difficult to engage with the people who need this information the most.

Trying to reach audiences in Belarus while working in exile led to discussions about alternative strategies, like leveraging older content, adapting SEO techniques, and using tools to track keyword trends. Ezio, a keyword and search optimisation tool, became a crucial topic. We explored ways to identify trending keywords and discover what was happening on Belarusian TikTok without being physically present in the country. Since exiled journalists couldn’t always see what their audience inside Belarus was experiencing, we needed alternative ways to access and analyse content trends. It’s a challenge that forces journalists to rethink distribution strategies entirely.

It was a fascinating process – experimenting with different tools, figuring out workarounds, and learning how journalists in exile could still stay connected with their home audiences despite the challenges. It reinforced for me how much adaptation and innovation are required to navigate journalism in the digital age.

Navigating reporting restrictions of the Social Media platforms

The challenge I encountered firsthand in Georgia was during the elections and the subsequent protests. Content moderation on social platforms quickly became a serious issue. These platforms have opaque rules – they don’t provide clear guidelines on what specific content will be flagged or taken down. There’s no checklist that says, “Don’t publish A, B, or C and you’ll be fine.” Instead, journalists are constantly walking a fine line, never knowing whether their work will be suppressed, their accounts restricted, or entire pages deleted without explanation.

This uncertainty created a palpable tension. Journalists wanted to share critical information, but also knew there was a risk their content could be blocked, rendering all their hard work useless. It’s an exhausting challenge, but one that forces journalists to think creatively.

These difficulties are particularly highlighted in crisis situations, but even in day-to-day reporting, journalists must navigate the evolving restrictions of digital platforms while still ensuring their content reaches the right audience. It’s a constant balancing act, but one that ultimately sharpens our ability to adapt and find new ways to keep journalism alive in the digital age.

The biggest revelation about TikTok

One of the biggest revelations for the journalists adapting to TikTok was how informal and raw the platform allows you to be. Many were hesitant at first, believing they needed a professional studio setup – a green screen, high-end equipment, or even access to a full production team. I kept hearing, “I have to ask my colleagues, I have to borrow, I have to buy new equipment.” But my response was always the same: “You don’t really need that.”

Yes, you do need to publish more frequently because, as TikTok itself has confirmed, quantity drives visibility. Typically, in journalism, we hear “quality over quantity”, but on TikTok, the rule is reversed – more is more. The algorithm favours frequent content, but this doesn’t mean perfection is required. There’s no need for elaborate pre-production or heavy post-production edits. Editing? Keep it quick.

The best approach is to be relatable and authentic. Just use your phone, film yourself, and publish. That’s it. The audience, especially younger viewers, values information that feels real and comes from a personal, familiar point of view rather than a polished, corporate-style production.

To help journalists understand this shift, I showed them examples of traditional media outlets successfully adapting to the platform. When they saw it firsthand, they recognised how even established news organisations were using TikTok’s casual, creator-driven style while maintaining journalistic integrity. Some even said, “Oh, that’s nice – I wouldn’t have known this was media if I hadn’t seen the logo.” That’s the challenge: blurring the line between journalism and digital content creation while preserving credibility and ethics.

We’re seeing this shift globally. Reports from the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism in their latest Digital News Report confirmed that more people are getting their news from social media, and increasingly from independent creators rather than traditional journalists or news organisations. So, our challenge is clear – if we want to stay relevant, we must adopt the same language and storytelling techniques as digital creators while upholding the ethical standards of journalism.

The most useful takeaway? Don’t obsess over perfection. Just be natural. Be yourself. That’s what resonates most with audiences today.

The most common question

One of the most common questions I get is about TikTok monetisation. Funding is always a pressing issue in media, particularly on social platforms. Creators and independent organisations can sometimes rely on monetisation features available on platforms like YouTube or Facebook. Unfortunately, TikTok doesn’t offer monetisation options for organisations, only for individual creators.

This led to an interesting discussion – how can media organisations still contribute to the platform while also creating opportunities for journalists to monetise their own work? One approach was to maintain organisation-run accounts while also encouraging individual journalists to establish personal accounts they could monetise. This personalised approach to content creation was fascinating to explore, especially since working in public media, I had never needed to consider monetisation strategies before. In public broadcasting, we don’t rely on this model, so it was eye-opening to analyse it from the perspective of independent journalists.

Cheap, democratic and unaccountable

TikTok has democratised information, but that comes with both advantages and disadvantages. On the downside, misinformation spreads rapidly because anyone can film and publish content that reaches millions without editorial oversight. There’s no need for expensive equipment or a professional setup. However, on the positive side, TikTok has enabled real-time reporting from people on the ground.

At the beginning of the conflict in Ukraine, young people who previously posted makeup tutorials were suddenly documenting their experiences in bunkers. They were still doing “get ready with me” videos, but now under the circumstances of war. They provided firsthand accounts of evacuations and war-like situations, giving the world a new way to witness these events.

Social media platforms are often called the modern public square, but with increasing fragmentation. There was a lot of talk about Tik Tok being banned. We have to ask: if a platform disappears, where do audiences go? Do they migrate, or does storytelling itself evolve? There’s no single answer.

Of course, I understand the concerns about these platforms, particularly regarding data privacy and regulations, which are actively discussed within the European Commission. However, we as journalists must work with these platforms to achieve our goals. The audience is already there. We can’t dictate where people consume news – we must adapt and meet them where they are. If a platform gets banned, audiences don’t disappear; they move. Our challenge is to understand how to follow and adapt to these shifts.

TikTok across the world

TikTok’s user demographics have evolved. In Europe, the largest group of users is now between 24 and 35 years old. These were the same people who were teenagers when TikTok exploded in 2019-2020. In the Middle East and North Africa, TikTok’s audience was always slightly older, overlapping more with Instagram users.

In contrast, in countries like Pakistan, Indonesia, and Bangladesh, TikTok remains dominated by younger users. This variation affects how content should be styled – what works for a 14-year-old audience differs from how you would present the same story to an 18-year-old or a 30-year-old.

Using TikTok beyond content distribution

Many of the Georgian and Belarusian journalists I’ve trained have found TikTok useful for research. Rather than just using it as a distribution platform, they search for topics and use the platform for story development. One Belarusian journalist told me that he regularly uses TikTok’s search function to find new story ideas. This underscores an important shift – social media isn’t just for content distribution; it’s a space for discovery and engagement.

Author: Zoya Charles

[popular_posts columns_xl=”4″ columns_l=”4″ columns_m=”3″]