Adapting the Journalism Tradition

Smarter Shift President Mitchell Beer and Social Media Strategist Jenise Fryatt both originally trained as reporters. Mitchell spent seven years in journalism, including almost three years in Canada’s Parliamentary Press Gallery. Jenise worked as a news assistant for two years at the Palm Springs, California ABC TV affiliate, K-ESQ TV, and as a reporter for two years at the Palm Springs area’s Post newspapers.

That’s why we’ve been excited and a bit fascinated to see so many other ex-journalists moving into the world of content marketing. We think this mix of editorial traditions is good news for marketing, and great news for client organizations and the audiences they’re trying to reach.

And we see strong, steady news judgment as the starting point for an approach to online content curation that builds the story from the ground up, drawing on multiple reliable sources to make sense of a complex or controversial topic.

Smarter Shift’s approach to content strategy adapts the best traditions of daily journalism to online communications…with a few important differences.

• We do produce snappy, accurate content while it’s fresh, in as many languages as necessary. We deliver compelling, relevant news and insights that help build conversations online.
• We don’t operate as an independent news source and we never practice “gotcha” journalism. Our clients review every word before it’s published, and our highest goal is to use smart, honest content to help organizations meet their objectives.
• Our work is built on a journalist’s passion for accurate, responsible storytelling and clear, precise writing.
• We do take a careful, selective approach to online content curation by learning a subject area well, collecting all the source material we can find, picking the smartest, most reliable content, and revising it to deliver a consistent tone and message.