How Can Journalists Use Twitter Spaces to Connect with Their Audiences?

In November 2020, Twitter announced a new feature called Twitter Spaces, a feature that hosts audio-only chats on the platform. Hosts can invite their followers to listen in on interviews and discussions — and even allow them to join the discussion themselves. Spaces are public, allowing anyone to listen to Spaces regardless of whether they’re logged in to a Twitter account (or even have one). 

Twitter created Spaces in response to Clubhouse’s success with audio chatrooms, but initially limited the ability to host Spaces to those who had 600 followers or more. The company later walked back that policy, expanding Spaces to all users in May 2021, part of its goal to grow its daily active user base to 315 million by the end of 2023.

Given the feature’s capabilities, Twitter has encouraged newsrooms and publishers to incorporate Spaces into their audience strategies. In an interview with Nieman Lab, Eric Zuckerman, head of U.S. news partnerships for Twitter, said that Spaces presents “an opportunity for newsrooms and journalists to have open and authentic conversations with their audiences about what’s happening in the world and about the stories they’re covering.” 

While Twitter has a primer on its website showing people how to use Spaces, it encourages journalists to test out the feature on their own. 

Sarah Feldberg, the editor for emerging products and audio at the San Francisco Chronicle, which has done several Spaces thus far, stressed that testing the product out themselves offers journalists the opportunity to learn more about its capabilities as Twitter rolls out updates.

“Test. Test. Test,” Feldberg told Nieman Lab’s Sarah Scire. “The feature is fairly easy to use, but the functionality seems to be updated regularly, so it’s important to stay on top of how it’s working and make sure your guests know how to join the Space and start speaking.”

Feldberg noted that Spaces has proven itself indispensable, allowing the Chronicle to connect its audience with public health experts who’ve offered guidance and addressed concerns around the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

“They’ve been a way to give our community live access to local experts and to talk about pressing issues around the pandemic, like advice for parents of children too young to be vaccinated and concerns around Long Covid in breakthrough infections,” Feldberg said. “We recorded the audio from those conversations and edited the highlights into subsequent podcast episodes.”

Matt Adams, engagement editor at NPR, noted that the radio company has hosted dozens of Spaces thus far, adding that Spaces are being integrated into the company’s larger audience strategy in a bid to go beyond the airwaves and its digital publication.

“We’re starting to wonder, O.K., can this work as a social audio conversation? How can we get more voices on this, whether from the audience or our sources?” he added. “I’d say that it’s becoming part of our strategy just like we produce pieces for on-air.”

Twitter has proven itself an important newsgathering tool since its inception, allowing journalists to diversify their sourcing and giving them opportunities to collect information that might have been missed or outright ignored by gatekeepers at other organizations. Twitter has also broken down barriers between journalists and the public; journalists who regularly engage with their audiences, whether liking and retweeting content or soliciting tips, stand to gain a lot in the form of trust. 

With these points in mind, Twitter Spaces, much like the more exclusive Clubhouse that came before it, can further nurture the relationship between journalists and their audience in several different ways, according to freelance journalist and audience strategist Adriana Lacy, who offered valuable observations in a piece for The Donald J. Reynolds Journalism Institute.

Lacy points out that:

• Audio has proven to be an effective reporting tool, especially when elected officials and public figures participate.

• Conversations can be interactive, allowing room for both a structured Q & A and spontaneous conversation.

• Discussions around events can elicit significant public participation, as the organization noted in its example of entertainment reporters who invited the public to analyze and speculate about the 2021 Academy Awards ceremony.

• Instant analysis, such as directly after an awards show, can have the same effect.

• Audio platforms can serve as a valuable testing ground for future audio projects, such as the launch of a more structured podcast that can explore issues more methodically.

• Audio platforms give publications the opportunity to gain subscribers, ultimately generating more interest in their work.

Twitter Spaces is not without its drawbacks, however. Audio platforms make it easier for bad actors to disseminate misinformation because moderating audio broadcasts is labor intensive. Twitter has also shifted the responsibility of reporting misinformation to its users, who can flag conversations that violate its existing content policies.