What's Everyone Talking About?

My friend and brilliant morning show consultant, Steve Reynolds says there is only two kinds of content. One is what everyone is already talking about, and the other is to create something for people to start talking about.

Just look at the trends each day and you will discover that his keen insight is not only so relevant for morning shows and radio stations that want to keep their fingers on the pulse of what's happening now and connect with listeners, but also for anyone thinking about making an impact with social.

A great case in point happened just last week with the news that a local TV app tops the iTunes charts: http://bit.ly/lNMWUi

Orlando's WESH-TV produced a 99-cent iPhone app that has topped the paid news app chart on the iTunes store. And they did it by focusing the app on a single story with a national following: the Casey Anthony trial. The app has bounced between the #1 and #2 spots on the paid news app chart, beating popular apps like Instapaper.

The app features daily news stories, videos, case calendar, photos, legal documents (20,000 pages in all) and "live wire" updates as the case is underway. The app doesn't feature live video, in part because of the cost associated with providing it, but the on-demand clips have been popular.

The singular focus around an extremely topical, local story that everyone is talking about integrated with the WESH-TV purpose and combined with the right social media tools have created a huge success!

Now that's using your personality/identity with great content and uncovering the digital equivalent of your local watering hole.

Is there a topical moment that offers you the same opportunity?

I'm betting yes ... if you go beyond just covering content and go deeper to unleash your passion and purpose around a connection that really matters to the end user.

So ... what's everyone talking about in your network and tribe now?