Adrian Ma 0:06 Hello there and welcome to another episode of working media. This is the podcast where Professional Journalists offer insight and advice to aspiring reporters but making it in the news media industry. My name is Adrian Ma. I'm your host and I'm a journalism professor at Ryerson University in Toronto. This podcast is presented in partnership with J-Source, the English language portal of the Canadian journalism project. I am very pleased to introduce our next guest, Mr. Elamin Abdelmahmoud. He is currently the social media editor at BuzzFeed Canada. We had a really great chat about him getting his start in radio, and then moving into the digital realm. And all the challenges involved in keeping up with how incredibly fast things move in the social media world. Without further ado, this is my conversation with el amin, Amin. Hey, how you doing, man? Elamin Abdelmahmoud 0:52 I'm wonderful. How are you? Adrian Ma 0:53 I'm really good. Thank you for asking. Okay, so we are with you at the BuzzFeed Canada offices. Welcome. Thank you very much. Yeah, it's a great environment. Yeah, it's just it is it is a bit of a frenetic environment. So podcast listeners, if you hear footsteps or yelling or bantering, perhaps even bickering. We do get into some fights you get in some fights? Yes. Then Then pay no mind, just listen to the wonderful insights that this man is about to share with us. Elamin Abdelmahmoud 1:19 Yeah. Don't worry about the family fighting in the background. Adrian Ma 1:22 No, no, no, it's all it's all love. So el amin, you are the social media editor at BuzzFeed Canada. Yes. So you specialize in content strategy, you really dug deep into the digital side of journalism. But I first want to talk about where you started. And I think like many of us who enter this business, you got into this to campus media, right? Like you started working at you did Okay, so, Queens University is where you you? Did you do? Yes. Elamin Abdelmahmoud 1:48 I know. The podcast listeners can't see this. But I just lifted my fist up in the air. to salute Queen's University. My represent the queen. Yeah, at all times. Yeah. Um, Yemen. Sorry, Adrian Ma 1:58 I cut you off. No, no, no. So you got into radio. Is that right? So tell us tell us how that got started for you. Yeah, man. Elamin Abdelmahmoud 2:05 Radio as a radio was a first love. Way back in at Queen's University. I sort of began working with cfrc, one on 1.9 fm. If you're listening in Kingston, please listen to it. Shout out to Kingston, yeah, Kingston, also the hometown. And I started there working on the news team. And for me, working in an environment that was a community radio station, which is to say, its job was to cover stories that other people were not covering, was electric was so much fun, you know, and so I, I sort of gravitated towards doing that kind of work. Now, having said that, I didn't really plan on pursuing journalism after leaving University wasn't the plan at all, I applied to some policy schools. I didn't get into policy schools. And and then I sort of was like, Well, I guess I'm gonna have to, you know, survive somehow. Right. And I'm very happy to sort of picked traffic journalism afterwards. But it wasn't the original plan. Adrian Ma 3:02 Right. Yeah. So I mean, covering any particularly interesting stories was was kind of like this aha moment for you when you're in the radio station working there colleagues. And I feel like a lot of a lot of us won't get into this. who aren't, you know, sure that we want to be journalist. Usually it kind of just comes about that. There's this moment where you kind of remember very clearly, like, you're like, yes, this this is this feeling or whatever I'm feeling right now. Is is what I want to kind of experience. Elamin Abdelmahmoud 3:28 Did you have that totally spring of 2009? All right, you know, that was, but listen, this was again, this is what I was doing. cfrc was like I this is a lot of fun. Like this is Yeah, this is there's a thrill involved in this. And that was when we were covering, by we, I mean, the radio station, but it was just me at there at six in the morning covering an incredibly local story about the shutting down of these farms that were attached to the prison in Kingston. Now, the farmers provided jobs for the prisoners, you know, a lot of prisoner advocates. in Kingston were like, this is an amazing rehabilitation program. And so, you know, that corrections decided to shut them down. And there was a massive protest, like people showed up, were talking like, chained themselves to trucks, you know. And they wanted to prevent the cows from leaving. I'm not kidding. They wanted to prevent the cows from leaving the premises. And people were crying in the street. And there was no other news organization there. There was just no one. And that's sort of the that's like a super local journalism moment, you know, yeah, very few other outlets are there. And the Globe and Mail are tweeting me and they're like, Hey, can we use your photos? I'm like, Well, why don't you send somebody down here. And I think that moment was like, this could be, you know, something that I really enjoy doing with the rest of my life. And I still wanted to do policy and I'm a little bit bitter that I didn't get a policy school, but it sort of became very clear to me afterwards. I was like, you know, I journalism is the thing I want to do, which is to say, bringing conversations to people and saying this is something we should really talk about is the thing I want to do. Like, I'm most interested in curating the kinds of conversations we have and the ways that we have them. Yeah. And my job, very Luckily, lets me do that. Adrian Ma 5:18 That that was your journalistic Spring Awakening, if you will. Elamin Abdelmahmoud 5:21 Absolutely. Yes. Adrian Ma 5:24 So you didn't get our policy squared away. See, but you decided, Okay, so I'm going to I'm going to see how this journalism thing works out. Is that what brought you to George Stroumboulopoulos Tonight? Elamin Abdelmahmoud 5:32 Yeah. Okay. So I went to a few tapings of George stroumboulopoulos. Tonight after I moved to Toronto, I'm still hopeful that I'll get into policy school at that moment. And so I went to these tapings and I just really enjoyed the the environment. But it was like, you know, really great conversations I still sad to this day, that show ended because it was so good. And it filled a large hole, a large gap in Canadian cultural landscape. And I saw, I saw someone in the corner, and she was sort of calling the shots and telling people what to do. And I was like, gonna go talk to her and be like, hey, I've done some radio stuff. Do you have any jobs? And that that woman was telling you, not CIF. And she was like, No, don't have any jobs. But she made the mistake of giving me her email. And, boy, was that a mistake? you capitalize on that? You don't even know. I think I emailed Tanya, probably once every three weeks until she gave me a job. Like it was something something like that, right? But eventually, she was like, Listen, I don't have like a full time job. Now I have a 30 day contract, right? Because we really need some help in terms of we need, you know, an AP to sort of pick up the slack on this little area. And I was like, That's it, I'm in, I'm down. Let's do this. The 30 day contract turned into a three month contract. And then the season ended. And I was like, hey, seasons end on TV shows what doesn't have seasons? And the answer to that is the news. So transitioning to the new side was strictly a decision of wanting to live. And recognizing that needing to live doesn't have seasons. And so I was like, Adrian Ma 7:17 it would be amazing if we could hibernate. Elamin Abdelmahmoud 7:19 Yeah, it'd be incredible. Yeah, but we can't know. And so you know, while it shows on hiatus in the summer, I'm like, Hey, I really feel like I need to eat and pay rent and stuff. And and so I sort of had a few conversations with people within the CBC. And the national was hiring for a part time sort of researcher position. And that was that was sort of my transitioning into news. Adrian Ma 7:47 Right? which brought you yes to the national. So it was still at that point, kind of more on the broadcast side of things. Yes. Yeah, very much. So Elamin Abdelmahmoud 7:56 for sure. Yeah, I really enjoyed doing broadcast stuff. But the other thing that I was really enjoying was a little show called the agenda with Steve bacon. Yeah. Which today, you know, is one of the best current affairs TV shows in this country, that the depth, you know, the length of the given to, for for stories should appeal to the policy geek within Exactly. I mean, and if you talk to any policy nerds, like they're all like, you know, the best show is the genuine Steve paikin. And the reason for that is because they get to have the most knowledgeable people to, you know, on the topic, and they don't say, hey, talk for six minutes, they say, how about we talk about this for an hour, you know, how about, we were talking about this for 25 minutes. And it's just not something that you see a lot, you know, throughout the rest of the TV landscape. And so while I was at the National I was sort of really interested in in transitioning to just more keeping in keeping tabs, you know, on what was happening at the agenda. And I got in touch with the executive producer at the time, Dan Dunnski, and I was like, Listen, I don't know what you guys need, but I can do you know, the things that I'm interested in our online journalism, I'm interested in social media. And he was like, well, we do need a little bit of help on a social media side. And that was that was sort of my first foray into working for specifically on the online side of things anywhere. Yeah, I was the online producer for the agenda. And then that's sort of transitioned into a social media role for TV shows, Current Affairs and documentaries overall. So Adrian Ma 9:33 well, especially that point in time, too, I mean, a lot of time, at that point in time in your career, a lot of kind of content units and shows were just kind of dipping their toes into this stuff. So you must have had a pretty good kind of carte blanche to do things and try things out. Elamin Abdelmahmoud 9:48 That's exactly it. Right. It was sort of the right moment, because you know, you have TV shows that are like wow, we need to start taking online stuff seriously. We need to figure out the best ways to promote our content online. Because people aren't just waking up and then like coming to TVO.org or the GlobeandMail.com or whatever websites, they're transitioning to come into content, mostly through social channels. And so if you're going to get the views, if you're going to get the audience to actually just engage with the things that you're creating at all, it's that's going to have to start playing a much larger role. And so that was the perfect moment, right, like the perfect moment of coming in me, like, I have the skills. And the proof is in my own personal social media channels. So you should let me do this. But for you, instead of, you know, the other stuff that I tweet, and, and, and it worked out, you know, and I'm also very conscious of the fact that it doesn't work out for everyone, right? This is not a pitch that everyone is able to make. Or just because like, because of timing, because of access, right? Not everyone gets your email answered, I am fully aware of that kind of thing, because it worked out for me, but it's not gonna certainly work for everyone. My point, though, is it was worth trying, it was worth trying to have a conversation with a place that's like, Hey, you clearly need this gap filled? How can I help with it? How can I be the person to fill that particular gap? Adrian Ma 11:15 So that's a really interesting point in that your sounds like you believe that, you know, your opportunities are in part due to luck. Yes. But and also, what advice may you have on becoming that person who gets that lucky? You know what I mean? Like, right? Was there anything that you thought you did, or you learn to do that helped kind of put you over the top and, and, and really let you take advantage of that opportunity? Elamin Abdelmahmoud 11:39 I am one of those people who will email everyone that I'm interested in talking to, and be like, Hey, can we have coffee. And and when I do that, I'm not looking to pitch myself as a potential employee, what I'm looking for, is for them to reveal all their secrets. And then I go back and reverse. So here's, here's the process, right? We're gonna go out for coffee, and then I'm gonna be like, Hey, tell me about everything that you guys do. And then I'll go home, and then re engineer my resume to be like, I am the perfect person for everything that you just told me you do. And so I would say that, like, the job seeking process, the small hack that you can do is, go find out what they want first, and then put that in your resume, like we put those skills if you have them, put them in your resume. Because there's no sense in like, spending hours and days and weeks on a resume that you present it they're like, we're looking for none of these things. And so, to get that lucky, one of the thing that I did was sort of reverse engineer that process, have a conversation first, and then be like, Hey, is that a right fit for me? Can I do those things? And if I can, like, I will put them literally at the top of my resume be like, these are all the things that you said that you're interested in? Guess who's got them? This guy? Adrian Ma 13:00 That's a great hack, man. That's good. Yeah, I'm gonna use that. Elamin Abdelmahmoud 13:02 Okay. But you said by all means, yeah, Adrian Ma 13:05 yeah. So this kind of gets us to now where we are now. So how did you end up going from TV Oh, to to coming to BuzzFeed. Elamin Abdelmahmoud 13:14 Right? Listen, before going to BuzzFeed, I was a big fan of BuzzFeed as a huge, I mean, there were so many people. And BuzzFeed launching in Canada was a huge deal, right. And so the reason I was interested in BuzzFeed was because they were really pioneers. And we still are pioneers. I say they like I don't work here. But they, we, I believe this company was a pioneer in terms of getting people to consume content, through particular content strategy that is like, you don't have to come to our website, you don't have to come to the place where we live, in order to consume the content that we make. That is not a thing that we ask of you. It'd be nice if you do. But we'll make sure that all of this content is available to you, wherever you are, whether it's instagram, whether it's Twitter, whether it's Facebook, the idea is you get as much of the story as possible on those platforms. And we have teams that do that, right? We have teams that take a new story and be like, how can we tell the story on an Instagram story? How do we tell this story in a Twitter thread? So that it's like, we get it like, what you're doing is you're you're living on your social media apps, and you want to keep scrolling, most people don't want to leave social media apps to go to websites we have, most companies have the data to prove this. And so working within that. BuzzFeed was one of the leading companies in terms of being like, okay, we'll meet people where they're like, adopting that as a serious sort of content strategy. And so for me, that was an interest as a really big interest when they sort of started to move into the country. Craig Silverman, who used to be our, the head of BuzzFeed Canada, he now he's a media editor for BuzzFeed news. was, was sort of a contact person for this and So I did the regular things that you do, which is, you know, I followed him on Twitter. But then I also decided to add him on Facebook. And the reason I decided to do that is because if he if I was going to be a social media editor for BuzzFeed, Canada, my thought was, I want this person to see how I run my social media. And that worked. That is also a gamble. And I'm aware of that, right? And not everyone is comfortable making that decision. And so the thought being, on top of communicating that I understand what BuzzFeed is trying to do with social media, I also wanted to be like, and like, here's like, a live example of how I do stuff, how I run my own sort of channels. And that, that did it, I guess. Because after two years and a bit at t vo, I came came here to BuzzFeed, BuzzFeed. Adrian Ma 15:53 Did you send a thank you note to Mark Zuckerberg? Elamin Abdelmahmoud 15:55 I did not. Yeah, maybe I should. Yeah, it's long overdue. Adrian Ma 16:00 All right, that sounds awesome. So this podcast is all about offering aspiring journalists some key insights into getting their careers going. One question I asked all our guests is this, what do you know now that you wish you knew when you first got your start in this industry? Elamin Abdelmahmoud 16:16 literally no one cares if you email them and ask them for advice, right? Like the worst single do is delete your email, the best thing we'll do is respond to you with 500 words about what you should do. You have nothing, literally nothing to lose by asking people for advice. And most people want to give it like, because I don't know, I think I think I tried to sort of think back to when I was trying to break into the industry. And looking at people be like, hey, those people have pretty dope jobs that I really want. My thought was like, I'm not gonna bother that person. I don't want to be a bother on that person's radar. But like, most people in those jobs, don't think of themselves as like, they're in positions where like, I'm too high above like, you know, helping people, because they themselves got their start somehow. And they want to share that journey. And they want to share how they got there. And so I used to be quite hesitant about I guess, blanket bombing people's inboxes with like, hey, I need your help, hey, I need your help. Don't be annoying about it. And like, I don't know, be respectful of people's time. But like, ask for help. People want to help they really, really do. They don't mind helping. I wish I knew that. I wish I knew that before. Because it would have saved my time. It would have cut my time in half, I think. Yeah, yeah. Great. Adrian Ma 17:36 So your job, let's talk about that a little bit. Because that's social media, let's talk about it. Social media, I think is a really fascinating area. Because, you know, you've obviously really, you know, you got your start in kind of more traditional forms of, you know, broadcast media, and you really embraced into the digital side of the equation. But social media feels like that's one area where the changes are even more Fast and Furious than then then some some other types of digital journalism. Yeah, you got to be mindful of how people are using technologies, how audiences shift and adapt even the vernacular, right? The language is constantly evolving. So it's a full time job, in and of itself, just to be learning about social media. So how do you keep on top trends, you know, as a part of this job? Elamin Abdelmahmoud 18:22 How do I keep on top of trends, one of the things I do is maintain my mental health by not going on social media all the time. And like, I don't know, I don't know that sounds counterintuitive. But like I try to, like for the most part, I take weekends off social media. I don't I don't tweet as much if I do at all, Alyssa, I don't know, this guy falls. But for the most part, like, what that does is give me the distance to have some judgment about whether some new trend is a thing that's gonna last and is interesting to investigate. Or it's something that is totally passing. Because so much of social media is so much noise. And people trying to create types of content and, and ways of engaging people like they just don't last right? apps and platforms that are gone within a week. You have to figure out what has staying power and has staying power potential. And what doesn't. And I think that comes from sort of maintaining a healthy distance from social media and looking at it as like an evolving project. I think some people get a little bit too deep. And they think they have to, you know, speak the new way that people are speaking every single day. And if they don't have an article on every single trending topic that comes out, then they're like, behind the ball and like I don't, I don't I don't think so. I think for me, social media is a thing that evolves quickly, but a lot slower than most people think. Adrian Ma 19:50 That is so interesting, interesting to me, because I think that a lot of people feel like to really get to know social media, you must immerse yourself in all the time and what You're saying is none if you take a step back and think about, you know, how you're using it and think about whether something has staying power. Elamin Abdelmahmoud 20:08 Yeah, like I mean, you know, if if a tweet is popular try to, I mean, this is something that I try to do all the time. It's like if I see a popular tweet or a popular thread, from someone, I sort of tried to reverse engineer it try to be like, well, what, what is it about this that really worked? So you know, one of the leading places on Twitter is, for me, a nonprofit, that's called pro publica and pro publica do Twitter threads better than literally anyone. I truly aspire to pro publica level threads, because they create these threads that are so like narratively gripping, there's kind of like, here's a story, and here's why you really get to care about it, it has a lot more to do with the craft of the story, and why you should care that it is about embracing some sort of trend. Whereas you see a lot of trends that just don't, we just don't last, like maybe you'll get some good retweets on a day. But for the most part, like, people will move on and be like, that's not interesting, you know. And so I don't know it comes with is certainly a language, social media is a language you have to sort of learn to speak somewhat fluently. And for that to happen, you got to be present and on it and sort of monitoring it, you know, and but don't be obsessed about it. Like don't obsess about the things. Don't obsess about every little thing that you see on it, because I think that's like a very shortcut. Very quick shortcut to going crazy. Yeah, for real. Yeah. Adrian Ma 21:36 So I guess just kind of thinking recently about what you've been looking at and what you've been sort of investigating? What are there are there are a few things happening on social media right now that that really pique your interest that you think may have some staying power or some really interesting storytelling potential? Elamin Abdelmahmoud 21:52 You know, I, I think the next thing that we have to sort of figure out is how do we do audio on social media? How do we do audio effectively, on social media, we haven't really figured that out yet. No one's really cracked that to an effective degree. And so I'm sort of keeping keeping some keeping tracks of keeping track of like how Vox is doing it, for example, they do some interesting stuff with audio on their Twitter account. But I don't know, I think that'll be an interesting frontier. Because for the most part, the podcast universe, you know, on the social media universe have sort of existed a little bit far apart. And as you start to blend those, there's just so much content that comes out of the podcasting universe, it's fascinating and will play super well on social media. And but we just haven't gotten there yet. Mostly because the platforms themselves don't lend. They, they don't lend themselves to sharing audio very well. So I'm sort of curious about the evolution of that. Right. Adrian Ma 22:48 So do many other, you know, thinking about, because you probably get contacted all the time from, from, you know, younger student journalists, aspiring journalists. You know, do you have any, you know, suggestions in general, or advice about people that just really, really want to break into this industry? Maybe even particularly as getting involved in social media work? Elamin Abdelmahmoud 23:11 Sure. Yeah. Yeah, I think my biggest advice would be to sort of develop a voice. And it doesn't have to be my voice. I try to be sort of the way Adrian Ma 23:18 Your voice is so silky smooth. You could be Elamin Abdelmahmoud 23:23 my nice jazz, my Hello, you listen to 91.8? No, I don't know. Adrian Ma 23:28 That's pro it's pro level. Elamin Abdelmahmoud 23:31 Thank you. It's very kind. I'm trying to develop a voice on social media that is that is reflective of you, and the companies you're hoping to work for, right? That's going to be different for you than everybody else. And I always sort of when people ask me to describe the BuzzFeed candidate voice, I sort of try to say that like, it's like, sounds like a really smart and really engaged and really informed sort of 16 year old girl like that, sort of like the voice description. Which is to say, like, pretty willing to share news with memes. You know what I mean? Like, don't be I'm not, I'm not afraid of that. But other companies might be like, that is not I think that we might do. I don't know where you want to work. You know, my advice would be to watch them watch what they're doing. And see how you can add your own personal voice to it, because that would really work for you. Sounds great. And Adrian Ma 24:27 I guess kind of wrapping things up. What what worlds remain to conquer for you? Right? Elamin Abdelmahmoud 24:34 What worlds remain to conquer? That's a fun one. That's a fun question. I here's here's the thing. I wear a few hats at BuzzFeed. So I'm social media editor for BuzzFeed Canada, but one of the 50% 80% of my time. I spend 50 to 80% depending on the day is spent on our morning newsletter. So I get up at four in the morning to write a newsletter for BuzzFeed news. Which is super dope. And these others are so back in? Yeah. Oh yeah, love it big time having a huge moment. I know, we have an incredibly engaged subscriber base who get really mad at me sometimes and be like, Hey man, where, you know, I see you making fun of Kanye and I don't appreciate it or whatever. And I love that. So I'm a bit I've only been doing newsletters for about four or five months or so. And so this is new for me. I really love it. And one of the nice things about being a BuzzFeed is that, like a new things introduced into my role is like, something's rotated out, something's rotated in every few months. And I really love that about working here. So I'm like, kind of trying to embrace this newsletter moment and be like, what could we could do with this, it sounds like a lot of fun. Especially because of what you just said, which is that newsletters are super back end, I realized that like the newsletter that I put together is one of several that will show up in people's inboxes. So I've been sort of trying to work on crafting the voice for it and crafting what it should sound like the ways that informs people in the morning. And bed has been like a total total thrill. But then the other part of it is I like bonding, the we're learning is that new my newsletter audience really loves explainers like really love it when some new big thing happens. And you're like, this new big thing happened. But you might not have the background. Let me just walk all this back to you. So you can understand the full context of the thing that just happened. And we're like, we're talking about maybe turning part of those into video. And I'm interested in seeing what it looks like when I do that on camera. I don't know. And so those are worlds to conquer. I do occasional panels on CBC and so like, I'm not unfamiliar with being on camera. But being on camera in my own voice might be fascinating. Adrian Ma 26:50 Well, best luck to you in those endeavors. Thanks so much for talking to us today. Brother. Elamin Abdelmahmoud 26:54 My pleasure. I hope this was helpful. Adrian Ma 26:55 That was great. Thanks a lot, man. Thanks. Once again, I'd like to thank me for taking the time to hang out with us today. Technical producer of working media is Nicole de Donato and our executive producer is Hayley Watson. This podcast is in partnership with J-Source. Thank you so much for listening. Until next time.