Geotags on social media posts is an incredibly useful feature for journalists to utilize. Not only is it an interactive way to report, it’s also a great way to find stories and social media content. Here’s a look at some of my favorite geotagging search tools:
Twitter’s geotagging features are some of the most subtle on any social media platform. Unless a user turns it off, Twitter will automatically add a geotag to all tweets and images sent based off your device’s physical location or IP address. It’s also possible to override this feature and manually insert a different location into the tweet. Twitter uses this to aggregate location-specific trend lists, and will allow you search tweets and filter them by location.
Snapchat Map
The Snap Map is a great tool to see what’s going on in a specific location. The map not only shows you the current locations of all your friends, but it also displays all public Snap stories by location. On the map, areas of darker red show a greater concentration of photos and videos in that location. The lighter blue/green means that there might be one or two videos in that specific location.
Banjo
Banjo is a tool that’s built specifically for journalists. The app allows journalists to search across all social media platforms by location. Posts from Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Periscope are all included on the searchable map. Beyond location, you can also filter the posts by keyword. This tool is great to use for breaking news events. It’s important to remember that users who post pictures and videos on social media retain the copyright on those images, and so journalists have to reach out to them and get permission in order to use them on air or online.
Michael Pyskaty 