Reddit Makeover Part 8: Set up Engaging AMAs

AMA’s are Q&A sessions on Reddit. They are great opportunities for publishers to interact with Redditors. There are several steps that you need to go through by order.

Note: For my master’s capstone project, I worked with Barron’s editorial development, design and reporting teams and Reddit’s Media Partnerships team to help them build a presence on Reddit from scratch. I will keep posting my findings and gradual steps for publishers to engage with Reddit users every week.

If you are new to Reddit, read the series step by step, as all of them are built on one another. Skipping one step will probably leave you confused when you read those after it. You can bookmark any article (if you are not logged in) or save it to your Medium account (if you are logged in) if you want to review it later. You can treat the guide as a workbook. Save it and refer back to it as you go through each of them to build a presence on Reddit.

• Proof that you will be the one to host an AMA. It can be a photo of you holding a sign that lists the date of the AMA, your name, and your username. Cross-post the proof on your other social media to draw more participants. Below is an example from Michael Finkel, who wrote a cover story of the science of sleep for Nat Geo.

• Title that states your name, who you are, that you will do the AMA and what you will discuss
• Intro that talks more about major pieces of work you have done and lists links to them. Here is what Michael wrote in the AMA post.

Send your proof, title and intro to AMA@reddit.com. The Reddit team will then make a customized submission link, through which you can review your title, text and the sub-Reddit your AMA will appear in. Take a second look, make sure everything is accurate, and then hit the “Submit” button.

Reddit also has an AMA setup guide with more detailed explanation and examples.

I have also developed checklist for you to maximize your chance to nail an AMA. You don’t have to meet each criterion, but try to check off as many as possible.

• Relevancy. Does your AMA hosts’/hostesses’ specializations align to the missions of your publications?
• Expertise. Does your AMA hosts/hostesses have credible work in the related fields?
• Recognition. Have they won any recognizable awards? They don’t have to be big names, but prestige in related fields helps.
• Trends/Newsworthiness. Are the topics you are going to discuss trending? How many people are interested?
• Training. Unless your AMA hosts/hostesses are active Reddit users and have done AMA before, invite them to come to you early to give a quick tutorial on the platform and AMA. “In TV production, you get your guests camera-ready. For AMAs, get them keyboard ready,” Dom DiFurio, web producer at The Dallas Morning News, told me during a conversation on the phone.

Internal collaboration matters when engaging with Reddit users, and my incoming posts in the next few weeks will talk about it. If you have any questions or thoughts on Reddit AMAs, comment under my post. I appreciate any insightful feedback, sincere appreciation and constructive criticism.