Gemma García of Telemundo: “Anticipating Digital Change And Understanding Audiences Are Key To Noticias Telemundo’s Success”

Anticipating changes in digital and understanding audiences are two of the key factors, in the view of Gemma García, Executive VP of Noticias Telemundo, that explain the success of the Noticias Telemundo TikTok account, which currently has 16.7 million followers—making it the most-followed news account in the U.S. “and I dare say the second-largest Spanish-language news account in the world,” García noted.

“This trend really stands out to me for several reasons. First, because it is obviously linked to very young audiences. I think it highlights something very important: that young Spanish-speaking audiences in the U.S. are interested in news. It is not true that they don’t want to consume information and news. What happens is that you have to know how to market it to them and how to explain it. And I think that has been the great success of Noticias Telemundo,” the executive said.

García emphasizes that they have been able to anticipate changes, “something very important in any business strategy in any newsroom today.”

She explains that another key element for the digital news team has been creating content tailored to the interests of young audiences, content that is not mainstream.

“Understanding what their real problems are: in today’s U.S. context, immigration, housing, student loans. The content produced by Noticias Telemundo has not been mainstream content like that of other media outlets. We stepped off that track to reach these young audiences and show them that information is important for them as well,” García added.

NEWSROOM TRAINING FOR SOCIAL MEDIA CONTENT CREATION

The executive explains that to achieve this strong digital performance, they hired young people who are digital natives and understand the language of TikTok.

Another very important strategy has been training the traditional newsroom “so they can get on board with creating content for platforms like TikTok. TikTok has been the big surprise and the great source of pride because there is a lot of work behind it that has paid off,” she said.

STREAMING: NOTICIAS TELEMUNDO AHORA (NTA)

Streaming has also been a key trend for the news team. García recalled that they launched their streaming channel Noticias Telemundo Ahora (NTA) on May 1, 2024, and that “NTA became profitable in less than a year. For comparison, for example, NBC News Now took two years to become profitable; in our case, in nine months we already had revenue—small at first—but the investment, which by the way was minimal, had already been recovered.”

Noticias Telemundo Ahora´s talents

She explained that the investment in NTA was “minimal” because another strategy in launching the channel was to leverage existing network and linear resources. “What we did was duplicate the newscasts. When the linear newscast ends, we start another one specifically for NTA, immediately after. That allowed us to generate content without large investments, and that was also a success. So much so that something happened that illustrates very well the diversification of platforms and how they coexist. At 7 a.m. and 10 a.m. on NTA we had a newscast that was originally exclusive to NTA, and a few months ago we also moved it to linear. And it is now beating Despierta América (Univision) almost every day. It is a very interesting case, because it is a reverse migration of what usually happens. At first, linear content was moved to social media and streaming, and now we are doing the opposite,” she explained.

NEWS VERIFICATION

García stressed that today news verification is more important than ever. “For those of us working in audiovisual communication, videos on social media have become both a nightmare and something very important to verify. At Noticias Telemundo we are fortunate to be part of NBC, whose verification, standards, and guidance teams are very strong and very good. This has been an important company-wide effort to ensure that no fake images or false information slip through,” she said.

PIONEERS IN GRAPHICS

García noted that one of the areas where they have invested most heavily is graphics. “Just as we have been pioneers in TikTok and social media, we have also been pioneers in graphics. I am referring to two types: virtual reality and real-time graphics. We have invested in this technology. If you have seen or look up NBC’s coverage of Tom Costello on Artemis, it was all done in the Noticias Telemundo studios. NBC has come to use our technology. I think that investment is delivering excellent results,” she emphasized.

She added that they strategically chose to invest in graphics because platform diversification made it clear that visuals help explain things in a faster, more agile way that resonates with younger generations. “From gas prices to a storm, a hurricane, or Artemis, we understood that graphics visually explain what is happening better than a two-minute report. It has been an investment I am honestly very pleased with,” she said.

García also noted that they are investing in AI “in a very controlled way.” Together with NBC, they are being cautious, with joint working groups between NBC and Noticias Telemundo. “In news we have to be extremely careful,” she said.

She described that NBC has created a training hub for producers and journalists. “There are already 2,000 people between NBC and Noticias Telemundo receiving ongoing training,” she said.

She added that they are using some AI tools, including one called Runway, an AI video generation platform, where they maintain full control over outputs. “We set the guidelines for the platform and, of course, anything generated with AI is labeled on air as ‘generated by AI.’ Runway is a platform that is working well for us, and we are also experimenting with AI tools for translation and clipping,” she said.

FUTURE

Looking ahead, García said it will be increasingly important for media outlets to tell stories as they are and provide context. “Packaged newscasts and quickly outdated reports will lose relevance, while more in-depth pieces that provide context will remain important,” she said.

Another key aspect will continue to be live information. “People have an appetite for live content; this is a fact and a trend likely to continue in the coming years. But this is nothing new for us. These new formats are actually moving toward where we already are. Whether the platform is a phone, glasses, or something else doesn’t matter much, because what we do is tell stories in real time—and that will thankfully continue,” she concluded.

Julio Vaqueiro, anchor of Noticias Telemundo