Robert Quigley was recently named social media editor at the Austin American-Statesman.

Yes, you read that correctly: a newspaper has a social media editor. And why not? Newspapers have all kinds of editors, but few have a dedicated editorial staffer who focuses solely on social media.

“To me, social media is one of those things where it is no longer a question whether you should, but how you should do it,” Quigley said.

For Quigley, being on social media isn’t something that’s nice to do but optional. He said harnessing social media (and the Web, mobile and any  new tools that pop up)  is a question of relevancy.

“If we’re going to stay relevant, we need to be everywhere,” he said.

If millions of people are on social media, Quigley said journalists need to be there too. Social media is only going to become more popular and its relevancy will only increase. Ignoring social media may be tantamount to ignoring reality.

In his previous role as Internet Editor, Quigley spent half of his time on social media and the other half on working with the newsroom to make sure the Statesman’s staffers were coordinated and getting content and breaking news online.

“I’ve found a lot of success with social media in the past year,” Quigley said. “The management here recognized that and wanted to advance even further with social media.”

And social media really is a full time job. Papers like the Statesman have scores of reporters and editors using social media and engaging users online. Quigley is now the point man for social media and how journalists should be using it at the Statesman. Perhaps more importantly, Quigley is the point man for experimenting with new technologies.

“I can spend more time focusing on social media, interacting with the community, finding the best ways to engage our readers and our viewers and to make sure we are staying ahead on technology,” he said.

The Statesman was not one of the first news organizations on Twitter, but it was one of the first news organizations on Twitter that really tried to harness the medium well. From the beginning, Quigley knew he didn’t want the @Statesman Twitter account to just be an RSS feed.

“I noticed that all of my friends on Twitter were sharing links to news,” Quigley said. “And I thought ‘why can’t we guide this conversation?’ I wanted the interaction.”

Quigley uses the @Statesman account to interact with people, hand select interesting stories to share and “basically treat social media with the social part emphasized.” Even though many of his bosses weren’t on Twitter and many didn’t even know what Twitter was, they were supportive of his idea.

“It was pretty successful from the start,” he said.

One of the things Quigley is hoping to spend more time on now is seeing what is coming next.

“I want to find where the new curve is and get in front of it as fast as possible,” he said. “I want to be able to spend my time reading up on everything I can, seeing what non-newspaper industries are doing and what works for them.

• Why did the Statesman originally get into social media?
• How did Quigley first get into Twitter? Why did he become addicted to it?
• What are the biggest positives of social media?
• Are the lines between marketing and editorial blurring?
• How does a journalism student or journalist get a job as a social media editor?

Click here to stream the interview. Or download the MP3.