Higher Ed Storytelling University

00:00:00:20 - 00:00:20:22
Speaker 1
Like, I don't want to tell people that we do something. I want to show people that we did it. And relying on advising or faculty to share great stories, they may share interesting stories, but those stories may not have a relation to the core positions we're trying to promote. And that's kind of where the gap is a lot of times where it makes sense to insert a more intentional casting process.

00:00:21:07 - 00:00:31:01
Speaker 1
And because we're not just trying to find great students with interesting stories, although that's a part of it, we're trying to find people whose stories demonstrate proof points of the value propositions or positioning on.

00:00:37:06 - 00:00:59:03
Speaker 2
Hey, welcome to the Higher Ed Storytelling University podcast on the Be Podcast Network. This is a podcast dedicated to helping higher ed marketers tell better stories, create better content and enroll more students. My name is John Azoni. I am the founder at UNVEILD a video production company working specifically with college marketing teams on automating their student success stories through a subscription approach.

00:00:59:10 - 00:01:19:01
Speaker 2
And you can learn more at unveild.tv that's UNVEILD dot TV. If you're listening to this podcast for the first time, go ahead and subscribe. And if you've been listening for a while and haven't left a review, I'd love for you to do that. My guest today is Seth ODell. Seth has a solid background in higher ed marketing and producing great results for the institutions he's worked at.

00:01:19:07 - 00:01:42:23
Speaker 2
He brings all that expertise to his company, Kanahoma, a boutique education marketing agency based in San Diego, California. Founded in 2020, they serve colleges and universities from across the country as well as K through 12 organizations and education, technology and service providers. This is a really good episode. I'm just going to throw that out there. In this episode, we talk about a lot of things, but we zero in on Can.

00:01:42:23 - 00:02:01:07
Speaker 2
A Home is a unique process for finding great stories to tell. They have kind of a white glove done for you approach to this with the schools they work with, and it's pretty great. And the great thing is you can take this approach and make it work for you, do it as is or simplify it. But it's a great way to go about cataloging.

00:02:01:07 - 00:02:10:04
Speaker 2
Great student and alumni content at scale. That's the key here at scale. So here's my conversation with Seth O'Dell. Seth, thanks for being with us today.

00:02:10:20 - 00:02:13:05
Speaker 1
Happy to be here, John, Great to meet you. And thanks for the chance to chat.

00:02:13:23 - 00:02:17:03
Speaker 2
Yeah. So tell us a little bit about your background, who you are, what you do.

00:02:17:17 - 00:02:36:21
Speaker 1
Sure. So I'm Seth O'Dell. I've been in higher ed marketing for a little less than 20 years, so I've been starting my career at UCLA. I'm probably best known for my work. I worked at a school called Southern New Hampshire University from 2011, 2015. I did a whole lot of TV commercials and brand marketing during a really fun, fast growth stage.

00:02:37:17 - 00:02:59:20
Speaker 1
Was the general manager of an after that called Helix Education that was recently acquired by Ruffalo, Noel Levitz. And then after that I was vice Chancellor of Marketing at National University System, a large adult serving institution, home to about 45,000 students. That's what brought me to San Diego, where I live today. But currently I'm the founder and CEO of Can a Homeowner Education Marketing Agency.

00:03:00:12 - 00:03:16:13
Speaker 1
We are fully remote. A lot of us are in San Diego, but we are a little over 30 employees working with about a dozen colleges and universities. So small in comparison to some folks. But having a total blast about two and a half years into this and just having a great time, still love the space and really enjoying the work.

00:03:17:11 - 00:03:25:18
Speaker 2
That's awesome. And to to take us already on a tangent, you and your in your LinkedIn. You said you remodeled Dr. Phil's Kitchen.

00:03:26:08 - 00:03:48:16
Speaker 1
Yeah. When so I worked in TV news for a little while for ABC out of college and I moved to L.A. without anything lined up and without really, you know, much to do. And so when I showed up in L.A., I ended up working in construction and was an assistant general contractor and got a chance to remodel Dr. Phil's kitchen, you know, And it was a beautiful kitchen, teamed with a great job.

00:03:49:08 - 00:04:07:01
Speaker 1
I played a extremely small part in it, and I was not very good at it, candidly, which was I was very glad when UCLA came calling and I got to work in media relations for them, which just kind of opened up both my higher ed career end up and a path to marketing. So definitely an interesting anecdote, but I don't know that I personally contributed much to that.

00:04:07:01 - 00:04:09:14
Speaker 1
To the great work that you did at Dr. Phil's house.

00:04:09:22 - 00:04:15:07
Speaker 2
What would you say are like some of the major, you know, outstanding features of his kitchen?

00:04:16:02 - 00:04:34:01
Speaker 1
It was the biggest island I'd ever seen for sure. Massive island. That was probably the biggest thing. The other one was just the feat of pulling it off. Mean it was like a 24 hour construction. So it was like the idea was that like every team was stacked and we were going to like make as minimal disruption to him and his family as possible.

00:04:34:01 - 00:04:43:08
Speaker 1
And so it was like watching an orchestra play, but it was all subcontractors, all like perfectly lined up and executing. It was really a feat of scheduling. Actually.

00:04:43:15 - 00:04:55:21
Speaker 2
That's stressful. I just started watching is like, I can't remember what it's called, but it's like these investors and they they buy a property and then they they rehab it in 48 hours. And it's like incredible thing to watch is.

00:04:55:21 - 00:04:59:03
Speaker 1
It's probably exactly like a lot like that. I have no doubt.

00:04:59:17 - 00:05:08:16
Speaker 2
Yeah. All right. Anyway, back to back to the topic at hand here. So. So how did you come up with the name Cannon Homer.

00:05:09:12 - 00:05:30:12
Speaker 1
So Cannon, Homer stands for Kansas and Oklahoma, but more importantly, to me, it was the name of my family's lake house. So my family had a lake house in the Finger Lakes in western New York. For 99 years. My great great grandfather moved from Kansas to New York, and he worked for the Oklahoma Mortgage Company, and so he named it Kanahoma.

00:05:30:17 - 00:05:46:10
Speaker 1
And we unfortunately had to sell the property for 99 years. My grandmother passed away and we couldn't afford to keep it. And so the same years founding the business and so name the business, Kanahoma in its honor, its place, I love it was a one word name that was available on Google, which is hard to find these days.

00:05:46:22 - 00:05:54:17
Speaker 1
And aspirationally, if business goes well, someday I am going to use the proceeds to go buy the cabin back. So that's kind of my my personal Northstar.

00:05:55:12 - 00:06:08:18
Speaker 2
That's awesome. I love that. Yeah, We have my my family owns a farm in Ashland, Ohio, that's been in the family for many, I don't know, centuries or something like that.

00:06:09:03 - 00:06:14:02
Speaker 1
Yeah, legacy properties are just so awesome if you have it. So it was such a another cool experiences, right.

00:06:14:02 - 00:06:22:10
Speaker 2
Yeah. So on your website you talk about on the can on the website, talking about the company's unique approach to education marketing. How would you describe that?

00:06:22:20 - 00:06:46:17
Speaker 1
Yeah, so, so the big thing is the blend of creative and performance marketing. So we operate at kind of the crossroads, a beautiful brand creative and effective direct response. Historically in especially in higher ed, there's really been sort of two teams. There's been like agencies that are like direct response that are known for like lead generation. And then there's separately been agencies that have been much more focused on creative and brand positioning.

00:06:46:21 - 00:07:18:11
Speaker 1
We really strive to overlap and do both. For my past experience, I found that, you know, in a crowded market, creative is increasingly important, and I think a lot of folks have undervalued the role that creative plays in supporting acquisition marketing activities. And so we really try to do both. We have a really great stacked creative team. We have a very dedicated and effective paid team and the way we've built our businesses both to like we primarily are agency of record for school, so we'll manage spend, but it's not just spend.

00:07:18:11 - 00:07:40:00
Speaker 1
We offer unlimited creative and so the paid teams are allowed to get any assets that they need and I think it's a big factor in why we outperform a lot of our peers from an acquisition cost perspective. And so that's really the nuance we think is just that like in a world where it used to be brand agencies and direct response agencies, we really have strived to build both and do them effectively.

00:07:40:00 - 00:07:44:19
Speaker 1
And so that's where we we hope or aspire to, to have carved a little bit of a lane for ourselves.

00:07:45:12 - 00:07:51:04
Speaker 2
How do you practically manage that collaboration? Are you guys like in the same room together, making decisions together.

00:07:51:21 - 00:08:09:19
Speaker 1
So great question. So we're 100% remote, so we're 32 full time employees are fully remote. We're also asynchronous, so we don't have set hours. You know, we have team meetings and client meetings, but outside of that, people can work whenever they want. And so we are we rely a lot on Slack and Asana. But the biggest thing is process.

00:08:09:19 - 00:08:27:01
Speaker 1
You know, I don't in a creative business, part of our work is is customized, creative, right unique to the institution. But I don't think people are hiring us just for that. People are hiring us for like the effectiveness of the machine that we've built. So in a lot of ways we really strive to build a process in the product that's replicable.

00:08:27:16 - 00:08:50:12
Speaker 1
So for us, it's really like we understand how to manage media and how to place ads and measure effectiveness. And then what it's really about is incentive structures. So like the unlimited creative piece that I mentioned, we've made it very intentional. Our paid team is held to the performance of the budget that they get, like what's the ROAS like the return on ad spend that they generate for our partners, but they also have unlimited creative meaning.

00:08:50:12 - 00:09:16:12
Speaker 1
They get to treat the creative team a bit like a buffet. And so it's like if you want ten new Facebook ads next week and you want to move in and test tick tock, like we have to service you within the company and provide you all the assets that you need. And so that way paid is driving the creative requests because most agencies will create a small amount of creative and use it too much because they don't want to put more resources into creating creative because it hurts your margin in the short term because it puts more hours in.

00:09:16:12 - 00:09:36:07
Speaker 1
So it's really about incentive structures. So the paid team can ask for whatever they want. The creative team is designed to service a high volume like we commonly launch campaigns with hundreds of ad units, not dozens. And and then we measure the performance together. And then each month we track the hours the clients get, you know, how much it costs us and try to understand like which clients are over under utilizing.

00:09:36:14 - 00:09:59:11
Speaker 1
And so it's not a perfect science, but primarily it's just like a through a few key check in points, which is like weekly performance meetings, like monthly agency ops meetings, weekly account planning meetings, things like that. We're just designed where we do come together and sync up on on how we're doing. But the main goal is like give the team business objectives and kind of try to get out of their way and knock on wood.

00:09:59:11 - 00:10:02:01
Speaker 1
So far, that's that's not totally falling apart on me.

00:10:02:23 - 00:10:23:04
Speaker 2
All right. Super. Appreciate that. I think that's that's very rare. You know, I definitely like I've worked in, you know, out of college work for, you know, organizations that was very much like a Butz and C, it's kind of like, yeah, you're here from this time to this time. We don't really care what you're doing, but as long as your butts in that chair.

00:10:24:04 - 00:10:42:19
Speaker 1
Yeah. So I'll tell you, that's on a personal level, that's one thing you're trying to do with can a home is like be better employers. And so, you know, a lot of people are forcing people back into the office. We've been very intentional that we'll never do that even we don't have set schedules. You know, we pay for 100% of health insurance for our employees, spouses, dependents.

00:10:43:00 - 00:11:02:00
Speaker 1
We take over student loan payments. We've made a big push both because, like, I really want to be a better employer. Like, that's a personal aspiration that I'm striving to, you know, work towards as a business owner. But also, candidly, it's a great talent acquisition strategy. We've been picking up a lot of talent from a lot of people that aren't treating themselves like there are teams that way.

00:11:02:07 - 00:11:24:21
Speaker 1
And so, you know, we have a position open now. One position got know, almost 1500 applications and it's like, yeah, so it's both the better thing to do. But it's also, I do think better business and it's like I think as companies are forcing people back to the office, it's like, well you know, you can come work for us if you'd prefer to, can make whatever hours you want and we're all going to, you know, treat you like an air player and you'll have a lot more freedom and flexibility.

00:11:24:21 - 00:11:44:18
Speaker 1
So, so far that's been a good approach for us. I will say, though, we're small right? We're 30 people. So, I mean, I'll be very curious what aspects of our operation and approach like that properly scale as we get closer to 50. Most people say like a business changes at like 45 to 50 employees. And so I think we'll well, we probably haven't faced our biggest test yet when it comes to all that you know.

00:11:45:10 - 00:12:05:08
Speaker 2
You'll love it. Okay, so again, humor is very involved in storytelling. And what I want to kind of focus on in this conversation was the how you guys go about acquiring stories on behalf of of school. So tell me just broadly about kind of home is focus on storytelling and then we'll kind of dive deeper from there.

00:12:05:21 - 00:12:24:23
Speaker 1
Yeah, happy to. So, you know, brand storytelling stuff is a big part of the creative work that we do. And a lot of that is is steeped obviously in like brand strategy and, and authenticity. And so, you know, we have a full like, you know, brand strategy offering that we do with some partners. If you want to come in and we can do everything from like you know we do logos and mission statements to brand positioning.

00:12:24:23 - 00:12:44:04
Speaker 1
But you know, key piece of that always comes down to like, you know, there's research, then there's strategy, then there's creative development, and then there's campaigns which are like the for like the four phases or milestones of bringing work to market. But that creative piece is always what bridge is like a good idea on paper to an actual ad or actual web story or piece of organic content.

00:12:44:19 - 00:13:08:12
Speaker 1
And so that piece has always been important to us. We always, you know, strive to just use real students and real alumni, not any actors, not stock photography that just feels like it was such a cop out and that our price point in higher ed, the idea of trying to get someone to make, you know, the largest or second largest purchase of their life based off of stock images I think is a bit dismissive.

00:13:08:12 - 00:13:27:16
Speaker 1
And we've seen authentic imagery and storytelling be incredibly effective in both driving interest and improving conversion. And so, you know, that's been a big approach for us. One of those aspects is we have an offering called Kingdom of Casting, which is like how we try to solve one of those bottlenecks has been schools say, Yeah, we love authenticity, we're on board.

00:13:27:16 - 00:13:45:00
Speaker 1
Of course, please tell our students on our stories. But then like, great, you know, what do you have? And they're like, Well, we have like the same three students that we've told their story ten times in the past five years. And so one of the bottlenecks is everybody knows great storytelling makes great marketing, but people don't know how to generate a high volume of great stories.

00:13:45:00 - 00:13:59:18
Speaker 1
And so that is we have a can home with casting as an offering that we've developed, which is basically built on my experience from way back when I was at Southern New Hampshire University, and I first did my first castings of students alumni. And so that's one thing that we both sell and we integrate it into our brand projects.

00:13:59:18 - 00:14:07:02
Speaker 1
So if somebody buys a brand project, we just offer that as a component of it and basically handle the sourcing of those stories on behalf of the institution.

00:14:07:18 - 00:14:09:00
Speaker 2
So what's that process like?

00:14:09:19 - 00:14:31:11
Speaker 1
Okay, so stop me as I go because I'm down to give it all away because I think everybody can do this. And if they want to hire us and we to do it, cool. But like, I think it's the thing people could do. So the first thing and that is a you always start with the casting call. Our recommendation is to send an email with a very simple web survey to every student and every living alumni.

00:14:31:23 - 00:14:48:12
Speaker 1
Everybody. And that's the first thing that makes institutions uncomfortable because they're like, Well, we want to curate. And what if they're not in good standing? It doesn't matter. Invite everybody and be clear about what you're inviting them to do. Do you want to be part of an upcoming marketing campaign? Do you want to share your story? Because we think it could help impact and inspire others.

00:14:49:02 - 00:15:07:06
Speaker 1
Typically, we get a one and a half to 4% response rate. So, you know, if you have a, you know, 100,000 alumni, you should get maybe, you know, a few thousand people raise their hands and fill out. For us, it's a relatively lengthy survey. You know, we probably 8 to 10 questions. The questions are basically just like, you know, though, here's the other part.

00:15:07:07 - 00:15:28:11
Speaker 1
These are open ended qualitative questions. So get ready to read. It's things like tell us about yourself. Why did you choose the institution? No pick lists, no select alls. It's all open ended for us that then. So it's a casting call. Send out a couple emails, typically 1 to 4% response rate for us, which feeds into a Google sheets, but it can feed into whatever backend system you want.

00:15:29:03 - 00:15:50:11
Speaker 1
And then we manually read through each. It typically takes dozens of hours, sometimes hundreds of hours, and we read through every single submission. And we have a color code system more or less just like, yes, no, maybe. And like, you know, the no's are easy because they're like, I don't like you and people are mad. And there may be some people that just they respond, but there's not a lot of substance there.

00:15:50:11 - 00:16:10:20
Speaker 1
It's just sort of like, I really enjoyed my time. And the yeses are people who can like really articulate these open ended questions and say like, you know, here's the things that resonated with me about the institution, or here's how it's impacted myself in my career, my family. And so that basically read through any color code coded and then you build a ranked system for us, we typically probably go forward with about a third.

00:16:10:20 - 00:16:35:08
Speaker 1
So if you have a thousand people, fill it out. We might have a shortlist of 250 to 300, so 25 to 30%. Then we get on a zoom with all 250 of them and we record 15 minute Zoom interviews with everybody asking some of the follow up questions. That helps us understand if the person is just a good written testimonial or if they're particularly dynamic on camera, if they can handle questions, if they're comfortable or not.

00:16:35:14 - 00:17:04:03
Speaker 1
And so from there, we then break the results in the kind of three categories nose, which is rare, but sometimes someone who sounded good on paper but didn't wasn't as eloquent, maybe sort of like you probably better print testimonial like you just maybe you struggle under camera, which totally makes sense. A lot of people aren't on camera. And then the short list of like what we call heroes, like, okay, this student would be killer for like video photo written like there and there's aspects of their story that are complex and they align with ideally the brand position of the institution.

00:17:04:03 - 00:17:36:10
Speaker 1
So, you know, if the position institution's positioning heavily on like career progression as an example, we would be highlighting stories of like people who are like, Oh, I advanced my career because of X, Y, Z and could tell that story. So that was always proof points back on the positioning. And then from that short list, we then basically build what we call a casting book and it's like a kind of like a giant PowerPoint where every page is a bio of a student with all their information, with pull quotes and a link to the video, and then the following pages, all photos that they provide us from their social channels so that we can get

00:17:36:10 - 00:17:53:20
Speaker 1
a glimpse into their actual life and a little bit more about who they are. And then so we deliver that book to the institution. And then from there it's like, okay, the institution can use that casting book or we can use it if we're doing like a big campaign, a photo shoot or a video shoot, we will select students from that short list and put it together.

00:17:54:16 - 00:18:18:07
Speaker 1
The biggest thing is it's wildly laborious, like, which is why we charge a lot like to be very transparent, like we charge $60,000 starting for this casting book. So it already knocks out a whole lot of smaller institutions that like that would be the budget for the campaign, let alone the cast. But it can be done on a smaller scale and it can be sent to less students or you can interview less.

00:18:18:15 - 00:18:40:10
Speaker 1
For us, the reasons we interview so many people is I've just found that like until you talk to somebody and you look them in the eye on a zoom and you just don't know how great some people can be in telling the story. And so we prefer to always cast a wide net as much as possible. And I also will say that I think one of the things that's important about this is also like the aspect of inclusion.

00:18:41:07 - 00:19:04:12
Speaker 1
So often if we only highlight the voices of people who speak up on their own and self-identify, we often disproportionately prioritize voices that maybe perhaps came from a little bit of a place of privilege or had had some aspect of an advantage in their education. And yet every story is worth telling. And so I do think casting and be intentional about inviting everyone to submit and be a part of this is a key thing.

00:19:04:12 - 00:19:15:01
Speaker 1
So that's a bit about the process. Happy to unpack in the aspect of it, but it's a I mean, it's a lift, but I learned it at SNHU and it's been like a kind of a calling card over the course of my career, if that makes sense.

00:19:15:18 - 00:19:54:05
Speaker 2
That's great. I love that. I mean, that's a it's I mean, it's a problem. You know, as we talked before we started recording this episode, it's the problem you of me with my company, we have a subscription based approach to producing student alumni videos, and that's always one of the bigger bottlenecks is kind of like, what's what? So the idea is to reduce the friction of telling stories, but what adds friction into the process is going, okay, well, let's find we got to find, you know, 12 stories, one one for every year.

00:19:54:10 - 00:20:16:22
Speaker 2
Okay, we'll find two and then we'll shoot those. And then, you know, two months later, we're starting to get behind. It's like, okay, you've got to hurry up and find two more. Yeah. You know, And it just kind of defeats the whole purpose of way. I'm like, Yeah, easy. Yeah. You know, and, and I totally appreciate the, you know, the cost of you know, 60,000 to me.

00:20:16:22 - 00:20:25:22
Speaker 2
I feel like a lot of schools might balk at that. But it's also like, is it, is it getting done? Yeah. You know like.

00:20:26:02 - 00:20:41:03
Speaker 1
It once it we always help it when we pitch it. You know a lot of folks say like that that range we okay like well we've given you the process like can you like between us you can replicate this with like a student intern or like over the course of a semester. It won't be as good. Obviously they won't have done this.

00:20:41:03 - 00:21:02:05
Speaker 1
But like. But it is something is better than nothing. And like a light version of this is totally feasible in a house with a student worker or one employee or thing. So like it also you just like pare down. You use a shorter list. So there's ways that make it achievable. But we know ours is a bit more white glove for like probably I call it enterprise institutions.

00:21:03:02 - 00:21:16:05
Speaker 1
But the, but the concept is still the same, which I think is that like if you want great stories, you got to ask for them and then when they come in, you got to take the time to listen because otherwise you're only getting stories filtered by faculty, right? Who are like, Oh, this student was really great and, and they're not wrong.

00:21:16:05 - 00:21:38:12
Speaker 1
But this is the faculty necessarily source the student based on the brand position. And that is there's no the sourcing of based on the student was a standout they're great academically and it goes back to what's the type of stories that's where like there's an editorial lens that that we bring and I'm sure you bring in your work where it's like, okay, what is the institution need from a brand position perspective for this department or school or the brand overall?

00:21:38:20 - 00:21:57:00
Speaker 1
And then like, let's go find stories that are exemplars of that. Like, I don't want to tell people that we do something. I want to show people that we did it. Yeah. And relying on advising or faculty to share great stories, they may share interesting stories, but the stories may not have a relation to the core positions we're trying to promote.

00:21:57:05 - 00:22:11:22
Speaker 1
And that's kind of where the gap is a lot of times where it makes sense to insert a more intentional casting process. And because we're not just trying to find great students with interesting stories, although that's a part of it, we're trying to find people whose stories demonstrate proof points of the value propositions we're positioning on.

00:22:12:19 - 00:22:39:14
Speaker 2
Yeah, And I also find that, you know, when you rely on professors or department heads to find stories, they there's a disconnect between a student that was a standout student and a student that actually has a story. Yeah, yeah, totally. There's like because I think that and I probably say this on every episode of this podcast, there's such a muddying of what story means.

00:22:39:20 - 00:23:03:07
Speaker 2
And just because you have somebody that's saying, I love the school five stars, and I was really successful and they helped me, That's not a story per se. Yeah, no, you know, Yeah, not really a narrative to that. That's information and that's very positive information that reflects very positively on the school. But a story would be like, this happened, then this happened and here is this turning point and completely was involved in that.

00:23:03:07 - 00:23:07:19
Speaker 2
And I don't think professors know how to how to look for that.

00:23:08:00 - 00:23:23:02
Speaker 1
Yeah, I totally agree. I mean, like in a perfect world, although it doesn't always happen, like we're looking for the hero's journey, right? And it's like the student. It's the student. They have a dream or an ambition. They're facing an obstacle. And then, like, we are the tool of choice that they have hired to help us help them get there.

00:23:23:19 - 00:23:27:03
Speaker 1
And that's just a more complicated, interesting story sometimes.

00:23:28:21 - 00:23:52:17
Speaker 2
Quick break here to tell you about our video storytelling subscriptions. Finding the stories is half the battle. The other half, obviously, is actually producing those stories. And for schools that don't have a rhythm of doing this, it's a lot of work when done the traditional way, the traditional way being you got to hire a video vendor, you got to herd all the cats, then you got to schedule everybody, coordinate everything and then you get one video out of that.

00:23:53:01 - 00:24:09:14
Speaker 2
But what if you could get a year's worth of storytelling content that you can use to highlight your various programs? And all you had to do was find the stories and hand them off? Well, we'd love for you to hand them off to us because our aim is to take the friction out of telling great stories at Unveiled.

00:24:09:14 - 00:24:28:14
Speaker 2
Whether you're a big school or a small liberal arts college, you can tell really compelling stories all year round and fill your content calendar with video content. We get this done anywhere in the U.S. We bet shoot a year's worth of content, and then every month we're going to drop out to you one new student or alumni story, along with a whole package of additional video content.

00:24:29:03 - 00:24:48:09
Speaker 2
You'll get the full length story, which is usually 2 to 3 minutes. You'll get a 32nd and a 15 second cut down to use in various ways. And then eight topical videos. Not only can you take what we deliver and, you know, crop everything vertically if you want and, you know, make great tiktoks and reels in addition to the normal ways that you would use these types of videos like on your website.

00:24:48:09 - 00:25:10:13
Speaker 2
But you get to keep all the B-roll and interview footage we shoot. And later in this episode, we're going to talk about why that is essential to a college's workflow. There is a wealth of additional content opportunities within that, and you don't have to go film anything. So head over to pricing. Dot unveiled TV to download our pricing guide, which has everything in it you need to know.

00:25:10:20 - 00:25:18:16
Speaker 2
And if you'd like to chat further, you can book a call with me on our website and I'd be happy to answer any questions you may have. Okay, Back to my conversation with Seth.

00:25:20:01 - 00:25:39:11
Speaker 1
There's also like time based components of it too. So like, like it's sometimes in a really good world for creative storytelling. It's not just about hire, about sitting down with a student to have them tell a story of the past. We want to find stories of the present whenever possible. And so, like, we're looking for things that are happening now.

00:25:40:02 - 00:26:00:15
Speaker 1
And so that's why, like when we cast, we was asked things like, What do you have coming up in the next 3 to 6 months? Because like, if you have like, oh, I'm, you know, changing jobs or my daughter's getting married, like, we want to know about those milestones because sometimes those things can be really great settings, especially for like video work as opposed to just like, let me sit down or you're going to tell me about the past, but I don't have any B-roll of the past.

00:26:00:15 - 00:26:24:14
Speaker 1
So like, what the heck am I going to show you? And it just makes it a little harder. So the best stories probably that I've told are ones where we've either captured or assisted in creating like accurate moments. And so those were like, you know, delivering a diploma to a dad at his son's fourth birthday party. That's though like, of all things, my career, that first casting I did was for a bus tour for Southern New Hampshire University.

00:26:24:21 - 00:26:47:12
Speaker 1
We drove a bus around the country and we delivered diplomas to students who couldn't make it to graduation online students. And it was a there was this one student, Auntie and Auntie live in Chicago. He had been a campus student, dropped out to try to be a pro soccer player, didn't make it and never finished. There was two classes short and went back online after almost 20 years and he and I asked why.

00:26:47:12 - 00:27:06:12
Speaker 1
And this guy was so dynamic. He's like you. I did it for my son. My son's turning four this summer, and I really wanted him to know that his dad got a college education and he's six. I've been including him in the journey, right? I've been like, he's been sitting on my lap. I've been doing. So it's like I want him to see me be successful because this is like a moment that I can teach him this lesson.

00:27:06:23 - 00:27:20:15
Speaker 1
I was like, It's amazing. AS So your son's four is it was almost four. He's actually turning four in a few months. We're having this big block party, you know, in this one block in Chicago. And I'm like, No way. And I look at the calendar and I look at my like, colleague. I'm like, we're going to have to f ing be there, right?

00:27:20:15 - 00:27:36:01
Speaker 1
Like, like. And so we drove the bus to Chicago and we pulled up in the middle of the block party at his son's fourth birthday party, and we delivered his dad's diploma right in front of the kid and all of his family and all of his friends and like, gave him a memory he's never going to forget. And it was like, so perfect and like, doesn't always work out that way.

00:27:36:01 - 00:28:01:00
Speaker 1
But that's where it's like sometimes storytelling is more like sourcing stories that are still in development. So that way we can go tell them in real time again. That's like probably the, like the aspiration more than the actual sometimes I buy my portfolio is full of sit down interviews of the past, but whenever we can, those kind of stories of the future and then getting a camera there is just like so, so great.

00:28:01:11 - 00:28:07:15
Speaker 2
That's amazing. That reminds me of that Caine's Arcade thing where the kid I don't know if you can.

00:28:07:16 - 00:28:08:02
Speaker 1
I don't know.

00:28:08:02 - 00:28:14:14
Speaker 2
I don't like a kid. There's a kid working at his dad's, like auto shop or whatever that he would build that. Yes, I.

00:28:14:14 - 00:28:26:00
Speaker 1
Loved that video. This was like, you're going way back in the early YouTube and to be like 2029 had to be Caine's Arcade, I think. I swear. Yeah. Yes. Do. That was so good.

00:28:26:15 - 00:28:45:01
Speaker 2
Yeah for people listening I don't that don't know as a kid I think I think I haven't seen the video and while he worked his dad's like car shop or whatever and he would build like out of scrap cardboard these, these little makeshift arcade games and then no one was coming to play. And then this guy found him and decided to document.

00:28:45:08 - 00:28:51:21
Speaker 2
He invited like hundreds and hundreds of people to this to come play the arcade. And it like, made his whole life.

00:28:52:00 - 00:29:06:14
Speaker 1
Yeah, it was so great. It just came out. But you're right. The first piece of content was about the kid in this, like, cardboard arcade. And then all this future content was people coming and experiencing it and like, this kid's dreams coming true in real time. It was really super inspiring.

00:29:07:00 - 00:29:29:03
Speaker 2
That actually I was surprised. Last year my daughter was in first grade and they actually their whole school did a Caine's Arcade play project, and so we came in to help as a parent and cut up cardboard, and their whole class was like making their own arcade games and that room was playing each other's games. So cool. It was really it was really cool.

00:29:29:15 - 00:29:40:02
Speaker 2
But just that idea of just making something out of nothing and just, yeah, just experimenting anyways. But, but he didn't. So the dad, he didn't know you guys were coming.

00:29:40:16 - 00:30:03:01
Speaker 1
So he so he did. We planned it with us. It's the behind the magic of storytelling. We ended up. He knew we were coming. We worked the whole thing out, you know, We even met him the day before and then. Okay, the real story is so we. We show up at the bus. He knows that we deliver the diploma and he's like a little stoic because this is like a tough athlete guy, right?

00:30:03:22 - 00:30:29:06
Speaker 1
And while we're delivering it, a car alarm goes off and so we're rolling sound and we're like, this is like beeping in the background. It's like we were like, this is like the pinnacle last shot and a whole crazy journey across country. And it's like, are you kidding me? We're going to lose the shot and select the producer, finds the car, lifts up the hood, and just like, literally rips off their battery and like, like, like unplugs the battery for the car.

00:30:29:06 - 00:30:50:06
Speaker 1
Right. And while we're doing that, like, this is the real thing. I take the diploma back and I'm like, okay, like, we're going to have to do that again. Like, this is like, you know, this is like docu style, not documentary. Exactly. Right. And so other you know, even the all documentaries have some of that. You know, Nanook of the North, the first documentary had a staged scene of a guy building an igloo.

00:30:50:06 - 00:31:11:02
Speaker 1
So, like, it happens. But when I took it back, it gave me a chance to talk to him and be like, man, we're like, How? How big is this moment? And like, through this, just like killing time conversation, I think it set in for him, like, what a big deal this was. And so then when we read Deliver the Diploma, like 3 minutes later, he was really choked up and he got this incredible emotional moment.

00:31:11:02 - 00:31:27:00
Speaker 1
We ended up using a national TV for like two years. It was the highest performing spot I've ever done in my career. And so it's funny how like, it was still real, but it actually took redoing it to to for him to, like, get settled because he the first time it's been a little tough and stoic and stuff.

00:31:27:05 - 00:31:31:18
Speaker 1
And so yeah, so he knew we were coming and we delivered it twice.

00:31:33:18 - 00:31:56:01
Speaker 2
That's awesome. I mean, that's all right. You know, I concur. It's documentary filmmaking. There is an element of planning that goes into it. You know, if you watch I mean, if you actually if you if they actually just had like The Bachelor or The Bachelorette and they just had cameras in the house and just let things happen, it would be so boring.

00:31:56:06 - 00:32:04:18
Speaker 1
Yeah, so different. Exactly. It's some curation and, you know. Yeah. Everything. Yeah. You just create opportunities for things and then film them. So it's a little.

00:32:04:20 - 00:32:22:22
Speaker 2
Yeah, but I love the I love that, you know, you always, you always try as a, as a filmmaker to set up a scenario where real emotion can play out. I mean, I think that's really directing in general. But yeah, you know, you're trying not to say, Hey, we're going to, we're going to hand you this thing and I want you to get emotional.

00:32:22:23 - 00:32:32:00
Speaker 2
That's never going to happen. Yeah, just try to like just try your best to create the environment and then you just cross your fingers and hope something cool happens and, yeah.

00:32:32:13 - 00:32:33:23
Speaker 1
You know, totally, totally agree.

00:32:34:22 - 00:33:02:15
Speaker 2
But the other thing you said earlier was it's there's no B-roll of the past and that is that is a challenge to that I try to work with schools on is like when we're selecting stories let's think about the visual opportunities that we can realistically capture that day. I told that you you know, because if yeah, if they're talking all about the past and they don't have any pictures to go with that, then what are our options?

00:33:02:15 - 00:33:30:17
Speaker 2
Stock video, which is I just avoid at all costs and then staging scenes. Yeah. Which also then becomes kind of just kind of stiff and you can't always stage everything. Yeah. So, so yeah, that's I always work with schools to say like let's, let's think about a good story. Let's, let's think about the stories that are really moving us that, that really are like yes, this is gold.

00:33:30:23 - 00:33:46:06
Speaker 2
But then also let's look at it from a production lens of like, what can we get? Is this going to mostly just be an interview because of the nature of the story or. Yeah, and we actually plan this on a day where we can actually get a lot of, you know, footage out of them. So I like story.

00:33:46:06 - 00:33:57:15
Speaker 2
I like sports. Yeah, I like doing sports films because there's always an opportunity to go to a practice or go to a game or something. And that covers a lot of, you know, the bases completely intended.

00:33:58:23 - 00:34:13:02
Speaker 1
And I totally agree. I mean, the biggest one of the, the challenging arts of storytelling. And so it's in particular with like resource restrictions, like you're going to be there for a day. So it's like, okay, well, can we get in the day and who can be there and what can we create? Yeah, how do we make it dynamic and interesting?

00:34:13:02 - 00:34:21:15
Speaker 1
I mean, because, you know, folks, you know, nobody has a lot of time these days and attention are pretty short. So like, yeah, we just got to make it as interesting as possible.

00:34:22:00 - 00:34:25:04
Speaker 2
Right? Do you guys do production in-house?

00:34:25:15 - 00:34:46:15
Speaker 1
We do. So we own and operate our own production company called Cannon Homa Productions. We stood that up last year and so we just finished our largest production for an institution two weeks ago, had had, you know, dozens of crew members. So we we've just been doing that. We were outsourcing production fulfillment up until about a year and a half ago.

00:34:46:15 - 00:34:54:19
Speaker 1
And then I've been doing production for almost 20 years. I started as a videographer and so finally have our own production company, which has been great.

00:34:55:17 - 00:35:03:01
Speaker 2
That's awesome. Yeah, yeah, same here. My maker, while I make my career went from homeless outreach to video operation.

00:35:03:07 - 00:35:04:07
Speaker 1
No. All right.

00:35:04:22 - 00:35:27:18
Speaker 2
That's how I went from. Yeah, I graduated art school, ended up working for an organization, co-led a homeless outreach program for three years, and then was fired There because I was always more interested in telling their stories, you know, writing blog articles and making videos. And my boss was like, You should just go make videos. Yeah, you know, you should marry a social worker, which is what I did.

00:35:29:01 - 00:35:33:09
Speaker 1
You know, it sounds like it all worked out. Yeah, that's amazing.

00:35:34:11 - 00:35:45:10
Speaker 2
So let's see, what do you think is at the. Yeah. So enrollment, enrollment, marketing, what do you think is at the core core of enrollment marketing success?

00:35:46:20 - 00:36:09:19
Speaker 1
So you know, the biggest things are attracting attention. So the first thing is like, you know, doesn't matter. What you say is interesting if people don't notice it. So the first thing is you have to be noticed. And so that's like upper funnel advertising has to be like visually arresting with good, simple, benefit driven copy. So like 101 strong marketing is the start to enrollment marketing success.

00:36:11:03 - 00:36:38:01
Speaker 1
But then the kind of the core things I would say is a combination of one, reducing friction in the funnel excuse me, like a sorry student like Clayton Christensen, author of Innovator's Dilemma, talks about the job to be done. Like, what is the job to be done for the student at each state? The enrollment process is so long, especially for undergrad, and so the first is reducing friction wherever possible, which like most of our enrollment processes are like a closet.

00:36:38:01 - 00:37:09:22
Speaker 1
Like stuff comes in but never goes out and you got to spring clean. And in addition to like reducing friction, then to me it's something we call messaging hierarchy, which is we, which is we evolve the message as a student progresses when the probably the biggest like 101 mistake people make is they spend all this time and money on them on a, you know, mediocre marketing campaign and then they say the same thing on the ad that they say to the person filling out the application that they say that the person who's been admitted and it's like the message has to evolve like like the job is like you, your job has been successful.

00:37:09:22 - 00:37:31:13
Speaker 1
You've progressed them. And like the job is to progress people every status stage all the way down or have them self-identify out because they're not the right fit, which is totally fine. And so to me it's about evolving the message in the creative. And so this is a common conversation we have with partners all the time, is it's not about what we're saying, it's about where we're saying it.

00:37:32:05 - 00:37:53:14
Speaker 1
And so like the place for a long form testimonial sometimes isn't going to be upper funnel paid ads. Sometimes it's the website, but sometimes it's more like, No, that's the email marketing. So unless we can cut up that piece into interesting anecdotes and like ask a student in an interview about financial aid and then use that clip and then put that into an email about affordability and like, how do we break and chunk out this stuff?

00:37:53:20 - 00:38:10:11
Speaker 1
So we're delivering the correct component at the correct place. Always, you know, establishing and supporting a sense of urgency and progressing students through the funnel. So to me it's reduce friction and evolve the message probably as a shorter way to say the long winded thing I just said.

00:38:11:14 - 00:38:28:16
Speaker 2
Oh, that's great, that's great. And I think I think just in clarity and, you know, avoiding, avoiding too, it's like such a tripping point. It's like if I don't know where to go next or, you know, there's just any level of confusion. I feel like people are so, so sensitive to that.

00:38:28:19 - 00:38:57:20
Speaker 1
Totally. The the one of the one I'll mention that just I just thought it was a it's a little more upper funnel, but it's across the board. People will only see what you make once and they will rarely remember what you say, but they may remember how you make them feel. And I think we as an industry disproportionately spend too much time worrying about what we're saying, assuming that people care and are going to pay a ton of attention when the truth is what we say doesn't matter nearly as much as how we make people feel.

00:38:57:23 - 00:39:19:00
Speaker 1
Because people don't remember what you say, but they do remember when they made an emotional connection to something. And that's the power of storytelling in a way that cannot be done with infographics and web copy nearly the same. And so I think so often we like pack too much in. We try to say too much and sometimes like saying less can have a bigger impact and feel more.

00:39:19:06 - 00:39:28:06
Speaker 1
And so that's the other one for me, I would say is like great enrollment marketing and great marketing in general focuses more on how you made them feel than on what you had to say.

00:39:29:04 - 00:39:51:16
Speaker 2
That's good and that's so hard. That's what's so hard even. I mean, even for me as a storyteller, I find myself having to be like, Wait a minute, let me take my own advice here and like, focus less on like, yeah, the features and benefits and more. I'm like, you know, the problems that that are being created for, for the client and things like that.

00:39:51:16 - 00:40:11:02
Speaker 2
And I find that, you know, I worked with so many marketing departments and things in all industries over, over my career, and I would say that's the number one trap that they fall into, is at the beginning of the project. They're like, Yeah, we want to do something different. Well, we want this to really capture attention. We want people to feel something.

00:40:11:23 - 00:40:38:10
Speaker 2
We deliver the V1 The first draft, and then it becomes a big just like infomercial after that, you know, because it's like, Oh, this isn't saying every possible thing that I need it to say, you know, when when they should be asking is this is this getting someone to the next step, which could be taking all that information and putting it in a different form, maybe on your website or maybe following up with an email or something like that?

00:40:38:10 - 00:40:46:04
Speaker 2
That's I feel like it's trying to make that front, that first impression video, do everything needs to do for the entire campaign. Yeah.

00:40:46:14 - 00:40:51:13
Speaker 1
Yeah, totally. Yeah, I totally agree. So I think that's definitely a great call out.

00:40:52:01 - 00:41:06:21
Speaker 2
Yeah. Cool. Can you write it down here? Can you tell maybe any many any school that you work with successfully with, maybe that's something unique that stands out in how you kind of handle those or what the results were? Hmm.

00:41:06:23 - 00:41:26:09
Speaker 1
Sure. So I mean, like, go back to my mentor at Southern New Hampshire University. I'm probably best known for their they're not a largest nonprofit university in the country. When I was there, we grew from 7000 to 70000 students and under four years. That was primarily driven by several things, but one of which was a national cable which required I produce 34 commercials in four years.

00:41:27:03 - 00:41:46:05
Speaker 1
All real students, almost all students and alumni and great storytelling. You know, more recently, a of humor. You know, we had the most awarded, at least I believe it's the most awarded campaign in higher ed marketing last year for a school called Concordia University, Irvine, with a campaign called Freedom to Explore. And that was all students and all done and gave us that.

00:41:46:05 - 00:42:05:02
Speaker 1
One was a great example. Again, I think, of creating the volume of assets you need. I mean, one of the things we pride ourselves on is that we don't shoot commercials. We produce asset libraries these days. We need a high volume of stuff. And the days of just shooting a 32nd storyboard are kind of over, but a lot of folks are still selling that.

00:42:05:02 - 00:42:27:05
Speaker 1
And so it's like, Well, hold on, we shoot horizontal, we shoot vertical, we shoot short form, we shoot long form. We're sitting down the student, we're getting stills like we're trying to like, capture as much as we possibly can and extract as much value from the production process. So when I think of, like the work with Concordia, that's probably what I'm most proud of, is like they do not have much of a library of, you know, student alumni content.

00:42:27:05 - 00:42:52:03
Speaker 1
Same thing for a partner of ours, New Mexico State University. We really focus on like how do we capture a high volume of assets when you don't have anything? And so everything from the casting process to the production to capturing TV commercials for both. So it's like it's still broadcast quality content, but also it's everything down to audio ads and Tok or Snapchat ads and like short form six second, you know, GIF content, like I think everything.

00:42:52:03 - 00:43:24:00
Speaker 1
And so those are the ones now like both of those partners are seeing significant growth in some areas which we're proud to be a part of And. I don't think that creative alone is going to drive growth, but I do think creative is one of the major hurdles to growing. And so I think those are examples where like I feel like we went and removed that hurdle, like we cleared the path for growth by making sure that like we had a library stocked with any assets that we could possibly need, like the way I view production with those partners and the way I've evolved and thought about it more in my career is that like

00:43:24:00 - 00:43:39:11
Speaker 1
really great production is stocking the pantry like so that way creatives can be the chefs and they can sit down and they can figure out what the dining room, which is the paid ads and the rest wants and they can figure out how to make it. And the worst thing you can have is someone out there wanting something.

00:43:39:17 - 00:43:50:21
Speaker 1
And when the chef opens the pantry, they don't have the ingredients to make it. And then it turns into like, Well, what can I make you with what I have? And we've all lived that life. Or it's like I haven't gone grocery shopping. Like, what can I make out of the food I still have? You never love those meals.

00:43:50:21 - 00:44:09:06
Speaker 1
And so to me, it's like stock. The pantry is the mentality of a content library shoot. So those two partners, I would say I'm probably most proud of that even more than the final product. I'm proud that I think we've we've produced it also, like everything we produce, our clients own everything, so they own every piece of IP, but they also own the working files.

00:44:09:06 - 00:44:18:17
Speaker 1
So like, we'll turn over everything down to our selects, like art. We're trying to build them a library that they can own someday. And so those are probably two that, that stand out as points of pride.

00:44:19:15 - 00:44:32:00
Speaker 2
That's great. That's great. We do that too, as it's give them all the beer, all the content. Even I've had clients ask for like project files so that they can. Yeah, so that they can make tweaks. I'm like, sure. And.

00:44:32:08 - 00:44:47:14
Speaker 1
And that's, that's very rare, man. Like, a lot of people don't do it the way that you're mentioning like right like the old school mentality in the space was to lock that away and force somebody to work with you forever. And like, I just absolutely hate that mentality. And so, like, I love that you're doing that.

00:44:48:03 - 00:45:13:02
Speaker 2
Yeah, I mean, it really part of it is just is just I hate confrontation. So I remember I worked at a at a previous production company for over a decade, and I remember we used to for pride for the first half of my career there, we used to kind of follow that old old guard mentality of like, we're going to do this thing, just this three minute video for you.

00:45:13:02 - 00:45:30:05
Speaker 2
And then if you want anything extra, you know, we held assets and we're yeah, we're going to charge you for it. And then one client we had didn't under didn't know that or didn't read the contract or didn't understand. They assumed they got everything. And so is this really awkward like, yeah, yeah, we're just deliver this great project, everyone's excited about it.

00:45:30:05 - 00:45:56:23
Speaker 2
And then just this deflation of like, yeah, that's it. Like we don't get any of the B-roll because we had some other intentions for it. Yeah, So we, we just said, let's just, we're just going to give it all the way. And so that's when I started my company. That's one thing I did with was like all of it get, you know, give, give schools what they need to do to do the work and partner with, partner with, you know, even their internal video person make it easy for them.

00:45:57:07 - 00:45:57:22
Speaker 1
100%.

00:45:57:23 - 00:46:13:22
Speaker 2
To do his or her job because they've already got a super hard job. If you can save them, you know, you know, ten, 15 days of production. Yeah. That just that's so much more work that they can put out in other areas for all those other departments that are yelling, yeah, louder.

00:46:15:07 - 00:46:15:18
Speaker 1
Yeah. Yeah.

00:46:15:20 - 00:46:42:11
Speaker 2
Totally cool. Well this has been a great conversation. I appreciate it. Yeah, I appreciate I appreciate all the openness that with the way that you guys run, your brand is just giving away that. Yeah. Not only giving away the footage but giving away the process for how you do casting and just seems like you guys have a really, really like a client first kind of mentality in a way that, you know, everyone says, Oh, we're client first.

00:46:42:11 - 00:46:43:09
Speaker 1
But yeah.

00:46:43:22 - 00:46:46:18
Speaker 2
But you guys are actually living it, so it's inspiring.

00:46:47:04 - 00:46:59:20
Speaker 1
Oh, that's I appreciate it. It's it's been a real privilege to get to build the business. And I'm just grateful that anybody wants to work with us. And I'm grateful that the team that works for us wants to be part of it. So yeah, it's always down to share that kind of stuff.

00:47:00:08 - 00:47:04:10
Speaker 2
Cool. So where can people find you out if they want to connect with or can home?

00:47:04:10 - 00:47:32:14
Speaker 1
I'm sure so can a homeowner. You can find us online at kanahoma.com, k A and ah0 M.A. or on personally Seth Odell pretty much everywhere. So Twitter, LinkedIn are the most active but like will welcome connections. Can't stress like like especially like shoot me not on LinkedIn and say you heard the podcast like I always am down there making make new connections so probably Safford L anywhere or kind of homemaker cool.

00:47:33:02 - 00:47:34:22
Speaker 2
Awesome. Seth Well, thanks for being here. I appreciate it.

00:47:35:04 - 00:47:37:11
Speaker 1
Yeah, you're welcome. John Thanks for our conversation. We appreciate the invitation.

00:47:37:21 - 00:47:57:23
Speaker 2
Thank you for listening. Three things I want to give you before you go. Number one reminder to go to pricing dot unveiled dot TV. If you're interested in our subscriptions, download our pricing guide will help you build a massive content library that will keep you going all year long. Number two, if you want to take the storytelling you're already doing to the next level, I have a free resource for you.

00:47:57:23 - 00:48:13:14
Speaker 2
It's a three part framework for creating compelling student and alumni testimonials and you can get it at unveild DOT TV's student testimonials. And that doesn't even have to be for video. Put the framework to use in any format in which you tell student outcome stories. Number three leave a review for this podcast. It helps us out of ten.

00:48:13:18 - 00:48:20:23
Speaker 2
Thanks for listening. My name's John Azoni go connect with me on LinkedIn. And in the meantime, we'll catch you on the next episode of the Higher Ed Storytelling University Podcast. Thanks.