Higher Ed Storytelling University

00:00:00:05 - 00:00:24:05
John Azoni
My guest today is Amy West. Amy is the associate vice president for marketing and brand strategy at Bowling Green State University. And she's got a really impressive team over there that I've gotten to know lately. Super impressed in there, doing great creative work, winning national rankings and things like that. So I want to talk about how she's built this powerhouse team.

00:00:24:14 - 00:00:26:10
John Azoni
And Amy, welcome to the show.

00:00:27:05 - 00:00:28:12
Amy West
Thank you for having me.

00:00:29:02 - 00:00:37:02
John Azoni
Yeah, absolutely. So I like to start off every episode by asking how. So tell me something people would be surprised to know about you.

00:00:37:21 - 00:00:59:19
Amy West
Well, I think they would be surprised to know that I actually started out as an accounting major and I have an associate's degree in accounting. And then I had this amazing high school accounting teacher who, you know, made me think that accounting was was my future. And then I quickly realized that I'm much better with words than numbers.

00:00:59:19 - 00:01:23:06
Amy West
But I did finish the associate degree, and that's actually how I got my foot in the door at Bowling Green State University, because they had a position open for a budget person and a production person in the marketing and communications office. And I took that role and I had finished a communications degree and then I later went on and did a master's degree in communications.

00:01:23:06 - 00:01:28:23
Amy West
But it was really that that accounting degree that that started my path in higher education.

00:01:29:21 - 00:01:49:10
John Azoni
That's awesome. I remember my accounting class in high school and my teacher just being like, Dude, this I feel like you sat me down and it was like, this spreadsheet does not balance even close. Let's just, you know, take this off your list of aspirations.

00:01:50:07 - 00:01:56:12
Amy West
Well, it's amazing how influential, you know, teachers are as you're as you're going through school.

00:01:56:19 - 00:02:04:01
John Azoni
Yeah. And here I am as a videographer, which is like at least 50% budget management.

00:02:04:01 - 00:02:17:16
Amy West
All ironically, I use that associate in accounting all the time because in my role, I'm in charge of a pretty significant budget. So, yeah, it's come in handy, I have to say.

00:02:17:19 - 00:02:35:11
John Azoni
Yeah, I've gotten good at I've gotten good at the budgeting and I do all of our budgeting for our like, you know, household and stuff like that. So like I'm good with budgets, but when it comes to like, you know, you have to every penny has to like balance. I'm like, I can't I don't know, but that's awesome.

00:02:35:11 - 00:02:53:02
John Azoni
Yeah. And so and I know when we had our pre call you kind of you talked about having kind of a varied set of experience that that led you to your position now. So I want to talk about what that journey has been like for you. How does one get to your level? What was your unique journey like?

00:02:53:15 - 00:03:33:08
Amy West
Well, I've talked to a lot of different people in my position, and I don't think anyone goes to college because they want to be the chief marketing and communications officer at university. I think everyone I talk to, we kind of stumble into this and I mentioned I started here as a budget and production person, and I have been here now about 25 years, and I think I've held almost every position in this department, which has been helpful because it's really given me a great overview of how the teams work together and how we can make adjustments to really have leverage every single individual on this team.

00:03:33:21 - 00:03:58:14
Amy West
I think most of us, like me, get our foot in the door in higher education and you fall in love with it because it's very meaningful. There's something about a college campus that just, you know, you just feel like you're part of this great community and the students are wonderful. And over the years, I've thought, Oh, maybe I should try something different or a different industry, but I can never bring myself to leave.

00:03:58:14 - 00:04:06:04
Amy West
And the people I talk to, I think they feel the same way. There's something very alluring about. About higher education.

00:04:06:13 - 00:04:29:20
John Azoni
Yeah. I mean, I don't work directly in higher education, but I interface with a lot of, you know, people that do, obviously, and it seems like a real family atmosphere. I was the other day, I was I do some work with a business school here in Michigan. And, you know, I report to their head marketing director, but then he has an assistant who is a student and like then became a marketing intern and now works full time.

00:04:30:02 - 00:04:34:21
John Azoni
And she just got married and he had her wedding in his backyard.

00:04:35:07 - 00:04:36:20
Amy West
Wow. That's awesome.

00:04:37:18 - 00:04:48:11
John Azoni
I was like, Oh, that's that's so cool. It's just like a I mean, what a show of, like, you know, ultimate, I don't know, family like solidarity on your team in higher ed, you know?

00:04:48:23 - 00:05:09:04
Amy West
I mean, it really is There's something about walking to a meeting across campus and you recognize people and you talk to people and it's amazing how many of the students you get to know and other faculty and staff. So it does it does feel like really up either a really big family or a really small community, but it's very rewarding.

00:05:09:10 - 00:05:18:14
John Azoni
Yeah. So I got to know you. I was introduced to you through Briana Blackburn, who is the social media. Well, she's just got a promotion was her.

00:05:19:01 - 00:05:35:08
Amy West
She's associate director of social media and she's you know, she's really amazing. She's doing some just innovative and great work here at the university. And I think a big part of the success that we're having is because of our social media presence.

00:05:35:16 - 00:05:58:17
John Azoni
Yeah. Yeah. So I that's how I got connected with you. And really, I mean, I was a fan of BGC as content before. I have seen it on TikTok and things like that. But yeah, and so I've gotten to talk to some of your other folks on your team as well, and I just really impressive bunch of people that just seem to really enjoy their jobs and have fun with creating.

00:05:58:17 - 00:06:18:21
John Azoni
And I just feel like the conversations that I've had, they're just like living in their passion. So this episode, I kind of want dig into that. Like, how have you built a culture that's that's just all like fire? I mean, I'm sure it's not all, you know, perfect, but from the outside, from my perspective, seems like it's firing on all cylinders here.

00:06:19:12 - 00:06:27:16
John Azoni
So when you came to BGC, you like what did you start with? What did you notice about, like the marketing strategy that needed to change where that transformation start?

00:06:27:23 - 00:06:55:01
Amy West
Sure. Well, any I think with anyone in marketing would say that one of the most challenging parts of this industry is that it changes constantly. You know, there's every day there's new digital tactics, there's new social media platforms. Google changes the way its search is managed. So, you know, you finally find a sweet spot and then suddenly you have to pivot because what was yielding great results yesterday is certainly not performing as well.

00:06:55:13 - 00:07:21:18
Amy West
And when I took this role, we had one social media person who did an amazing job. I mean, she built all of our social platforms. She built a following, but she was one person and that was definitely I saw that as an opportunity to get more eyes on our content. You know, we shifted really from, I think, a social last mindset to a social first mindset.

00:07:21:18 - 00:07:50:23
Amy West
And knowing that social is where we can tell our own story. We don't have to rely on other people to tell it for us. So as I restructured a bit, I put a heavy emphasis on social. We went from having one full time social person to now we have three. I'm hoping to add a fourth. We had one well, two photographers who were learning to do some video work, but we didn't and they were great.

00:07:50:23 - 00:08:30:02
Amy West
And they I mean, honestly, they were able to teach themselves and do some some great work. But we hired additional people that had a video background. So we went from one social person to three full time social team members. And then we had two photographers and now we have four, one photographer, three videographers. So our associate director of Social, which is Briana, and then our social, our associate director of video, his name is Justin and the two of them work side by side.

00:08:30:02 - 00:08:55:12
Amy West
They're so collaborative. They're always bouncing ideas off of each other and brainstorming. And their teams have really together built this incredible social media presence. And I think universities years ago and we did this to we use social media as a bulletin board. Now we tell our stories and then people would want to remind students that it's time to register for classes.

00:08:55:12 - 00:09:20:22
Amy West
And we would post that or we'd remind people to register for an event. And we were really using it as a place to put all of the content that we didn't know what to do with. And we have flipped that and we say no to a lot of content. We are measuring. We use data all day, every day to look at what's performing well, what types of content our audiences are responding to and engaging with.

00:09:20:22 - 00:09:50:11
Amy West
And if we find things that are not performing well, then we stop posting that type of content. We really focus on what we know will perform well. Briana does an amazing job at anticipating trends and getting in front of those. So when a trend emerges, she's on it and has something out often the same day and those perform so well, I definitely watch them of those and I don't get it, but I know I'm not supposed to and that's okay.

00:09:50:11 - 00:10:12:01
Amy West
I she has my full trust in the types of things she's posting and sometimes I'll see something and think, okay, I don't get this, but I trust her. And sure enough, it will be one of our top performing posts that month. So she really has a sense about what type of content's going to really perform well.

00:10:12:19 - 00:10:29:00
John Azoni
Yeah. When she was on the podcast I had to have her explain one of the trends to me because I'm like, Listen, I don't get this. I bet you get it. Like, And she explained it to me. So yeah, she's, she's, she's on it and Justin, too. And, you know, like between the two of them, they're both so fun.

00:10:29:00 - 00:10:51:08
John Azoni
And I've gotten a chance to interview Justin as well for, for a different context. I really enjoyed talking to him and just talking shop with, like, production, stuff like that to people that are just super fun to talk to and just would, would just be great to work for. I think that probably that positivity, you know, probably does a lot of good.

00:10:51:20 - 00:11:20:22
Amy West
They are they are incredible and I've worked really hard to build a team that is positive and collaborative. I think in higher education marketing, it's maybe any marketing team, but it's so easy to get siloed among your teams. And, you know, as I've hired people, I've talked about the importance in our culture of working well together and being collaborative and looking out for each other and stepping up to help another team member when they need it.

00:11:20:22 - 00:11:46:18
Amy West
And we've really built an incredible team here that, you know, I say you can teach skill, but honestly, above all, they're really positive and kind. And I think that's made people want to work harder and they they genuinely enjoy each other. So, you know, it's every day I see people brainstorm and bouncing ideas off of each other. And it's it's been great.

00:11:46:18 - 00:12:07:07
Amy West
And as I've interviewed people to work in this department, I've really talked about the culture and how important that is. And I've had people who we've ended up hiring come back and say, you know, when you talked about that in the interview, I really thought that was all, you know, just something that everybody says. But you're right, this really is the kind of team.

00:12:07:07 - 00:12:13:23
Amy West
It's a creative team. I you know, I everything you said was true. So that's made me feel really good.

00:12:14:13 - 00:12:36:08
John Azoni
Yeah. Awesome. I wanted to ask you because you said the idea that, like, social media is no longer this bulletin board. I mean, I'm on LinkedIn all day, every day, and I see so many higher ed marketers that are supposed to be the ones that know how to do this, not understanding social media, at least not understanding the LinkedIn platform.

00:12:36:09 - 00:12:58:03
John Azoni
I think we're really moving towards like this zero click sort of platform, native type stuff. And I think a lot of people just don't know what to do with that. And so, yeah, like taking it away from it's no longer just a place to like dump stuff and like, just, just like get clicks to your website. Now it's like you really have to treat it like it's its own community.

00:12:58:13 - 00:13:14:18
John Azoni
This is where the people that you have to give everyone the information as if they're not going to go anywhere else to get the information. And I think you guys do a really good, great job of that. And then the other thing you said too, was like really paying attention to data and stopping doing the things that aren't working.

00:13:14:18 - 00:13:36:00
John Azoni
Because I think with content creation and content strategy, we have a vision for our school and our in our brand and our message that we want to work. We want this to be the case that this is really popular because this is what we want to sell or this is how we want to say it. This is how we, you know, the millennials think it should be said, you know, and and it flops.

00:13:36:00 - 00:13:47:03
John Azoni
And we have to, like, respond to the data. What kind of tools are you guys using to to track that that data? Is there anything special or is that just like in, you know, within the platform like Tiktok's Analytics or something like that?

00:13:47:04 - 00:14:17:12
Amy West
We use Sprout Social also I'll give a plug to to Sprout social and it's been a game changer. The reporting and the analytics are in depth. You can measure your analytics against competitor analytics. So that has been it is definitely worth the investment for us. You said something that is so true and it's something we talk about all the time and that I think people, you know, they say what universities go out and they talk about themselves.

00:14:17:12 - 00:14:41:12
Amy West
But we've really emphasized thinking about our audiences and the storytelling We do. You know, we can have a research story that's about algal blooms in Lake Erie and we can write that in a really scientific way that we like to talk about it. But no one, no one is going to be interested in that because they don't know that it has any impact or relevance in their life.

00:14:41:12 - 00:15:06:09
Amy West
So we're taking that same story and really talking about how it impacts drinking water. And so we're taking our content and thinking about it from a broader peel. You know, how do we tell this in a way that is relevant to a very wide audience And that has been a game changer in the analytics of people clicking on these stories and the time spent reading the story.

00:15:06:09 - 00:15:10:14
Amy West
And those are all metrics that we're modern monitoring daily.

00:15:10:14 - 00:15:30:21
John Azoni
Yeah, that's interesting. I think about that a lot as I'm looking, you know, critically at various content and things like that. I'm always thinking like, why should someone care about this? Or what did they think that someone would care about with it? With this article? And you're and you're right. It's like it has to connect to like what's going on in their lives.

00:15:30:21 - 00:15:52:10
John Azoni
So the drinking water is a great example because like every morning I'm kind of like, I would rather just fill up the coffee pot with tap water because it's faster, but I have to go to my slow refrigerator, which takes like I just feel like I'm standing there for 5 minutes for this thing to fill up because I know that there's fluoride in the water and all this stuff.

00:15:52:10 - 00:16:13:18
John Azoni
And, you know, it's like that's the stuff that like it is impactful in people's lives. It might not be like real scientific, but it's like, it's like, here we've done all this research, but let me translate that for you. Let me curate a message for you that you're going to understand. And I think, you know, academics have a have a really hard time dumbing things down.

00:16:14:03 - 00:16:44:17
Amy West
Doing very, very hard. And I think we still have improvements we can make there. But there's such a distrust in higher education anyway. And I think it's so important to make sure that we are sharing all of the impacts that we're making in our communities, that it's not just about you come here and you get a degree. That's a huge part of it, but it's also the research that's improving community years and, you know, teachers that we are educating and putting out in classrooms.

00:16:44:17 - 00:16:52:00
Amy West
So. Mm hmm. I think telling our story in a way that highlights how important higher Ed is is also important.

00:16:52:15 - 00:17:12:21
John Azoni
Yeah, absolutely. It's it really is so much broader than just a pathway to work to a career which, you know, yeah, that's a big part of it. But it's also it's like this four or five years of being part of something, you know? Right, right. You know, for me in art school, I was like, you know, I studied like painting and stuff like that.

00:17:12:21 - 00:17:46:05
John Azoni
And for me that for years was really just about immersing myself in a passion that I had. And I'm like, this is that was like no other experience you could look at, like the ROI. And it's like, Oh, have I gotten a return on the investment of art school? Absolutely not. Like by selling paintings. Yeah, you know, but like, I don't know that I would be the videographer that I am today had I not been like, around all those creative people and like, been a part of this and like, made all these friends and learned from all these professors and been forced to, like, play with different styles of, you know, art.

00:17:46:05 - 00:18:04:01
John Azoni
And I imagine that translates a lot to like environmental studies or just, you know, really cool internships and things like that. Going back to your team, I want to talk about what was the hiring process like for you? Like what were you looking for? And some of the star star hires that you like. What were you looking for?

00:18:04:01 - 00:18:07:20
John Azoni
What did you see in them? What should others be looking for when they're hiring?

00:18:07:20 - 00:18:38:02
Amy West
I was looking for people that brought ideas to the table, people that seemed really creative, seemed very collaborative, easy to work with. There's a lot of competition in higher education, especially in Ohio. There's lots of universities where all competing for the same students. So I was looking for people who were thinking of what's the next big thing we can do that's innovative and is going to, you know, get ahead of some of the competition that we have.

00:18:38:02 - 00:18:51:21
Amy West
So that was a lot of when I was interviewing, a lot of the questions were around, how would you do this or what our opportunity is that we're missing and really trying to get people to talk about innovation.

00:18:52:04 - 00:19:08:00
John Azoni
MM Yeah, It's so much more compelling to work with someone that isn't just going to be a dead fish, you know, and say, Tell me what to do, you know? But like brings ideas and knowledge of the industry to the table and has a vision for leave and start working there. You know.

00:19:08:13 - 00:19:34:21
Amy West
I would say in almost any marketing shop at any university, the majority of work coming into that department is work being asked by campus partners. They have an event, they they need that promoted. They have an initiative that they want to talk about. And one of the things I've challenged this group to do is, you know, that is part of what we do and it's an important part, but it shouldn't be 100% of what we do.

00:19:34:21 - 00:19:55:20
Amy West
I'm trying to get to a model where it's maybe 50% of the work coming in and the other 50% is us coming up with our own projects that are going to elevate our brand and also expand our brand. So having that creativity and thinking ahead of our competition is so important.

00:19:56:11 - 00:20:11:02
John Azoni
Yeah, absolutely. So with three videographers, because you must get a lot of requests. There must be a lot, just a lot of stuff to do. First of all, can you tell me, like, what's the layout of those three videographers? What's like the chain of command there?

00:20:11:17 - 00:20:43:20
Amy West
We have a photographer who's been here for decades and he you know, he's one of the most creative and talented people I've ever worked with. He focuses he does have his drones license so he can fly drone. But he also, I would say, focuses mostly on the photography. Now that we've been able to hire videographers. And we have Craig Bell, who's director of photography, and then we have Justin, who leads our video team, and then he has two people that report to him that focus solely on video.

00:20:43:20 - 00:21:00:21
Amy West
But they all are capable of taking great photos as well. So they're back up to Craig. But that is the structure. And then they all work really closely with Briana and our social team to curate content. Mm hmm.

00:21:01:11 - 00:21:10:23
John Azoni
So how do you decide what gets done in terms of the workflow of, like, requests coming in? Like how do you decide what to say no to? How do you how do you communicate the No.

00:21:12:05 - 00:21:28:17
Amy West
Well, it's funny you brought that up because when I started hiring people, I really worked hard to improve marketing's reputation across campus and being a good campus partner and being easy to work with. And I say I always say, let's try to start from a place of yes. So it's become a little bit of a joke around the office.

00:21:28:17 - 00:21:53:13
Amy West
But the video resources I protect the most because you know how long it takes to produce a video. Yeah. So we come up with a list for the year of Here are the top probably ten videos that we want to do. These are our top priority. They are the videos that are going to get the most eyes and have the widest reach.

00:21:54:06 - 00:22:15:16
Amy West
Then we would probably, after that, prioritize anything that our admissions office might need. So sometimes there's a certain program we want to promote like engineering is that is a big program for us right now. So, you know, we'll make sure we have resources to do an engineering video. There are a lot of videos that we have to say no to.

00:22:15:16 - 00:22:40:05
Amy West
And honestly, if you explain to people the ROIC and the reach and the resources it takes, people are pretty gracious when you tell them no. And we also can offer an alternative. We have lots of freelance hours that we use. So if it's something they really need and we just can't accommodate it, I can get them a budget and set them up with a freelancer.

00:22:40:17 - 00:22:51:10
John Azoni
Oh, that's good. Yeah. Yeah. Because there's a lot of ways to get something done by like, your idea of like, Yes. And, you know, or the answer could always be yes, but that means we're having to say no to.

00:22:52:06 - 00:22:52:16
Amy West
Right.

00:22:53:08 - 00:23:07:10
John Azoni
To a bunch of other stuff. What does distribution look like for you guys? Like, how are you using, let's say like, you know, more like long form pieces of video. How are you using those like, you know, on your website or across email communications.

00:23:07:22 - 00:23:35:03
Amy West
All of those things. You know, when we have a video that is longform, I make sure that our admissions office has it, and they can include that in communications to prospective students. We make sure we're including it in communications that go out to parents and families. We work with our alumni office to make sure that they have videos that we think might be of interest to our alumni audience.

00:23:35:16 - 00:24:00:06
Amy West
So we try to leverage all of the content we produce as widely as we can. We, you know, have that kind of that Swiss cheese approach where, you know, if you layer enough pieces of Swiss cheese, there are no holes. And we we put so much time and effort into every piece of content that we're making sure we use all of the channels that we can to get that out there and get the most eyes on it.

00:24:01:02 - 00:24:09:14
John Azoni
I love that, and I've been thinking about that a lot lately is just distribution, and I think that's a big problem in higher ed like it.

00:24:09:14 - 00:24:28:14
Amy West
Is because I think it's so easy to create this amazing content, a long form written story, long form video. You put it on the website and you really hope people stumble across it and that's not going to happen. You really have to serve it to them. We're, you know, we're all humans, we're lazy. We want everything served to us.

00:24:28:14 - 00:24:32:21
Amy West
We're not going to go dig for it. So we make sure we're doing that.

00:24:33:09 - 00:24:40:19
John Azoni
Yeah, absolutely. So you told me in our pre call that like enrollment is in a pretty positive space for us. So tell me about that.

00:24:41:08 - 00:24:56:02
Amy West
We have the highest incoming freshman class in university history. We are up 23% over the last two years. So really, really strong numbers. Our retention is also at a historic high.

00:24:56:18 - 00:25:04:02
John Azoni
What would you attribute that to if someone were to ask you, Amy, how do I increase enrollment by 23% in the next two years?

00:25:04:11 - 00:25:23:09
Amy West
I have to say, you know, just invest in your marketing team. But it's so much more than that. Yeah, we have there's a lot of momentum here. We have a great president. There are a lot of a lot of positive things happening at the University. We've implemented this life design program that's one of the largest in the countries.

00:25:23:19 - 00:25:55:23
Amy West
We have a whole division of student success and engagement. Lots of new partnerships. We have a career hub that's doing amazing things. So there's a lot of great things happening. And I think where we've been successful is we're making sure people know about it and we're doing that through social, through media partnerships, through paid advertising, and we're just making sure that we are leveraging all of those stories so that it helps elevate and expand our brand into new areas as well.

00:25:56:15 - 00:26:13:03
John Azoni
That's awesome. I love that. You know, there's some all this enrollment cliff stuff and it was very doom and gloom for, you know, for the last couple of years. But now I'm seeing like there's there schools are like, hey, our enrollments actually up right when we're expecting it to be down.

00:26:13:10 - 00:26:35:01
Amy West
Right. I think the demographic cliff has shifted a little bit. So, you know, I think it's still coming in a couple of years, but we have a bit of a reprieve, which is nice. So it's an important time to to leverage that growth and position ourselves so that we are ready for that in 2027 ish. I think that's when it's coming.

00:26:35:13 - 00:26:50:04
John Azoni
Yeah. So I wanted to ask you, when you it was sort of a social media last culture that you transformed it to a little more of a social media first culture. What were those conversations like with with leadership that how did you get by in for making that that shift?

00:26:50:21 - 00:27:24:18
Amy West
That was probably the only part of this that was easy because our president has a business background. He definitely appreciates marketing and realizes how important it is. So there was no convincing there. I mean, that was a very easy conversation, not just with the president, but our board. I mean, when I took this role, I talked to our board a few times and presented a strategy and they were all on board with thinking about elevating our social channels and putting more resources there.

00:27:25:07 - 00:27:34:16
John Azoni
Mm hmm. Awesome. Yeah, that's awesome. You know, and just talking to Briana and seeing some of the Tik Tok videos, your president does seem like a really cool guy down for anything kind of thing.

00:27:34:16 - 00:27:52:12
Amy West
He he is such a big part of our brand, and he's willing to do anything. He is so busy, but he is willing to be in any of our videos he's going to have. We're working on a holiday video coming up that I think is going to be incredible and he's going to have a big role in that.

00:27:53:02 - 00:28:20:11
Amy West
Sandy Earle, his wife, is also willing to be part of our part of our content. And President Rogers, the students love him. You walk across campus with him and they want to get their picture and you have to stop about ten times to get selfies. And he never says no. He knows everyone's name. He's, you know, on Halloween, I think it was last year, he dressed up as a giant orange dinosaur.

00:28:20:11 - 00:28:40:03
Amy West
So I don't know if you saw that content, but he'll do these surprise pop up Starbucks mornings where the first 500 students get free Starbucks. So he really engages our students. And Brianna and Justin do such a good job of leveraging that and making sure that we get him out front and center.

00:28:40:17 - 00:29:03:05
John Azoni
I love that. I'm going to put you on the spot here. I didn't include this in my question list that I sent you. But so if you don't have an answer off the top of your head, we'll edit this part out. But I'm curious to know, like, what are some of your highlights in terms of like specific pieces of content that you guys have created that maybe the whole team kind of rallied around or that just were really successful or were especially fun to create?

00:29:04:07 - 00:29:17:14
Amy West
Well, we just did my very favorite I don't know if you saw this. It's selling Bgsu video that we did. It's sort of a spinoff of selling Sunset.

00:29:17:14 - 00:29:18:10
John Azoni
Selling Sunset.

00:29:18:10 - 00:29:42:09
Amy West
Yeah, it was so much fun and we did work with an agency that helped us with that. Really. Birds is the name of the company that was so much fun and we've had such great, great engagement with that video. We've done a few holiday videos that have been really fun. Something else that Briana Briana is so she always wants to try new things.

00:29:42:09 - 00:30:13:21
Amy West
And she approached me. Oh, I don't know, maybe, maybe a year ago we did this for the first time about bringing an influencer to campus and, you know, I was a little nervous because it felt a little risky. But I also trust Briana. She has never steered me wrong. So we did that. And since then we've done it a couple of times and we just I think two weeks ago we launched a speed tour of campus that has, I think, over a million views because the influencer has such a great following.

00:30:14:15 - 00:30:32:03
Amy West
We're going to release another one this week, a second one. But those have performed so well and they have increased our followers. We get a lot of feedback at admissions visit days when they ask, Well, why don't you come visit? And we have people say, Oh, I follow you on social. And I was it's your social, so good.

00:30:32:03 - 00:30:40:22
Amy West
We just wanted to check out this university. So I think, you know, Brianna, thinking outside the box like that has been has moved the needle.

00:30:41:06 - 00:30:42:22
John Azoni
Who is the influencer? Do you remember their name?

00:30:43:13 - 00:30:48:08
Amy West
Well, Vele was the first one. Trent Miller is the speed tour.

00:30:48:16 - 00:30:49:02
John Azoni
Okay.

00:30:49:19 - 00:31:09:01
Amy West
So Trent will do the speed tour and we'll have another one coming out. But they're they're funny. I don't know if you're familiar with his work, but he's a realtor and he does speed tours at the houses. So we had him come to campus. I think he is out of Pennsylvania, so not too far. And he came to campus and filmed these and they are really, really funny.

00:31:09:06 - 00:31:34:15
Amy West
So this year we did kind of a whole series around, you know, people say Bgsu feels like home. And we did a whole series around this with kind of that real estate. Yeah, him And we did a Bgsu Cribs video that performed really well. We did the selling Bgsu We're working on Residence Hall Hunter's kind of that's themed after house hunters.

00:31:34:15 - 00:31:48:14
Amy West
And then we had these this trap Miller Cone. So that's been so much fun. And I've really liked being able to space these out over, over the fall semester and they all have this great theme that's awesome.

00:31:48:14 - 00:31:53:18
John Azoni
And so does he post those on his account or are you kind of seeing his face on yours?

00:31:53:18 - 00:32:02:13
Amy West
He posts them on his, which has been great because he has, I think, over a million followers. So these videos are getting so much traction.

00:32:03:05 - 00:32:21:01
John Azoni
Yeah, that's awesome. That's such a great idea. I love that. The idea of home, but then taking it to like a I don't know why real estate is so fascinating, but like, every time I'm in a waiting room somewhere, there's always a real like a house hunting, selling sun at some some sort of real estate thing going on.

00:32:21:01 - 00:32:40:12
John Azoni
And it's it is fascinating, right? I'm waiting for a college to do like a trashy dating show. People have listened to this podcast for a while. No, I love Love is blind. I'm like, obsessed with it's terrible, but it's it's so intriguing to me.

00:32:41:20 - 00:33:02:06
Amy West
That's one of the hard parts about higher ed because there are so many edgy things that you can do. But you do have to be a little bit careful when you talk about the kind of that housing theme. We all brainstorm really well together and some of the group is like, Wow, does this resonate with students or is this more parents?

00:33:02:06 - 00:33:27:22
Amy West
So that's how we came up with the idea to do a whole series. Then we we did a written piece that looks like Architectural Digest, and it's really cool architectural images of campus spots that Craig Bell, our photographer, did. And that piece has performed really well, too. So we've had this whole this whole theme around housing that has something for every audience.

00:33:27:22 - 00:33:46:04
John Azoni
Yeah. I'm curious how you navigated those conversations and how did you monitor who it was resonating with? Because off the top of my head, you know that you say that I'm kind of like, Yeah, I'll look at, you know, if I'm thinking about like, you know, when my daughter is going to college and a real estate thing would probably appeal to me, I'm not sure that would readily appeal to my kids.

00:33:46:04 - 00:33:48:06
John Azoni
But like, what did you guys notice with that?

00:33:49:01 - 00:34:13:09
Amy West
Well, when we when we had this conversation, we thought, okay, this the selling Bgsu video might resonate more with parents, but we've got the Bgsu Cribs and the Speed tours that would resonate with students. But what we really found was we have a pretty strong social following and a really loyal base. I think they performed well with all three.

00:34:13:09 - 00:34:26:08
Amy West
I think all three performed well with both audiences. And the comments were the comments were great. So I don't know. I think if you have engaging content, it's going to perform well across the board.

00:34:26:08 - 00:34:39:22
John Azoni
Yeah. And if you have existing follower base that's along for the ride, you can get away with a lot and they're going to they're going to love this. It's just kind of part of the channel, you know? Right. You're, you know, you're serving content to them of all kinds.

00:34:40:11 - 00:35:05:15
Amy West
Even our board members will comment, Oh, you know, I saw this on Tik Tok and it was so funny. So I think Bowling Green does have a really loyal following and across the board. I think there's a lot of pride in the institution. So the content seems to be resonating with that and people are sharing it. And of course, you know, that only increases your your metrics.

00:35:05:15 - 00:35:09:05
John Azoni
Yeah. And so you guys are ranked in the top ten or something like that.

00:35:09:05 - 00:35:10:03
Amy West
Number six.

00:35:10:16 - 00:35:13:00
John Azoni
Number six, what was the ranking? Tell me about that.

00:35:13:10 - 00:35:41:11
Amy West
So recently, rival IQ ranked Bowling Green number six in top Division one higher education institutions on social overall. So we're really proud of that. I think Brianna just mentioned another ranking that came through where we were number one for engagement and if you look at our engagement rates alongside our peers, they are extremely high.

00:35:42:05 - 00:36:04:21
John Azoni
MM That's great. And you know, engagement is huge, you know, getting people to comment and stuff really like kind of pushes things along in the algorithm. And I think it's, it's a difficult task, I think to get people to comment on something. I think we're very used to, I'm very much like a comment lurker, like I will run to the comment section for something that's controversial or something and I'll scroll through.

00:36:04:21 - 00:36:32:09
John Azoni
I'm very reluctant to like make a comment saying, but I like to I feel like someone put this in a tick tock today that came across my feet the other day that some of the most funniest comedians in the world are just in the comment section like and he was like showing screenshots from like this one Post's comment section and it's just like these brilliant comments that are just like comedic genius.

00:36:32:21 - 00:36:45:21
John Azoni
But yeah, that's what I go to the comment section for. Sometimes I'm cracking up the most at comments, but it is it's a tough task, you know, sometimes to get people to like, go beyond just like scrolling and go, Oh cool, that's funny haha. Okay, bye bye. You know.

00:36:46:10 - 00:37:04:17
Amy West
I mean, increasing our follower is obviously important, but we have prioritized increasing engagement above everything else. And you're right, I mean that really feeds into that algorithm. People see more of your content, but our engagement is is really high.

00:37:05:06 - 00:37:15:00
John Azoni
Yeah, that's awesome. So looking ahead, like, what's your vision for further expanding the creative efforts at Bowling Green? Like, how do you plan to keep going? What's what's next for you guys?

00:37:15:14 - 00:37:43:13
Amy West
Well, you know, I have a great boss, Cecilia Castellano, who is the VP of Enrollment Management. And as she says, good work is always rewarded with more work. And we have a lot more work to. So I would say, you know, thinking, thinking ahead, it's continuing to focus on that model where we are coming up with 50 of our own work and coming up with new ideas that we can execute.

00:37:43:13 - 00:38:08:10
Amy West
And we're not getting bogged down with simply requests coming in of us. So that that's a big part of it. I want to continue to put more resources into content hiring another videographer. We have a position open right? So if there's any amazing videographers out there that we'd like to apply, please check out our Web site, putting more resources into that area.

00:38:08:20 - 00:38:32:05
Amy West
Really thinking about how we can continue to tell our stories in different ways. Attention spans get shorter and shorter every day. We still do write long form stories, but thinking about how we can tell our stories through video or photo essays and make sure we're telling, you know, segmenting some of that content for each audience.

00:38:32:17 - 00:38:41:17
John Azoni
Mm hmm. Awesome. So final thoughts here. What advice would you give to people wanting to build a really thriving creative marketing team?

00:38:42:19 - 00:39:12:11
Amy West
That's a good question. My career has been in higher education, and as I've hired, I've brought people in from agencies. I brought people in from health care. I thought people in from lots of different industries. So that's brought a wide breadth of experience and ideas. I listen to podcasts a lot. I don't know if you've ever listened to Jamie Hunt's podcast, but I also listen to one about marketing maturity model.

00:39:12:11 - 00:39:32:16
Amy West
And then at a conference I went to a session, I think it was Indiana University, that that did this and I looked into that and we've been working on that here with my leadership team. And one of the things that we've really focused on is, you know, it's good to hire people who are generalists and we've done that.

00:39:32:16 - 00:40:07:21
Amy West
But I've also been able to hire people who are experts in their area. And I have an advertising director who she is incredible and she's really shifted that as that paid advertising strategy. Hmm. To do more social advertising and more video advertising. And then I have people like Briana and Justin, who are experts in their field. So I think bringing in a team who is from many different industries and who are experts in their field has been a game changer.

00:40:08:03 - 00:40:36:19
Amy West
It's, you know, I would consider myself a generalist. I can do a little bit of everything, but I'm not an expert on anything. I think the one thing maybe I'm an expert on is helping to build a team and get buy in and collaboration across teams. But I just I really have a talented, a talented group that someone called me recently and they said, Wow, Bowling Green has the they're the best agency in northwest Ohio, which I thought was really high praise.

00:40:36:19 - 00:41:06:22
John Azoni
That's awesome. I relate to being a generalist too, and I think that makes good creative leaders because like you said, like you were you've done everything you know, you've done all parts of the job which helped informed, you know, your role today. I feel the same way about myself. You know, the only reason I think I'm able to run a video business is because I have done everything from cameras to audio to editing to animation, to, you know, hiring freelancers and stuff like that.

00:41:06:22 - 00:41:26:12
John Azoni
So so now it just becomes you're good at putting teams together and assembling people and you know what to look for in all those departments because you've done it. And so so I'm a huge fan of generalists, but then I'm also a huge fan of like knowing when to hire a specialist for, for stuff.

00:41:26:12 - 00:41:31:00
Amy West
So you need the perfect mix of both, I think, to be a high functioning team.

00:41:31:11 - 00:41:38:02
John Azoni
Yeah, absolutely. Okay, well, where can people find you at the spinning? Great conversation. Where can people find out if they want to connect with you?

00:41:38:18 - 00:41:49:09
Amy West
Well, I am on LinkedIn. You can find me on LinkedIn, Amy West and my email is Amy West at bgsu dot edu. I'm always happy to connect with people.

00:41:49:23 - 00:41:54:00
John Azoni
Awesome. Well, thank you so much for being on the show. Amy was super great to talk to you.

00:41:54:18 - 00:41:57:07
Amy West
Thank you so much for having me. This has been so much fun.